Iran hangs 2 in rare blasphemy case as executions surge
JON GAMBRELL
Mon, May 8, 2023
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran hanged two men Monday convicted of blasphemy, authorities said, carrying out rare death sentences for the crime as executions surge across the Islamic Republic following months of unrest.
Iran remains one of the world's top executioners, having put to death at least 203 prisoners since the start of this year alone, according to the Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights. But carrying out executions for blasphemy remains rare, as previous cases saw the sentences reduced by authorities.
The two men executed, Yousef Mehrad and Sadrollah Fazeli Zare, died at Arak Prison in central Iran. They had been arrested in May 2020, accused of being involved in a channel on the Telegram message app called “Critique of Superstition and Religion,” according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Both men faced months of solitary confinement and could not contact their families, the commission said.
The Mizan news agency of Iran's judiciary confirmed the executions, describing the two men as having insulted Islam's Prophet Muhammad and promoted atheism. Mizan also accused them of burning a Quran, Islam's holy book, though it wasn't clear whether the men allegedly did that or such imagery was shared in the Telegram channel.
Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, who leads Iran Human Rights, decried the executions as exposing the “medieval nature” of Iran's theocracy.
“The international community must show with its reaction that executions for expressing an opinion is intolerable,” he said in a statement. “The refusal of the international community to react decisively is a green light for the Iranian government and all their like-minded people around the world.”
It wasn't immediately clear when Iran carried out its last execution for blasphemy. Other countries in the Middle East, like Saudi Arabia, also allow for death sentences to be imposed for blasphemy.
The streak of executions, including members of ethnic minority groups in Iran, comes as monthslong protests over the September death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after her arrest by the country's morality police have cooled. Already, at least four people charged over alleged crimes from the demonstrations have been put to death. The protests, which reportedly saw over 500 people killed and 19,000 others arrested, marked one of the biggest challenges to Iran’s theocracy since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In 2022, Iran executed at least 582 people, up from 333 people in 2021, according to Iran Human Rights. Amnesty International's most-recent report on executions put Iran as the world's second-largest executioner, behind only China, where thousands are believed to be put to death a year.
Mehdi Hasan Torches Republicans By Naming The Only Thing They Really Stand For
Another Day, Another Mass Shooting
Ed Mazza
Mon, May 8, 2023
MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan said it’s time to call the Republican Party what it really is as lawmakers on the right reject any attempt at gun control amid a wave of mass shootings.
“In America in 2023 there have been more mass shootings than there have been days,” he said on his show on Sunday evening, citing statistics from the Gun Violence Archive. “This is how we live now.”
Hasan systemically dismantled the usual right-wing talking points after mass shootings, including the notion that nothing can be done.
“They’re lying to you,” he said. “This isn’t about mental health, which every other country has problems with. It isn’t drugs, which every other country struggles with. It isn’t computer games, which every other country has. It’s the guns. It’s obviously the guns.”
He said it’s high time to place the blame where it belongs: On Republicans.
“Let’s stop saying ‘Congress must act’ and start saying ‘the Republican Party must act’,” he said. “Let’s stop treating the GOP as the party of law and order and treat them, more accurately, as the party of gun violence, of school shootings, of mall massacres.”
He called for a ban an assault weapons:
Hasan also ripped into another common GOP talking point after each mass shooting: the notion that the answer is in “thoughts and prayers” or that God has to provide the solution:
Former Army officer and witness to Texas mall shooting who calls himself a 'gun lover' says mental health isn't the problem: 'We need more gun control'
Katie Balevic
Sun, May 7, 2023
Emergency personnel work the scene of a shooting at Allen Premium Outlets on May 6, 2023 in Allen, Texas.Stewart F. House/Getty Images
Former Army officer who rushed to scene of mass shooting in Allen, Texas says US needs gun control.
Steven Spainhouer said he's a "gun lover" but that "this is going to keep happening" without stricter laws.
He added that it was a gun, not mental health issues, that "killed these people."
A witness to the deadly mass shooting at a Texas mall on Saturday said he's a "gun lover." Then he called for more gun control.
Steven Spainhouer, who said he is both a former police officer and a former Army officer, rushed to the scene of the shooting on Saturday, arriving even before emergency responders.
"When you get hit with an automatic weapon fire at close range, there is no opportunity for survival," Spainhouer told MSNBC. "I don't know what the gunman's problem was, but it wasn't mental health that killed these people. It was an automatic rifle with bullets."
