Imagine you’re having lunch on a courtyard patio downtown. It’s a crisp, sunny autumn day with a light breeze. Your table is against a south-facing brick wall that is bathed in sunlight and there’s a row of tall bushes at the edge of the patio that break the wind. You wore a jacket to the restaurant but after sitting for a few minutes, you’re warm enough to take it off and enjoy the sunshine on your bare arms.

Water contamination adversely affects the lives of two billion people worldwide. According to the World Health Organization, half of the world’s population will struggle with water scarcity by 2025, with 785  million people currently lacking basic access to clean drinking water. However, the demand for consumer products requires mining, which can lead to water contaminants that affect aquatic wildlife, vegetation, and humans.

With the cost of living sky-rocketing and incomes lagging, it’s no wonder why people are anxious about their financial futures.

No one teaches you this stuff in high school. But there will soon be an app for that, thanks in part to recent York University research funded by Mitacs.

“Most Canadians don’t have a tool to optimize their investments and only the wealthiest Canadians have access to professional financial advice. But everyone needs a solid plan for retirement,” says Dr. Michael Chen, Professor of Mathematics at York University.

When your business relies on a natural habitat, your number one priority is protecting it. For John Grace and his family — owners and operators of the world-class Old Post Lodge on Northwestern Ontario’s Lake St. Joseph — conservation has been an important part of the corporate vision from day one.

Buddy is as old as maple syrup, and it’s not friendly. This burned-Tootsie-Roll taste can ruin syrup flavour and is undetectable until sap is processed — far too late for small producers to recoup costs.

The annual cost of buddy, which the Ontario Maple Syrup Producers Association (OMSPA) estimates can reach into the millions, is a lot of liquid gold for small producers who are forced to sell buddy product at highly reduced rates. To avoid the risk, some producers stop production too early in the season, missing the opportunity to make high-quality syrup.

Although an earthquake can devastate in a few short seconds, restoration and reconstruction can take years to complete. In the 2011 Christchurch, New Zealand earthquake, there were only two major building collapses, yet 70 per cent of the city’s downtown had to be demolished because buildings were deemed uninhabitable. Restoration took five years. Earthquake recovery costs are huge. According to an Insurance Board of Canada study, an earthquake either in BC or Quebec would be nearly ten times as costly as the Fort McMurray fires, which cost over $8 billion.