'We've reached a crisis point': Edmonton Public Schools desperate for new schools amid growing enrolment

Edmonton Public Schools says the time is now for the construction of new schools in the division amid an “unprecedented” growth in student enrolment.


Edmonton Public Schools' Centre For Education.

Kellen Taniguchi -  Edmonton Journal

Around 110,000 students currently attend a school within the division — about a five per cent increase from last year’s student population, said Trisha Estabrooks, Edmonton Public Schools board chairwoman, during the board’s first meeting of the 2022-23 school year.

“This kind of growth is great for Edmonton Public Schools, we’re welcoming new students, families and children into an amazing school division. But, on the other hand, this increase in students really does exacerbate the space crunch,” she said, adding the approval of new schools in the division is the board’s top ask of Education Minister Adriana LaGrange and the provincial government.

The board unanimously voted to approve a recommendation to its three-year capital plan for 2023-2026 on Tuesday which moves a proposed K-9 school in the Edgemont community from priority four to priority two within the division’s aggregated list of properties and new construction list of properties — a list that includes five proposed schools, including a Grade 7-12 school in Glenridding Heights which remains the board’s top priority on both lists.

The recommendation said that students in the Edgemont community are being bused to a number of different schools — elementary and junior high students being transported to three different schools and high school students in the community attending two different schools.

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The recommendation tabled during Wednesday’s meeting also states students in the Edgemont community have the longest average bus rides this month, with elementary students riding for an average of 20 minutes and junior high students on board for 31 minutes.

Board vice-chairman Nathan Ip said he supports the recommendation, but emphasized all five schools listed as a year one priority urgently need to be built.

“In the not-so-distant future, Edmonton is projected to have a population of two million people. We currently serve a student population larger than the population of Red Deer, we’ve grown by 5,000 students this past year. While we’re talking about moving the priorities up, frankly, the reality is we need all of these schools and we needed all of these schools a long time ago,” Ip said during Tuesday’s board meeting.

“I do think that we’ve reached a crisis point. When you have a community like Edgemont being bused to three different designated schools.”

Following two school years that included online learning at some point, Edmonton schools are back to in-person learning, although, the division is still being cautious about COVID-19 and other respiratory illnesses. The division’s superintendent, Darrel Robertson, said five of its schools currently have a respiratory illness outbreak.

ktaniguchi@postmedia.com

twitter.com/kellentaniguchi

Judge certifies $16M class action in deadly E. coli outbreak in Edmonton

Wallis Snowdon - 20/9/22

A judge has certified a $16-million class action alleging that contaminated pork sold by a central Alberta Hutterite colony led to a deadly E.coli outbreak in Edmonton four years ago.

The lawsuit seeks compensation for people who suffered damages as a result of buying or consuming contaminated pork products from The Meat Shop at Pine Haven, a meat-packing and retail operation at the Pine Haven Hutterite colony near Wetaskiwin.

The suit, certified Friday by Court of King's Bench Justice James Neilson, alleges that the shop and its operators — the Pine Haven Hutterite Colony and the Hutterian Brethren Church of Pine Haven — failed to prevent and contain the outbreak.

One person died and 42 others fell ill in the outbreak in the spring of 2018. The cases were linked to pork products contaminated with O157:H7, a potent strain of E.coli.

Among those who fell ill,14 people were hospitalized and five developed hemolytic uremic syndrome — a disease that affects the kidneys and blood-clotting functions.

About half of the cases involved people who had eaten at Mama Nita's, a Filipino restaurant in southeast Edmonton which has since closed. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency traced the pork products to The Meat Shop at Pine Haven.

"The defendants owed a duty of care to the plaintiff and other class members to ensure that its products were safe for consumption and that ingestion of those products would not cause illness or injury," the plaintiffs say in their statement of claim.

They seek compensation for physical injury, mental anguish, medical expenses and lost wages. The suit also seeks refunds on behalf of consumers who bought the recalled meat.

In total, the plaintiffs seek $15 million in damages and another $1 million in special damages.

The suit also seeks a declaration that the recalled pork sold by The Meat Shop was contaminated and that defendants were negligent in its manufacturing, processing and packaging.

None of the allegations have been proven in court.

About 45 people are part of the suit, said Edmonton lawyer Rick Mallett, who represents the plaintiffs. He expects it could take up to two years to reach trial.

Edmontonian Nora Romero, 67, is the representative plaintiff.

A day after dining at Mama Nita's in March 2018, Romero developed severe stomach cramps, fever and gastrointestinal distress. She was hospitalized and diagnosed with E. coli.


She spent two days in hospital, often relying on a morphine drip. It was the most severe stomach illness she's ever had and the most painful experience of her life, she said.

"I don't like to remember because it was very sad and very painful," Romero said. "I felt like I was going to die."