A gunman opened fire inside Allen Premium Outlets on Saturday, killing eight people and injuring seven others before a police officer who happened to be nearby shot and killed him. Police have not yet identified the gunman or his motivations.
In a statement calling for stricter gun regulations, President Joe Biden said the gunman used an "AR-15 style assault weapon."
The shooting in a town north of Dallas came about a week after five people were killed in a shooting in Cleveland, a Texas town north of Houston.
Politicians resistant to gun control have blamed the prevalence and severity of American mass shootings on mental health – despite reports that only a small portion of violence is tied to mental illnesses.
"I'm a gun lover. I have guns. I'm a former police officer. I'm a former Army officer. But these M-4s, AR-15s, they've got to get off the streets, or this is going to keep happening," Spainhouer said on Sunday. "We've got to stop that at some point."
"All the politicians are going to make statements. They're going to offer prayers and condolences," Spainhouer said. "Prayers and condolences won't bring these people back. We need some action in our legislatures at the federal and state level for better gun control. And I'm saying that as someone who loves guns."
Climate change is bad for everyone. But this is where it's expected to be worst in the US.
Dinah Voyles Pulver, USA TODAY
Sun, May 7, 2023
If you’re thinking about a long-term real estate investment or shopping for a place to settle down for 20 or 30 years, you might be wondering which cities or states could fare better than others in a changing climate.
“There are no winners in a world where climate change gets worse,” said Alex Kamins, director of regional economics at Moody's Analytics and author of a recent study on climate risks in the United States.
Climate change is ramping up the long-term risk almost everywhere, said Kamins and others. Temperatures are increasing. Oceans are warming, and rising. And scientists say the heat and higher sea levels help make some natural disasters more extreme.
The impacts vary widely over time and space, so it’s difficult to make a definitive ranking that says “buy here, not there,” but a growing body of evidence helps highlight some general trends.
USA TODAY looked at data from First Street and Moody’s Analytics – two organizations examining future climate risk – to see what areas of the country are most at risk from these climate impacts over the next 30 years.
Insurers and mortgage companies are asking the same kinds of questions, Kamins said. Banks are being asked to “stress test their portfolios in preparation for the impact of climate change.”
While locations with the greatest risks seem obvious – think Florida – others might surprise you.
Here's your guide to what, when and where you can expect climate change impacts to be the worst in the U.S.
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READ MORE Latest climate change news from USA TODAY
Each region sees risks
Climate change will have uneven impacts on the U.S. in coming decades. Some areas may experience more heat, more flooding, more extreme storms, or more intense wildfires – or all of the above.
The U.S. won’t see any locations underwater or wiped off the map over the next 30 years, Kamins said, but access to fresh water and insurance premiums will become bigger challenges.
“Every year it becomes increasingly crystal clear, just the amount of risk that we face, whether it’s increasingly severe natural disasters or droughts and heat risk,” he said. “In some cases it’s creating renewed momentum or brand new momentum for governments and businesses that hadn’t been thinking seriously about the impact of climate change before.”
Everyone loses out if others are impacted, because we all rely on goods and services from other states and countries, said climate scientist Michael Mann, director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media at the University of Pennsylvania. “It’s a domino effect.”
East Coast: Wind, flooding and sea level rise stack the deck against many counties and states, especially Florida and the Carolinas, Kamins said. Bustling economies and distance to the beach still attract people in droves, but at some point the tide literally will turn against communities along beaches and coastal rivers.
Southwest: Heat and fire bring increasing risks, particularly in Arizona, he said, even without factoring in the perils of a dwindling water supply.
Interior: Intense heat may affect these states the most in runaway warming scenarios, Mann said. Sudden downpours with unprecedented rain also are occurring more often, even though these states aren’t in hurricane-prone coastal areas. One study he co-authored showed some of the greatest risk of heat stress could be in urban areas in the Pacific Northwest and Great Lakes.
Idaho to Minnesota: A swath of states across the northern U.S. look better than most, with less-pronounced risks, Kamins said. Recent statistics on an influx of newcomers to Idaho and its burgeoning tech hub in Boise show people may be figuring that out. He expects Montana may be the next frontier within 10-20 years.
What are the causes of climate change? How can it be stopped?
What are the effects of climate change? Disasters, weather and agriculture impacts.
States that may face more climate change risk sooner
Texas - Its sheer size and geography means Texas has a lot of risk. First Street's data shows some of its counties are at great risk of wildfire, some face higher potential losses from tropical cyclone winds and some have greater flood risks. The Lone Star State leads the nation in billion-dollar disasters, according to information from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It averages 5.3 such events a year, double the number it experienced in the previous 20, even adjusted for inflation.
