Dollars & Sense: Digging into Local Food Opportunities – Webinar, June 17th
Posted: May 29, 2015
Categories: GoodFoodBites / News from Sustain Ontario / Webinars
UPDATE: It is with regret that we are cancelling this webinar due to low pre-registration turnout. We encourage you to access the follow-up materials from the April 27th Dollars & Sense webinar here. Please contact jennifer@sustainontario.ca with any questions or concerns about this event.
—-
Due to popular demand, we are hosting a second webinar with the experts behind the groundbreaking Dollars & Sense report! Register here.
Published in January 2015, Dollars & Sense: Opportunities to Strengthen Southern Ontario’s Food System encompasses the first research of its kind in Canada on the economic and environmental impacts of food production in southern Ontario, where roughly 98 percent of the province’s food is produced. This keystone report, produced by the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, the Metcalf Foundation, and the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation, looks at a number of scenarios to study the potential impacts of shifts in food consumption and production.
Join two of the report’s authors, Dr. Rod McRae and Dr. Atif Kubursi, and moderator Kathy Macpherson, Vice President of Research and Policy at the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation, for a special webinar on June 17th to discuss their findings and understand the research process behind Dollars & Sense and its extensive background reports. This webinar will be of particular interest to policy makers, community leaders, funders, academics, and others who want to learn more about this new resource and how it can inform government policy discussions.This conversation is an opportunity to deepen understanding of the findings, discuss policy options and implications of the research in other regions. Register here.
This webinar will build on our previous webinar with Dr. Kubursi, Dr. MacRae and Beth Hunter of the McConnell Foundation that featured a lively discussion fueled by a questions from a wide range of academics, public health organizations, non-profits, foundations, and government representatives from municipalities and provincial ministries that joined us from across the country. The discussion gave attendees a deeper look into the report’s research on job creation, effects of organic transitions, emission calculations, the implications of trade agreements and more. Join us as we dig deeper into this report’s findings and its potential uses.
Dollars & Sense: Digging into Local Food Opportunities
When: Wednesday, June 17th from 2:00-3:30p.m.
Where: Online!
Cost: Free for Sustain Ontario Members and Supporters; $10 for other attendees. Register today! Space is limited, pre-registration is required.
Speakers
- Dr. Atif Kubursi, Professor Emeritus of Economics at McMaster University
- Dr. Rod McRae, Associate Professor in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University
- Moderated by Kathy Macpherson, Vice President, Research and Policy, Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation
Register by 9a.m. ET on Friday, June 12, 2015 to receive log-in information. Please contact jennifer@sustainontario.ca after this date if you would like to attend and missed the pre-registration date.
Speaker Bios
Atif A. Kubursi is professor emeritus of Economics at McMaster University. Dr. Kubursi has also taught economics at Purdue University in Indiana, USA, was a senior visiting scholar at Cambridge, and lectured and consulted at Harvard. In 1982, he joined the United Nations Industrial Organization as Senior Development Officer, working as a team leader of missions to Indonesia, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Sudan, and Egypt. In 2006-2008, he served as the Acting Deputy and then Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. He is the author of 12 books and over 300 articles and reports. In 1972, Dr. Kubursi formed Econometric Research Limited and has since served as its president. The firm specializes in impact analysis, tourism and economic development and designs computer based models for national, provincial and regional economies. He holds a PhD in Economics from Purdue University.
Rod MacRae is associate professor in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University in Toronto and one of Canada’s foremost food policy thinkers. His teaching and research focuses on programmes and policies to support the transition to health-promoting and sustainable food and agriculture systems. Prior to joining York University, he worked as a food policy analyst and consultant to all levels of government and numerous Canadian NGOs. He was the first Co-ordinator of the Toronto Food Policy Council and holds a PhD from McGill University.
Kathy Macpherson is Vice President of Research and Policy at the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation. Kathy joined the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation in May 2008, bringing more than 25 years of management, policy and program development, and evaluation experience in Canada and abroad. Kathy worked for 11 years in Southeast Asia, including with the World Bank on poverty reduction and directing a CIDA project to help build evidence-based policy development capacity within the Indonesian government. Prior to that Kathy worked in different Ontario ministries and Ministers’ Offices on a range of policy and program reforms. She was delighted to return to Ontario to find that the province had permanently protected prime farmland and areas of environmental significance in the Golden Horseshoe where she grew up. She enjoys everything the Greenbelt has to offer—from Niagara’s peaches and other tender fruit to hikes on the Escarpment—and is looking forward to cycling the Greenbelt Cycling Route in 2015. Kathy has volunteered with a variety of organizations for the last 30 years and is currently on the Executive and Board of Crossroads International.
Download Dollars & Sense as well as background research from the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation website: Dollars & Sense: Opportunities to Strengthen Southern Ontario’s Food System.
Read Sustain Ontario’s summary: The Dollars and Sense of a Healthy, Ecological, Equitable and Financially Viable Food System.