Nora Romero was hospitalized after she suffered an E. coli infection in the spring of 2018. She is the representative plaintiff in the class action lawsuit.© Travis McEwan/CBC

The Meat Shop at Pine Haven denies the allegations. It has filed third-party proceedings against Mama Nita's, alleging the restaurant should be held liable.

An investigation by Alberta Health Services found that 22 of the lab-confirmed cases were linked to the restaurant.

Investigators found 35 of the 43 people who got infected with E. coli had direct or indirect exposure to food from a facility that purchased pork from The Meat Shop.

A summary of the investigation by AHS, obtained by the plaintiffs, details how inspectors uncovered food safety concerns at Mama Nita's and The Meat Shop.

At the restaurant, inspectors detailed issues with sanitation and refrigeration, including evidence of a mouse infestation.

At the Hutterite colony, inspectors noted three areas of concern: a lack of record-keeping, inadequate handling of ready-to-eat product; and inadequate slaughter procedures.

Ready-to-eat products were prepared with the same equipment as raw product. Procedures didn't effectively minimize the risk of cross contamination and equipment had visible residue build-up, the investigation found.

The Meat Shop denies that its pork was contaminated or that the plaintiffs consumed its products. It blames Mama Nita's for failing to properly cook the pork to ensure it was safe for consumption.

Mama Nita's denies all allegations and disputes its liability. In a statement of defence, the restaurant says The Meat Shop failed to properly inspect its pork and denies the ongoing medical losses suffered by the plaintiffs.

Escherichia coli are a large group of bacteria commonly found in the environment, foods and the intestines of animals and humans. Most strains are harmless. The specific strain E. coli O157:H7 is dangerous to people, producing a powerful toxin that can cause severe illness.

The main symptom of E. coli infection is diarrhea, which can be bloody. Serious life-threatening symptoms can develop, including strokes and seizures.

Tracing the outbreak

Cases began emerging in the Edmonton area in March 2018. Alberta Health Services and federal investigators began investigating. The investigation pointed to The Meat Shop as the primary source of the outbreak.

On April 24, 2018, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency issued a mandatory recall that covered all pork products sold and distributed by The Meat Shop at Pine Haven between Feb. 19 and April 24.

According to the statement of claim, The Meat Shop was negligent with quality control, monitoring and processing, storage, distribution and sale of the product that was later recalled.

The suit alleges that The Meat Shop failed to test its products rigorously and also failed to adequately clean equipment or properly train its staff in safe food handling.

It also alleges that The Meat Shop failed to recall all of the tainted pork immediately upon learning that people were becoming ill.

Liberals and NDP waste no time in attacking Poilievre at the opening of fall session

The NDP put out an attack ad on social media timed to get their message across just before Poilievre took the floor of the House of Commons

Author of the article:

Catherine Lévesque
Publishing date:

Sep 20, 2022 • 

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre rises during question period 

in the House of Commons on Sept. 20, 2022.

PHOTO BY ADRIAN WYLD/THE CANADIAN PRESS

The Liberals and the New Democratic Party (NDP) wasted no time in attacking new Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre on the first day of the fall session in Parliament.

In a rare move, the NDP put out an attack ad on social media on Tuesday responding to Poilievre’s claims that he is fighting for the people and instead attempting to portray the new leader of the official opposition as being cozy with the elites and “big business.”

“He’s not in it for you,” reads the script in the 29-second long video two times.

Melanie Richer, director of communications for the NDP, told the National Post that the goal for the party was to get their message across just before Poilievre took the floor of the House of Commons as leader of the Conservatives to talk about inflation and the cost of living.

“I think that Pierre Poilievre has been trying to reframe himself as somebody who’s in it for people. And we’ve seen clearly that that’s not true,” said Richer.

“He’s never going to go after corporate greed and he’s never going to make your salaries better. So he says a lot of things, makes a lot of noise, but he’s not actually doing anything concretely to make things better for people,” she added.

NDP deputy leader Alexandre Boulerice said that Poilievre talks a lot about the price of food going up, rightly so, but that he would never dare to speak up against big corporations in the food industry which are making “record profits” right now on the backs of consumers.

“Pierre Poilievre will never have the courage to stand up against those grocery store giants,” said Boulerice.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, so his first confrontation in question period against Poilievre will not happen before Thursday.

But that didn’t stop his ministers, who were up against Poilievre for the first time since he became leader. They spent the better part of their first question period touting “real solutions” to the cost of living crisis but the were in turn ridiculed by Poilievre.

Minister of Families, Karina Gould, spoke about the agreements on child care made with all provinces and territories which would save families “thousands of dollars that are going to help them with the high cost of living.”

“Those are real solutions,” she said.