Florida – 8,346 miles of shoreline, surrounded on three sides by water. Need we say more? Rising sea levels and extreme rainfall fueled by warming oceans, with the potential for more intense hurricanes while more people crowd into densely populated areas, increase the risks. Florida has the most top spots on First Street's list of counties that could see the biggest increases in the number of days with the very warmest temperatures they experience today.
New Jersey - The Garden State has counties among the top of First Street’s lists for potential increases in average annual wind losses, extreme fire risk and properties at risk of flooding. New Jersey suffered three hurricanes or their remnants in 2021-22, including Hurricane Ida, Hurricane Henri and the final vestiges of Hurricane Ian. Forecasts for higher winds from more tropical cyclones and hurricanes aren’t good news.
California - Over the past three years, the state has seen its largest wildfire season in history, its worst drought in 1,200 years and a string of record-setting atmospheric rivers. Golden State residents need no reminder of the risks they face, but First Street’s data shows some California counties high on its lists for most extreme fire risk and some cities with the greatest percentage of residential properties at risk of flooding.
Which states did Moody's Analytics find face the greatest physical risks?
When it comes to weather-related events, hurricanes are literally the heavy hitters when accounting for acute physical risk. Climate change already is cranking up the rain in some tropical storms and hurricanes and could be slowing them down over land but that research is still underway, scientists say. Floods and wildfires also figured into Kamins’ assessment of physical risks. Here’s his list:
Florida
Louisiana
South Carolina
North Carolina
Delaware
Rhode Island
New Jersey
Virginia
Massachusetts
Connecticut
Other locations suffer from change happening over time rather than in single headline-grabbing events. Think the creep of rising sea levels or warmer nights and higher average temperatures.
San Francisco faces above average risk across these categories and more, and is the nation’s most exposed large city, Kamins said.
Brown pelicans fly in front of the San Francisco skyline on August 17, 2018 in San Francisco, California.
It's one of those urban areas where residents aren’t used to temperature extremes and many homes don't have air conditioning, he said. In a world where temperatures rise 5-10 degrees, unlike Floridians, San Francisco residents are ill-equipped for dealing with heat and it could be economically damaging.
Other cities with more gradually increasing risk on the Moody’s Analytics list are:
Cape Coral, FL
New York City
Long Island, NY
Oakland, CA
Phoenix, AZ
Tucson, AZ
Wilmington, DE
West Palm Beach, FL
North Port, FL
Southeastern metropolitan areas are particularly risky because they’re experiencing rising sea levels and higher temperatures, in addition to a parade of cyclones that could be growing more intense, according to Kamins’ study. The top 10:
Jacksonville, NC
New Bern, NC
Myrtle Beach, SC
Wilmington, NC
Greenville, NC
Charleston, SC
Punta Gorda, FL
Deltona, FL
San Juan, PR
Palm Bay, FL
Goldsboro, NC
Billion dollar disaster data helps point to states already paying the price as the climate changes.
If there’s any doubt about risks from future climate change, look no further than NOAA’s list of the weather and climate disasters that caused at least $1 billion in damages.
At least 37 states suffered twice the number of billion dollar disasters this century than during the previous 20-years.
Tornado activity appears to be expanding in the Mid-South, with more frequent outbreaks, and a USA TODAY investigation showed extreme rainfall events are occurring more often along the Mississippi River Valley. Scientists say both trends may be linked to the warming Gulf of Mexico.
USA TODAY Investigation How a summer of extreme weather reveals a stunning shift in the way rain falls in America.
But it’s not just weather events causing the disaster toll to rise, NOAA said. More extreme weather events take a greater toll when population and development increase in vulnerable areas.
“Where you live is important, but how you live is just as important,” said Stephen Strader, a meteorologist and associate professor at Villanova University. “There are things we can do to better prepare our current developments for climate change.”
Billion dollar disaster events per year since 2001 (More than 3):
Texas - 5.3
Illinois - 3.9
Georgia - 3.7
Oklahoma - 3.6
Missouri - 3.5
North Carolina - 3.4
Alabama - 3.3
Tennessee - 3.3
Virginia - 3.2
Kansas - 3.1
Mississippi - 3.1
More than 300% increase in billion dollar disaster events per year since 2000:
Arizona - 500%
Wyoming - 450%
Utah - 400%
New Mexico - 367%
Nevada - 335%
Nebraska - 320%
Colorado - 300%
Wisconsin - 300%
When considering future scenarios, it’s important to note much remains within the world’s control, Mann said.