Poilievre shot back right away. “Canadians can’t even afford to have a family in the first place,” he said. “They can’t get out of their parents’ basements or the 400 square foot apartments after housing prices have literally doubled in this country under this prime minister.”

Housing Minister Ahmed Hussen also chimed in that the Liberals had proposed “real solutions” — like the housing accelerator or the first-time homebuyer tax credit. But Poilievre countered that Canada had the “second worst housing bubble of any country on planet Earth.”

Randy Boissonnault, Associate Minister of Finance, said that Canadians would see “two competing visions” during the fall session between the Liberals and the Conservatives.

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh pointed fingers to both parties during question period for the cost of living crisis, saying Liberals kept saying it was worse in other countries.

“And then we’ve got a leader of the opposition who thinks you can magically opt out of inflation by buying cryptocurrency which ended up tanking and hurting people,” he said.

Afterward, Poilievre’s spokesperson did not immediately comment on the attacks toward the new leader.

But a written statement put out by the Conservatives earlier in the day offered three solutions to stop inflation: cap government spending with a Pay-As-You-Go law, axe the carbon tax and “remove red tape and gatekeepers” to help businesses and workers.

Biden pushes election 'dark money' disclosure bill doomed to fail in Congress

Trevor Hunnicutt and Alexandra Alper
Publishing date:Sep 20, 2022 •

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday made a plea for Congress to pass a bill that would require super PACs and certain other groups to disclose donors who contributed $10,000 or more during an election cycle, a measure doomed to fail due to lack of Republican support.

“There’s much too much money that flows in the shadows to influence our elections,” Biden said at the White House, noting that advocacy groups can run advertisements supporting or attacking a candidate “right up until election day” without disclosing who paid for it.

“I believe sunlight is the best disinfectant,” he added, calling on Republicans to join Democrats in supporting the bill.

The measure is slated for a Senate vote this week, top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said on Monday, as Democrats seek to boost election transparency ahead of the November midterms after failing to pass more ambitious voting rights legislation earlier this year.

The legislation does not have the support of 60 senators necessary to overcome the Senate’s vote threshold for ending debate.

Still, the bill represents one of many fronts on which Democrats are warring with Republicans over laws governing elections following the 2020 presidential race won by Biden but which his predecessor, Donald Trump, disputes with false claims it was stolen.

Election experts worry the next presidential election in 2024, in which Biden may seek re-election and Trump may run again, could be even more bitterly disputed.

Republicans, including Texas Senator Ted Cruz, have argued that companies have the right to express themselves through anonymous donations. Democrats say such ‘dark money’ donations have warped the political system, resulting in laws that do not reflect the majority of Americans’ views.

“There is no justification under heaven for keeping such massive contributions hidden from the public,” Schumer said.

The measure, known as the DISCLOSE Act, was initially included in Democrats’ voting rights bill that sought to counteract voting restrictions in Republican-led states. That package passed the House in January but died in the Senate under Republican opposition.

The DISCLOSE ACT, if approved, would also require groups spending money on judicial nominees to disclose their donors.

After long championing broad political spending reforms, Biden took heat from Democrats and good-governance activists when he dropped his opposition to outside political spending groups during his 2020 presidential campaign.

Biden had initially struggled to match Trump’s fundraising might and that of his Democratic rivals and used the outside funding to support a campaign running on a shoestring budget.

Under federal law, super PACs can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money, unlike candidates, but cannot coordinate their efforts with a candidate’s campaign.

The House of Representatives is separately considering a proposal by Republican Liz Cheney and Democrat Zoe Lofgren clarifying a 135-year-old law to show that the vice president’s role in certifying elections is purely symbolic.

The proposal is a response to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters, who were trying to stop certification of Biden’s victory, and to pressure from Trump himself on his Vice President Mike Pence to overturn Biden’s election win by decertifying certain slates of electors.

House Republican leadership is urging party members to vote against that measure. 

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt, Alexandra Alper and Moira Warbuton; Editing by Heather Timmons, Edmund Klamann and Bill Berkrot)

EU countries want option to claw back coal plants' revenues - draft

09/20/2022 

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Coal power plants could be subject to the European Union's plan to cap energy producers' revenues to raise cash to bring down soaring energy bills, a draft document seen by Reuters shows.

The European Commission last week proposed a package of emergency measures to curb energy prices, including windfall profit levies on energy firms for governments to recycle into cushioning businesses and citizens from sky-high energy bills this winter.

Diplomats from EU countries are negotiating the proposals and trying to find deals that all will be willing to approve at a Sept. 30 meeting of EU energy ministers.

A draft of the countries' latest negotiating document, seen by Reuters, would allow countries to subject coal plants to a planned EU cap on power generators' revenues.

"Member States may allow the regulatory authority to maintain or set a specific cap on the market revenues obtained from the sale of electricity produced from hard coal," said the draft, which could still change before the Sept. 30 meeting.

The Commission had proposed a 180 euros ($179.64) per megawatt hour cap on revenue earned by power generators with the cheapest running costs - including wind, solar and nuclear plants - since those plants can earn the largest profit margins from soaring power prices.

Coal plants were left out because the Commission said their running costs were above 180eur/MWh, so the revenue cap could make them uneconomical.

But EU countries plan to get around that by capping coal plants' revenue at a higher level if their running costs are above 180eur/MWh, according to the document drafted by the Czech Republic, which holds the EU's rotating presidency.

Countries could also impose a higher revenue cap on other plants with higher running costs, to ensure they can keep running and recover a "reasonable profit margin", it said.

EU member states are also considering a proposed EU windfall profit levy on fossil fuel companies.

Countries like Italy that already have a windfall profit tax on energy firms should be able to keep their national measures instead of applying the EU one - so long as it generates proceeds at least equal to those expected from the EU scheme, the draft document said.

($1 = 1.0020 euros)

(Reporting by Kate Abnett; Editing by Susan Fenton)

By Kate Abnett

© Reuters 2022

Rampant Nigeria oil theft is 'treason', House Speaker says

ABUJA (Reuters) - Crude oil theft in Nigeria, which is blamed for throttling output and exports, is tantamount to treason that should be punished by the stiffest possible penalty, the Speaker of the House of Representatives said on Tuesday.

Refinery workers are reflected in polluted stagnant water at an illegal oil refinery site near river Nun© Reuters/AKINTUNDE AKINLEYE

Oil production fell below 1 million barrels per day in August, figures from the regulator show..

Femi Gbajabiamila said Nigeria's crude exports were at their lowest in two decades, blaming it on crude theft that he described as "treason against our country".

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"Those who seek to impoverish our country in this manner have declared war against the Nigerian people," he told legislators when reconvening the House of Representatives after a two-month break.

"The government's response must be sufficient to convince them of the error of their ways and deter others who might be tempted to join in their treason."

President Muhammadu Buhari last month expressed concern over large-scale theft of crude oil, saying it was affecting the country's revenue "enormously".

(Reporting by Camillus Eboh; Editing by David Goodman)

Climate change plus a third straight La Niña is not a good thing

Jonathan Overpeck, Ph.D., opinion contributor - 


There’s a saying that climate is what you expect, and the weather is what you get. In an era of climate change, we can now expect hotter more extreme weather, and more often than not, that is what we get. Interestingly, aspects of how the Earth’s climate varies naturally around average conditions can sometimes improve our regional predictive skill even more.


Climate change plus a third straight La Niña is not a good thing© Provided by The Hill

Scientists and non-scientists alike recognize that climate has varied widely long before humans started overwhelming the planet with fossil-fuel-driven climate change. Ice ages came and went for well-understood reasons, just as we know why the time of the dinosaurs was a good deal warmer and more inhospitable than today.

Over 100 million years ago, natural processes led to higher levels of atmospheric CO2, just as the burning of fossil fuels is doing now. Higher CO2 levels during warm periods, and lower during ice ages tell us that greenhouse gases are a fundamental control knob on the Earth’s temperature.

Climate varies naturally over all time scales, from seasons to decades to millions of years, and climate scientists spend a lot of time trying to understand exactly how and why. This is critical to understanding what might come next because what we get, season to season, year to year, or decade to decade, will result from natural climate variability interacting with human-caused climate change. Of course, even natural climate variability is now being altered by climate change, and that makes climate prediction trickier.

The year 2022 has been unusually disastrous in terms of extreme climate and weather: Australia endured major flooding early in the year, while India and Pakistan were hit by extreme heat, followed in Pakistan by unprecedented flooding. China and Europe both struggled with unprecedented heat and drought all summer, just as the Horn of Africa is being pushed toward a major humanitarian crisis by its own hot drought. Yet, another disaster has unfolded as Hurricane Fiona slammed Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Through it all, the mainland United States has experienced multiple extreme heatwaves and the unending 22-year megadrought that is now stoking both wildfire and water crises in the Southwest. One of the reasons for all the climate and weather mayhem is obviously climate change. Without climate change, this year’s climate extremes would have been less severe, and the extreme heatwaves less frequent.

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Climate Change Intensifies Diseases, New Study Finds

The fingerprints of human-caused climate change are all over each of this year’s major climate disasters, but in each case, climate variability played a role, too. Climate change has supercharged extremes that in earlier times would have been less disastrous. Importantly, one major pattern of climate variability seems to be the primary culprit for why we got the climate extremes where we did this year: a tropical phenomenon called La Niña.