With substantial action to hold warming below 3 degrees F, "we can limit the worsening of extreme weather events," although sea level increases would already be locked in, he said. A lack of action would mean “impacts in the interior of our continent could be every bit as bad.”
How taking action could help On Earth Day, scientists tell us what 2050 could be like. Their answers might surprise you.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What are the worst cities and states for climate change effects?
Brutal Heat Continues to Grip Asia in Warning for the World
Jasmine Ng
Mon, May 8, 2023
(Bloomberg) -- Asia remains in the grip of a blistering heat wave, chiming with predictions from climate scientists that 2023 could be the world’s hottest year.
In an ominous sign ahead of the northern hemisphere summer, an emerging El Nino weather pattern is pushing the mercury to unprecedented levels in southern parts of the continent.
Vietnam reported its highest ever temperature of 44.2C over the weekend, triggering power shortage warnings, while Laos also likely broke records. The Philippines cut classroom hours after the heat index reached the “danger” zone, reflecting the potentially deadly combination of heat and humidity.
The scorching temperatures follow a pattern of increasing extreme weather in recent years that’s sending the world into uncharted territory. The sweltering conditions are testing the ability of governments to protect public health and also to prevent major disruptions to agriculture and power generation in economies that are still recovering from the ravages of Covid-19.
El Nino — characterized by warmer ocean temperatures across the Pacific — has far-reaching impacts on weather patterns around the world. It could bring relief to drought-parched areas of Argentina and the southern US, while blanketing parts of Asia and Australia with hotter, drier conditions. Coffee, sugar, palm oil and cocoa crops would be especially vulnerable.
Temperatures in Thailand remained above 40C in many northern and central regions over much of last week, pushing power demand to a fresh peak. A group of businesses and banks have asked the government to prepare an action plan to deal with a potential drought that they say might last for three years.
Rainfall in Malaysia may be as much as 40% lower in some areas, which could put palm oil production at risk in one of the world’s biggest producers of the commodity. Authorities are closely monitoring the return of forest fires and air pollution. An El Nino in 2015 caused a particularly bad episode of haze that was one of the worst environmental disasters in Southeast Asia.
Elsewhere in Asia, scorching temperatures have also roasted parts of China, India and Bangladesh over the past few weeks. Yunnan province, a major aluminum hub in southwest China, suffered its worst drought in a decade last month. India is on alert for more heat waves following soaring temperatures in April that prompted school closures in some states and caused at least 11 people to die of heat stroke after attending an event.
--With assistance from Thomas Kutty Abraham, Nguyen Kieu Giang, Manolo Serapio Jr. and Anuradha Raghu.
Recalling the eruption of Mount Pelée — deadliest volcano in the 20th century
Randi Mann
Sun, May 7, 2023
Thumbnail: "Evacuees on Rue du Pavé, Fort-de-France after 1902 eruption, photographed by William H. Rau." Courtesy of Wikipedia/William Herman Rau
This Day In Weather History is a daily podcast by Chris Mei from The Weather Network, featuring stories about people, communities and events and how weather impacted them.
On Wednesday, May 7, 1902, Mount Pelée, on the island of Martinique in the Lesser Antilles, started to erupt. Around 29,000 people died, making it the deadliest eruption of the 20th century and one of the most destructive in recorded history.
On April 23, Mount Pelée started eruptive activity. The volcano let out a series of large phreatic explosions that occurred before subsiding until early May.
Pelee 1902 1
1902 eruption. Photograph of Mount Pelee by Angelo Heilprin. Courtesy of Wikipedia
When Pelée started to start up again, the sky filled with dark clouds and lightning. The mountain emitted ash that blacked out the sun.
On May 5, a mudflow came down a side of the mountain and buried around 150 people. The mudflow also triggered three tsunamis that damaged coastal buildings.
Between May 6 and 7, the phreatic explosions turned magmatic.
On May 8, at about 8 a.m., the volcano exploded. Lava and turbulent gases flowed down the mountain at hurricane speeds. The volcanic material reached Saint-Pierre at 8:02 a.m. No one could escape. Most of the city's population died. Only two people in the actual city survived, and a few people from surrounding areas. All survivors experienced severe burns.
Pelee 1902
Remains of Saint-Pierre. Courtesy of Wikipedia
After the explosion, rescuers headed to the island. On May 20, Mount Pelée exploded again, killing 2,000 of the rescuers and other people who were helping with the aftermath. On Aug. 30, another eruption generated a pyroclastic flow, which killed an additional 800 people.