La Niña events are not rare — they happen every few years. They are defined by a pattern of ocean and atmospheric conditions in the tropical Pacific, including colder than usual surface ocean temperatures in the eastern and central tropical Pacific. Some are weak or moderate, and some are more pronounced. The stronger the La Niña is, the more likely it will influence the pattern of climate and weather around much of the planet in a recognizable way. The same holds true for La Niña’s counterpart, El Niño, during which the tropical Pacific warms. When a strong El Niño happens in the tropical Pacific, it can generate a pattern of extreme climate and weather around the globe that is roughly the opposite of what a strong La Niña will generate.

Our scientific understanding of how El Niño and La Niña variability works is a valuable tool in predicting what might happen in many parts of the globe months in advance. For example, El Niño events are known not just for a global pattern of extremes that are roughly opposite La Niña, they are also known for pumping large quantities of accumulated heat from the ocean into the atmosphere. The ocean is absorbing most of the heat trapped by the increasing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, so we can expect the next strong El Niño to help propel atmospheric global temperatures to record heights.

Over the last two years, however, it’s been the La Niña pattern of natural variability that has helped produce many of our climate extremes, only to have climate change supercharge these extremes with devastating impact. Two La Nina years in a row is not so unusual, but right now, based on current conditions and sophisticated models, we appear to be on the cusp of a rare “three-peat” — a third straight La Nina year — that will probably last through our Northern Hemisphere winter.

The persistent La Niña conditions raise the odds of continued heat waves and drought all the way from Europe and North Africa through the Middle East, the northern reaches of South Asia, and into China. Parts of East Africa will also likely continue to bake and dry out. In other words, the climate disasters that struck each of these places in 2022 could worsen into 2023. And, when it does rain, climate change increases the chances that the rainfall could be extremely intense.

Closer to home, the implications of continued La Niña conditions are also bad news. We can expect the odds will favor hot and dry weather from southern California across the southern tier of the United States to the Southeast. This is typical of past La Nina events and predicted by climate models. Despite a relatively wet summer monsoon across parts of the Southwest, we can expect the region’s 22-year-long hot megadrought to intensify again into its 23rd year. With yet another La Niña on the horizon, this is not the year to expect relief.

We can’t stop natural climate variability and the extreme weather La Niña can bring, so we must instead accelerate our efforts to stop the human-driven climate change that is relentlessly turning so many climate extremes into unprecedented disaster and suffering.

Jonathan Overpeck, Ph.D., is a climate scientist, professor and dean of the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan. He has researched drought, climate variability and climate change on five continents. Follow him on Twitter: @GreatLakesPeck

Canadian inflation eases again in August, smaller rate hikes eyed

The price of apples at the Northmart grocery store in Iqaluit

Tue, September 20, 2022
By Julie Gordon

OTTAWA (Reuters) -Canada's annual inflation rate eased more than expected in August even as food prices rose at their fastest pace in 41 years, data showed on Tuesday, with economists saying now smaller rate hikes may be best.

The country's annual inflation rate slowed to 7.0% in August, below analyst forecasts of 7.3% and down from 7.6% in July. The deceleration was largely due to lower gasoline prices and slower gains in the shelter index, Statistics Canada said.

On the month, the consumer price index fell 0.3%, the largest decline since early in the COVID-19 pandemic. On the other hand, the price of food purchased from grocery stores gained 10.8% on the year, the most since August 1981.

All three core measures of inflation, which taken together are seen as a better indicator of underlying price pressures, eased slightly in August, with the average edging down to 5.2% from an upwardly revised 5.4% in July.

While inflation appears to be easing off peak levels, it remains far above the Bank of Canada's 2% target. The central bank has hiked its policy rate by 300 basis points in just six months to tackle surging prices.

The data shows those rate increases are starting to work, but the central bank's job is not yet done, said Michael Greenberg, SVP and portfolio manager at Franklin Templeton Investment Solutions.

"It has maybe taken down some of the risk of a supersized rate hike in Canada in October, but clearly there is still more wood to chop," he added.

Money markets bets on a 50-bp hike to 3.75% at the October rate decision eased slightly following the data, though the larger move was still favored over a standard 25-bp increase.

Economist are split on how high rates will go this cycle and on when the bank will pause, though some said cooler inflation numbers suggest a lower peak rate for Canada than for the United States, where inflation remains stubbornly hot.

"Today’s numbers reinforce our view that the Bank of Canada might only have one 50-bp rate hike left, whereas the Fed could very well continue raising rates for longer and to higher levels," said Royce Mendes, head of macro strategy at Desjardins Group, in a note.

Still, economists said much will come down to whether consumer and business expectations on price increases have become further unmoored, with that data due in two surveys to be released by the central bank next month.

"Ultimately the really important thing will be the evolution of inflation expectations," said Andrew Kelvin, chief Canada strategist at TD Securities.

Kelvin added that while the central bank could revert back to traditional 25-bp increases at this point, its hands may be tied if the market continues to demand at larger move.

The Bank of Canada hiked its policy rate by 75 bp to 3.25% this month and left the door open to another oversized increase, saying it continues to see front-loading as the best way to battle fast-rising prices.

Deputy Governor Paul Beaudry will give a speech today, with his remarks due out at 3:30 p.m. ET (1930 GMT).

The Canadian dollar weakened as much as 0.8% to touch its lowest level since November 2020 at 1.3053 to the U.S. dollar, or 74.89 U.S. cents.

(Reporting by Julie Gordon in Ottawa; Additional reporting by Dale Smith and Steve Scherer in Ottawa and Fergal Smith in Toronto; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Andrea Ricci)

Inflation has likely slowed, but economists warn we're not out of the woods yet

Stephanie Hughes - Yesterday 

Canada's inflation rate is expected to cool in data coming out Tuesday.© Provided by Financial Post

Economists at Canada’s biggest banks believe the country’s inflation rate cooled for the second month in a row in August, with consensus expectations from Bloomberg surveys for Sept. 20’s CPI announcement running at 7.3 per cent, down from the 7.6 per cent annualized pace reported in July.

The anticipated decline comes as global supply chain disruptions are beginning to ease and lower commodity prices are working to cool the consumer price index, the economy’s main gauge on the growth of the cost of goods. Those easing pressures have led the Royal Bank of Canada’s economics team to conclude that the recent burst of inflation likely topped out at 8.1 per cent in June.

But the same team warned that, beneath the headline figure, some core prices are still bubbling up and will not likely peak until later this year.

“Food price growth likely accelerated again,” wrote economists Nathan Janzen and Claire Fan in a Sept. 16 RBC Economics note . “And we look for the rate excluding food and energy products to hold steady at 5.5 per cent. Alongside this, the Bank of Canada’s preferred core inflation measures also likely remained elevated.”

The Bank of Montreal’s chief economist, Douglas Porter, echoed this sentiment, though warned that like the U.S., which had recently reported a hotter than expected annualized rate of 8.3 per cent in August and saw core price pressures rise, Canada should “beware the core trends.”

“A weaker currency could further fuel consumer goods and imported food prices,” Porter wrote in a note to clients late last week. “To this stage, Canadian grocery prices have actually been less fiery than their U.S. counterparts (9.9 per cent year-over-year compared to 13.5 per cent year-over-year).”

Comparing Canada to its neighbour south of the border, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce chief economist Avery Shenfeld noted that the difference in how shelter costs are treated in Canadian inflation figures should have cost pressures, excluding food and energy, falling faster than the U.S.

However, Shenfeld also expects that since the price of goods excluding food and energy is driven upward by some supply chain issues and domestically driven services inflation is likely to peak in the second quarter of next year, core inflation won’t dip below the three per cent mark until the second half of next year.

Despite the common refrain among economists that high inflation is not here to stay, there remain risks on the horizon. In his note, Shenfeld raised concerns of a wage-price spiral, a trend where workers seek higher wages to keep up with rising living costs, a pattern that can cause high inflation to become entrenched. Shenfeld specifically pointed to the recent success U.S. railway unions had in negotiating new deals and averting a strike as an example of such upward pressure on wages. Though the gains may not send unit labour costs soaring as they have in the past, Shenfeld said they still pose an inflation risk that economists and central banks are keeping an eye on .

“Still, the concerns are that this is a five-year package averaging close to five per cent per year in wage hikes, partly backdated, but with a couple of years to run,” Shenfeld wrote. “That raises concerns that businesses are starting to assume that inflation will persist at elevated levels, baking in cost increases ahead that will make it tougher to winnow inflation down.”

Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem raised similar concerns during a July 14 video session hosted by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. Macklem told the small business community not to plan for continued high inflation or to “build that into longer-term contracts” or labour deals.

The comments sparked backlash against the head of the central bank, with some union groups arguing that Macklem should “stay in his own lane.” But Shenfeld wrote that he believed Macklem was not telling workers to avoid asking for raises.

“What he likely meant to say was that employers shouldn’t simply assume that we’ll have elevated inflation beyond the next few quarters,” Shenfeld wrote. “They should therefore be careful about locking themselves into pay gains, particularly in multi-year contracts, under the assumption that they will be able to pass them on in large price hikes.”
'All but set in stone': More economists join chorus predicting a Canadian recession
Food inflation may have peaked, says head of Canadian grocery giant

While the conversation has largely focused on how wages could lift inflation, Shenfeld said it was more likely that the flip side was occurring: high inflation prompts workers to ask for higher wages or to seek higher-paying jobs to stay ahead of rising costs.