Mount Pelée continued to erupt until October 1905
AMERIKA
Teacher appreciation? Try better pay, more governors say
Sun, May 7, 2023 
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — As schools across the country struggle to find teachers to hire, more governors are pushing for pay increases, bonuses and other perks for the beleaguered profession — with some vowing to beat out other states competing for educators.Already in 2023, governors in Georgia and Arkansas have pushed through teacher pay increases. Ahead of Monday’s start of national Teacher Appreciation Week, others — both Republican and Democratic — have proposed doing the same to attract and retain educators.More than half of the states’ governors over the past year — 26 so far — have proposed boosting teacher compensation, according to groups that track it. The nonprofit Teacher Salary Project said it is the most it has seen in nearly two decades of tracking.“Today we have governors left and right from every political party and then some who are addressing this issue because they have to,” said founder and CEO Ninivé Caligari. “We’ve never seen what we are seeing right now. Never.”In Idaho, Gov. Brad Little is aiming to raise the state’s average starting salary into the nation’s top 10. In Delaware, Gov. John Carney said competition for teachers is more intense than ever and a pay increase is necessary to “win the competition with surrounding states.”It’s not clear how far pay raises will go toward relieving the shortages, though, and some teachers say it is too little, too late to fix problems that are years in the making.Blame for teacher shortages has fallen on underfunding after the Great Recession, tight labor markets, lackluster enrollments in colleges and programs that train teachers and teacher burnout inflamed by the travails of the COVID-19 pandemic.There has been no mass exodus, but data from some states that track teacher turnover has shown rising numbers of teachers leaving the profession over the past couple years.Shortages are most extreme in certain areas, including the poorest or most rural districts, researchers say. Districts also report particular difficulties in hiring for in-demand subjects like special education, math and science.Meanwhile, teacher salaries have fallen further and further behind those of their college-educated peers in other fields, as teachers report growing workloads, shrinking autonomy and increasingly hostile school environments.Magan Daniel, who at 33 just left her central Alabama school district, was not persuaded to stay by pay raises as Alabama’s governor vows to make teacher salaries the highest in the Southeast. It would take big increases to match neighboring Georgia, where the average teacher salary is $62,200, according to the National Education Association.Fixing teachers’ deteriorating work culture and growing workloads would be a more powerful incentive than a pay raise, she said.She recalled, for instance, her principal asking her to make copies and lesson plans last fall while she was on unpaid maternity leave. Difficulty getting substitutes puts pressure on teachers who need time off for emergencies, she said, and spending nights and weekends on paperwork siphoned the joy out of teaching.“I would not go back just for a higher salary,” Daniel said.In Oklahoma, Joshua Morgan, 46, left his rural district a year ago because after 18 years he was still earning under $47,000. Oklahoma’s governor is talking about awarding performance bonuses, but Morgan said he would only go back to teaching for substantially more money — like $65,000 a year.The national average public school teacher salary in 2021-22 increased 2% from the previous year to $66,745, according to the NEA, the nation’s largest teachers union. Inflation peaked around 9% at the time.For new recruits, the math of paying for a college education is grim: The national average beginning teacher salary was $42,845 in 2021-22, according to the NEA. Teachers do often qualify for public service loan forgiveness, which forgives their student debt after they’ve made 10 years of monthly payments.Besides fewer teachers getting certified, the “teacher pay penalty” — the gap between teacher salaries and their college-educated peers in other professions — is growing.It reached a record 23.5% in 2021, with teachers earning an average 76.5 cents for every dollar earned by other college-educated professionals, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank.It has been widening for decades, researchers say. For men, it is 35% and for women it is 17% — reflecting the gender pay gap seen across the U.S. economy.For Rachaele Otto and other Louisiana teachers, the prospect of a $3,000 salary increase proposed by the governor might be appreciated. But at roughly $200 a month after taxes, it’s not enough to keep a teacher who feels burned out or demoralized, Otto said.“I know there are teachers willing to take pay cuts to leave the profession,” said Otto, 38, a science teacher in a rural Louisiana district. “If you double the salary, maybe that would change their thinking.”Sylvia Allegretto, a senior economist who studies teacher compensation for the Center for Economic and Policy Research, called salary promises by governors one-time “Band-Aids” that barely keep up with inflation.