“So the key to avoiding a self-sustaining price-wage-price spiral starts with cooling the economy, getting inflation down and then letting that lower inflation environment influence wage gains,” Shenfeld wrote. “It’s not about telling workers that they shouldn’t try to keep up with the cost of living.”

Statistics Canada is expected to release August CPI data on Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. EST.

IKEA's restaurants has more than halved food waste since 2017


Tue, September 20, 2022 

Shoppers push carts past a logo of IKEA outside IKEA's new store in Bengaluru


STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - IKEA, which as well as being the largest furniture brand also runs one of the world's biggest restaurant chains, has slashed its food waste by 54% since 2017 to save money and reduce its environmental footprint.

Global food waste accounts for between 8% and 10% of total greenhouse gas emissions, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation.

Ingka Group, which owns most IKEA stores, in 2017 announced a target to halve food waste with the help of an artificial intelligence tool that allows it to better tailor amounts cooked to demand.

At the time, daily food waste per outlet, known for the trademark meatballs, averaged some 150 kg (330 pounds), translating to some 43,000 tonnes annually in total.


Ingka said in a statement on Tuesday the reduction meant it had saved more than 20 million meals and avoided 36,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents. The total saving in terms of money was 37 million euros ($37 million), a spokesperson added.

"Although this achievement represents a relatively small proportion of our overall climate footprint, (0.1%), it is nevertheless an important step that we are proud of," it said.

The entire IKEA value chain - from raw material production to customers' disposal of products - in the 12 months through August 2021 emitted 26.2 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

"We’re continuing to explore, test and develop ways to prevent and reduce food waste in our operations as well as to inspire our customers and the many people to do the same," Ingka said.

The restaurants serve around 560 million visitors a year.

($1 = 1.0014 euros)

(Reporting by Anna Ringstrom; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Factbox-The Challenges Automakers, And Now Tesla, Face With Humanoid Robots

By Hyunjoo Jin
09/20/22 

A "Tesla Bot" humanoid robot prototype is seen in this undated handout image.

 Tesla Inc/Handout via REUTERS

Tesla's CEO Elon Musk is set to unveil its prototype humanoid robots at an event on Sept. 30, hoping to expand beyond self-driving cars that have not yet become reality despite his repeated promises.


While robots are widely used for specialist tasks at factories, other companies have struggled to create commercially viable human-like robots, despite decades-long development efforts.

"This market is very, very challenging market because you buy this big expensive robot, but it actually cannot do much," Heni Ben Amor, a robotics professor at Arizona State University, said.

TESLA

Tesla's humanoid robots, Optimus, will be initially used in manufacturing and logistics for boring and repetitive work, thus addressing a labor shortage.

For the longer term, Musk said the robot could be used in homes, even becoming a "buddy" or a "catgirl" sex partner.

HONDA

Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co's Asimo bipedal robot had served as a face for the company but was not commercialized after more than two decades of development. Honda is now focusing on disaster relief robots and "Avatar" robots for tasks like remote surgery.

Honda aims to demonstrate the Avatar robot before early 2024 and deploy the machines in the 2030s.

GM-NASA

From 2007 to 2012, General Motors and NASA joined hands to develop humanoid robots, R2, for assembly and space exploration.

NASA said that they are not under development anymore. NASA said its current focus is the development of next-generation humanoid robots that can be used on the lunar surface and eventually on Mars.

 

HYUNDAI MOTOR-BOSTON DYNAMICS

Boston Dynamics created internet buzz with videos of its humanoid robots running, jumping, backflipping and dancing. But the loss-making U.S. company changed hands several times, with Alphabet Inc's Google, SoftBank and then Hyundai Motor Co becoming the company's owner.

Hyundai and Boston Dynamics said in August that they will initially invest more than $400 million in a "research-first organization" on AI and robotics.

FORD-AGILITY ROBOTICS

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In 2020, Ford bought two humanoid robots, Digit, from Agility Robotics, to test the delivery of a package to doorstop from a delivery vehicle.

Oregon-based startup Agility Robotics is also working to deploy human-like robots that can pick up and move items at warehouses.

SOFTBANK, OTHERS

SoftBank's wide-eyed Pepper robot, which helped burnish Chief Executive Masayoshi Son's image as a forward-looking tech entrepreneur, saw production halted.

Several robot startups like Rethink Robotics also went out of business, as they failed to commercialize their products.

A humanoid robot developed by Tesla, known as Tesla Bot or Optimus, is shown in a frame grab from the live video of Tesla's AI Day streamed on August 20, 2022. 

Tesla/Handout via REUTERS

FOCUS-Elon Musk faces skeptics as Tesla gets ready to unveil 'Optimus' robot


Tue, September 20, 2022 
By Hyunjoo Jin

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept 20 (Reuters) - Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk blamed overreliance on factory robots for sending the electric carmaker to "production hell" four years ago, saying humans were better at certain jobs.

My, how times have changed.

Musk's Texas company now is floating ambitious plans to deploy thousands of humanoid robots, known as Tesla Bot or Optimus, within its factories, expanding eventually to millions around the world, according to job postings. Buzz is building within the company as Tesla is having more internal meetings on robots, a person familiar with the matter said.

Longer term, Musk said at a TED Talk robots could be used in homes, making dinner, mowing the lawn and caring for the elderly people, and even becoming a "buddy" or a "catgirl" sex partner.

The robot business eventually may be worth more than Tesla's car revenue, according to Musk, who is now touting a vision for the company that goes well beyond making self-driving electric vehicles.

At its "AI Day" on Sept. 30, Tesla will unveil a prototype from its project Optimus, an allusion to the powerful and benevolent leader of the Autobots in the Transformers series. Production could start next year, Musk said.

Tesla faces skepticism that it can show technological advances that would justify the expense of "general purpose" robots in factories, homes and elsewhere, according to robotics experts, investors and analysts interviewed by Reuters.

Tesla already employs hundreds of robots designed for specific jobs for production of its cars.

Humanoid robots have been in development for decades by Honda Motor Co and Hyundai Motor Co's Boston Dynamics unit. Like self-driving cars, the robots have trouble with unpredictable situations.

"Self-driving cars weren't really proved to be as easy as anyone thought. And it's the same way with humanoid robots to some extent," the lead of NASA's Dexterous Robotics Team, Shaun Azimi, told Reuters.

"If something unexpected happens, being flexible and robust to those kinds of changes is very difficult."

At an "Autonomy" event in 2019, Musk promised 1 million robotaxis by 2020 but has yet to deliver such a car.

Musk's robots may be able to demonstrate basic capabilities at the event, but it would be hard for them to impress public expectations of robots that are as capable as humans, experts say.

To succeed, Tesla will need to show robots doing multiple, unscripted actions, said Nancy Cooke, a professor in human systems engineering at Arizona State University. Such proof could provide a boost to Tesla stock, which is down 25% from its 2021 peak.

"If he just gets the robot to walk around, or he gets the robots to dance, that's already been done. That's not that impressive," she said.

Tesla did not respond to Reuters' request for comments, but Musk in the past proved skeptics wrong, jump-starting the electric car market and building a rocket company, SpaceX, although some product launches were behind schedule.

IN-HOUSE EXPERTISE

Initially, Optimus will perform boring or dangerous jobs, including moving parts around its factories, according to Musk.

Musk acknowledged that humanoid robots do not have enough intelligence to navigate the real world without being explicitly instructed.

But he said Tesla can leverage its expertise in AI and key components to develop and produce smart, yet less expensive, humanoid robots at scale.

He tweeted https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1572090491050799107 on Monday that its Autopilot team is also working on its Optimus robot, when asked about fixes of what it calls Full Self-Driving beta - a test version of its new automated driving software.

Tesla is on hiring spree for people to work on humanoid bi-pedal robots, with about 20 job postings on "Tesla Bot" including jobs for designing key robot parts like "actuators".

"The code you will write will at term run in millions of humanoid robots across the world, and will therefore be held to high quality standards," one of the job postings said.

Tesla has over 2 million vehicles on the road.

Jonathan Hurst, chief technology officer at Agility Robotics, a humanoid robot firm founded in 2015 said the technology "is right now starting to turn the corner."

"Certainly, an important measure of success is do they make money from it," he told Reuters, referring to Tesla's humanoid robot efforts.

HUMAN HELP?

Analysts see more pageant than product. "It's all part of distracting people and giving them the next shiny object to chase after," Guidehouse Insights analyst Sam Abuelsamid said.

"Investors are not excited about Optimus," said Gene Munster, managing partner at venture capital firm Loup Ventures, which holds Tesla stocks. "It's just such a low probability that it works at scale," he said, saying it is "infinitely harder than self-driving cars."

And then there is Musk's own experience with robots in the factory.

During the 2018 production hell, Musk specifically noted the problems of the "fluff bot," an assembly robot that failed to perform simple tasks that human hands can do - picking up pieces of "fluff" and placing them on batteries.

He said the cost of having technicians maintain the complicated robot far exceeded that of hiring someone to do the assembly.

The fluff bot is "a funny example but drives home the point that autonomy often doesn't generalize well, and so handling soft fluffy material that isn't as predictable as a rigid part was causing a huge problem," Aaron Johnson, a mechanical engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, said.

"Human hands are way better at doing that," Musk said.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by Peter Henderson, Ben Klayman and Lisa Shumaker)