“You’re kind of chipping away at the margins,” Allegretto said. “You’re not fixing the problem, generally.”For governors, raising teacher pay may be good politics, but raising it across the board may have little long-term impact. Getting better data on where the shortages are and then targeting raises — or bigger raises — to those areas will help more, researchers say.Research shows a pay raise will have at least some effect on retaining teachers, said Ed Fuller, a Penn State associate professor who studies teacher quality and turnover. What is difficult to research, Fuller said, is the effect a raise has on a college student’s decision to enter a teacher preparation program — and take on debt.Some districts haven’t waited for governors and legislatures to act.Kentucky’s biggest school district, Jefferson County in Louisville, gave a 4% raise last year and the board approved another raise of 5% to start this coming July. It also started giving an annual $8,000 stipend to teachers who work with higher-need students.Superintendent Marty Pollio wants the district to be the highest paying in Kentucky, calling the teacher shortage “a real crisis and a growing crisis.”In Pennsylvania, the William Penn School District is offering signing bonuses for long-term subs and holding its first-ever teachers job fair.Superintendent Eric Becoats said a teacher told him they can move to neighboring districts and make $10,000 more — something the relatively small and poor district cannot compete with right now.Some teachers also tell him they will retire or leave the profession if they can.Morgan said a major change in salary is required to overcome a major change in how teachers now view a profession where they once expected to stay until they retired.“That’s not how the world works anymore,” Morgan said. “I’m seeing more educators, especially the younger ones, coming in and saying, ‘I’m not willing to put up with this.’”___Brooke Schultz, a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative, contributed to this report. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Data reporter Sharon Lurye also contributed from New Orleans.___Follow Marc Levy on Twitter: http://twitter.com/timelywriterMarc Levy, The Associated Press
WHAT RECESSIONConsumers willing to spend at US restaurant chains despite menu price increases
Brooke DiPalma
·Reporter, Booking Producer
Sun, May 7, 2023
In the latest earnings results for fast-food and fast casual restaurants, consumers willing to spend despite higher menu prices, and lower employee turnover helped propel the top players to double-digit same-store growth.
"I think it's a pretty resilient consumer, where you're seeing the price increases being absorbed, and very, very little pushback on that," BTIG managing director Peter Saleh said.
This quarter, U.S. same-store sales got a boost across the board: McDonald's was up 12.6 % year-over-year, Chipotle, rose 10.9%, Wingstop was up 20.1%, YUM! Brands' Taco Bell was up 9%, Starbucks rose 12%, Shake Shack was up 10.3%, and even Subway saw a spike in sales growth as it gears up for a sale, rising 11.7% in North America. This is welcome news for investors, after all brands across the board increased their menu prices. Chipotle was one the brands to raise them the most, Saleh said in his coverage, yet its same-store sales also saw a boost. CFO Jack Hartung said menu price increases compared to a year ago are in "about a 10% range."
All this seemingly contradicts previous fears that higher prices would deter consumers, Saleh said. "We're just not seeing that right now."
At mega fast food chains, consumers are looking for value, Morningstar Analyst Sean Dunlop said. "We saw some evidence of consumers managing checks, particularly on the lower-income end of the spectrum."
YUM! Brands CEO David Gibbs told Yahoo Finance that the company tends to "flourish" in tough financial times, especially its Taco Bell brand. "People care a little bit more about value than they have over the last few years maybe when they were a little more flush with money in their pocket," Gibbs said.
In a call with investors, Papa John's CEO Rob Lynch said value was driving its customers as well.
"We're definitely entering into a period, if we're not already all the way there...value is going to become more important than it has been over the last 3 years and so it's critical for us to have a compelling and successful value strategy."
Saleh said he wouldn't call it a "a value war environment," however. "We still have all these restaurants [that] are still dealing with commodity inflation to a certain degree."
Menu price increases to moderate this year
Taco Bell drive-thru open for business with lush green plants and clear sky in a residential neighborhood, Walnut Creek, California, March 27, 2023. (Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)
Because of pressures like food input costs, labor costs, and other inflationary pressures, price increases will still happen, but maybe not in as vast of a jump as we saw last year.
"I think it's unlikely we see operators take too many incremental price increases in 2023, particularly as food input costs have moderated," Morningstar's Dunlop said.
Starbucks CFO Rachel Ruggeri told Yahoo Finance said the company would expect changes in price to start to moderate in the back half of the year, "as we get to more historical levels of pricing, which we've shared is typically around 1% to 2%."
The message was similar from YUM! Brands' Gibbs. "I do not anticipate taking as much price in 2023 as we did in 2022," he told Yahoo Finance. That's due to lower key input costs for food and "even the labor market has gotten a lot better."
Chipotle, the chain that took one of the largest price increases, is waiting to see how the year rolls out.
Despite an unpredictable inflation landscape, Chipotle's Hartung said the company doesn't have plans to make any price increases.
Company leaders said the easing of a tight labor market has also helped boost their bottom lines. In a call with investors, Shake Shack CEO Randy Garutti said lower turnover and a lot more people applying for jobs at Shake Shack is driving sales.
"That's just a huge win in every way," he said. "Turnover is expensive. It is hard to train people and mostly because you're just not up to the reps. You're just not up to speed and throughput. That's where the most gains are going to come from."
—
Brooke DiPalma is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter at @BrookeDiPalma or email her at bdipalma@yahoofinance.com.
Canada's electronic waste more than tripled in 20 years, study indicates
The Canadian Press
Mon, May 8, 2023
Canada's electronic waste more than tripled in the last two decades and is expected to keep increasing, a new study indicates, with researchers urging better e-waste management to reduce environmental harm and bring economic rewards.
Researchers from the University of Waterloo conducted what they called a comprehensive estimate of e-waste in Canada to better understand the lifecycle of electronic items from point of sale to disposal.
The study, published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials, looked at e-waste data going as far back as 1971.
E-waste consists of discarded electronic products including computers, televisions, cell phones, consumer goods like electronic toys and household lighting, and large household appliances such as refrigerators or washing machines.
The research indicates e-waste generation per personincreased from 8.3 kilograms in 2000 to 25.3 kilograms in 2020.
Canadians produced nearly one million tonnes of e-waste in 2020, and that's expected to reach 1.2 million tonnes annually by 2030, the study suggests.
Lead researcher Komal Habib, a professor at the University of Waterloo's School of Environment, Enterprise and Development, said the rising rate of electronic consumption can be attributed to the increased pace of technological developments since the turn of the millennium, shorter device lifespan and consumer habits.
"From a consumer perspective, we tend to upgrade our technological setup to the latest available technology," said Habib in an interview.
"The phone I'm holding right now ... is five years old, but not many Canadians are like me, right? They tend to upgrade their device every year."
The study also found the estimated growth of e-waste reflects Canada's growing population.
Within all of that electric junk is "an urban mine of precious minerals and many other types of resources," which, according to Habib, could help create a secondary supply chain of critical minerals and reduce potential supply disruptions if managed properly.
Meanwhile, inefficient handling of e-waste can lead to toxic materials being released into the environment, causing environmental and human health problems, the study said.
Canada's e-waste recycling infrastructure has not developed at a pace in line with electronics development, said Habib.
Governments can address rising e-waste by providing more incentives for recyclers to keep up with the waste, Habib said. Product designers should also give more consideration to how metals and minerals can be more easily recovered from devices in a financially viable way, she said.
"That is something which is lacking: a bridge between these two sectors at both ends of a product, at the designer and manufacturer level, as well as the end-of-life level," she said.
But managing e-waste is a shared responsibility, she said, and consumers play a role as well.
"It's our responsibility to be mindful of our consumption patterns," said Habib. "We really don't need to upgrade our product every year or every two years if it's fully functional and providing the service we bought it for."
Her research calls for more attention to be given to improving repair, refurbishment and product life extension opportunities rather than focusing solely on recycling and material recovery.
"Repair is something which we have forgotten in high-income societies," she said. "But we should really focus and promote where it is possible to repair a product before discarding it."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 8, 2023.
Tyler Griffin, The Canadian Press
More than 11.5 million tree seedlings destined for Quebec forests were destroyed last year
CBC
Sun, May 7, 2023
This pile of small trees rejected by the government in 2022 is part of the 11.5 million plants that will be turned into compost. (Priscilla Plamondon Lalancette/Radio-Canada - image credit)
While reforestation efforts are at the heart of the fight against climate change around the world, more than 11.5 million tree seedlings destined for Quebec forests were destroyed last year.
Ironically, it was extreme weather conditions that forced plant nurseries to discard those that did not meet the government's criteria.
The significant losses, valued at $3.6 million, represent almost nine per cent of the trees that were poised to be planted in the province.
"Because the plants are produced outdoors, they are subject to increasingly frequent weather hazards in a context of climate change," the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry said in an email.
"Early frosts in the fall, a lack of snow, a mild spell during the winter or late frosts in the spring can cause significant damage to the plants."
Priscilla Plamondon Lalancette/Radio-Canada
The ministry says 83 per cent of the trees destroyed in 2022 were related to extreme weather events.
Stéphane Boucher, president of Quebec's forest plant producers, says that over the past 10 years, the weather has been the source of headaches for nurseries and silviculture companies.
"There are people who replant trees that did not get their plants. There are sites that have not been reforested," he said.
His nursery in Saint-Ambroise, in the province's Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region, was one of the two most affected by losses in Quebec, with two million plants destroyed.
Priscilla Plamondon Lalancette/Radio-Canada
The most significant damage occurred in the Abitibi-Témiscamingue region, where the Serres coopératives de Guyenne, a greenhouse, had to dispose of eight million trees.
In total, 14 times more plants were destroyed in the province than in 2021.
"It's still quite spectacular, the increase we see in the loss of forest plants produced by our nurseries," said Jean-François Boucher, a professor in eco-advising at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi.
He studies the roles that reforestation and afforestation — the process of creating forests that haven't existed before — have in the fight against global warming.
"[These losses] challenge us in relation to the adaptation to climate change that must be done," he said.
Most trees were viable, says nursery owner
According to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, "when the seedlings are no longer of sufficient quality to ensure their survival and recovery on the planting site, they cannot be used."
However, growers feel that a fair number of trees that were tossed out last year were, in fact, viable. "The department only picks up the plants that have no defects," said Stéphane Boucher, with Quebec's forest plant producers.
He said most of the two million tree seedlings in his nursery that he was forced to throw away in 2022 were viable.
"It sure breaks my heart," he said.
Priscilla Plamondon Lalancette/Radio-Canada
Healthy trees end up in these piles of plant waste because they are deemed too small, Boucher says. The same goes for plants that have developed two heads following a frost or those whose roots are not sufficiently compact.
Faced with the climate emergency, producers and experts believe that many wasted trees could have been planted in forests to sequester carbon, especially since reforestation targets are still far from being met.
Professor Jean-François Boucher Boucher is calling on Quebec to rectify the situation, considering that many of the quality criteria for seedlings are not supported by science, he says.
"They must be of such and such a height, such and such a diameter, such and such a root mass and the roots must have such and such a shape," he said.
"There are a lot of criteria that are imposed on nurseries, and in the idea of being agile with respect to climate change, I think we will have to be more flexible."
Adapting to climate change
For three generations, Stéphane Boucher's nursery has been producing seedlings for reforestation programs in Quebec's Saguenay forests.
Technologies have evolved considerably since 1985. The germination of multi-cell seedlings is now done in a greenhouse to better control the conditions necessary for tree growth.
Plants sown indoors alternate between greenhouses and the outdoors to gain strength. To limit the risk of losses due to winter conditions and the lack of snow cover that previously protected the plants, the nursery became the first in Quebec to make the gradual shift to freezing the seedlings three years ago.
Priscilla Plamondon-Lalancette/Radio-Canada
Currently, 400,000 small conifers are dormant in a cold storage facility, protected from the elements. Last fall, they were wrapped in a plastic bag to preserve their moisture, then placed in a cardboard box before being frozen. All that remains is to ship them to the field where they will be planted.
This technique is used in Sweden, Norway and British Columbia.
Part of this centuries-old Quebec farm has been swallowed, maybe permanently, by the river
CBC
Sun, May 7, 2023
Flood waters inundated Claude Méthot's property on Monday, covering his fields with sand and clay. (Submitted by Claude Méthot - image credit)
It took Claude Méthot a couple of days to fully comprehend the extent of the damage to his farm in Baie-Saint-Paul, Que.
He says the land that he bought three years ago has been cultivated for hundreds of years.
The fields that had been ready for another season of wheat, corn or oats are now covered with sand and clay.
"We will not be able to farm this field anymore," said Méthot. He figures he's lost about 10 per cent of his land.
"It's a primal, visceral fear and shock just to see where there was this gorgeous wheat field last year. Now it's a river."
Unsure if he can recoup his losses, Méthot is one of the farmers in the region left reeling from the flooding and heavy rainwaters that hit the region on Monday.
Not only will this hurt his bottom line, but Méthot says the weather event could threaten Charlevoix's agricultural scene — a part of the region's heritage.
Submitted by Claude Méthot
'The field is going to be invaded again'
When the water levels rose on Monday, Méthot says the current swallowed up the riverbank that separated his fields from the water — essentially washing away two to three metres of land. Méthot says he's worried about the future of his property.
"The field is going to be invaded again by the flood because there's no more wall or nothing to prevent [even] a mild rise in the river from overtaking the terrain … It's just a field, but I still feel that," said Méthot.
He says considerable work goes into making his fields productive. He had removed rocks and cleared the surface. The result was a bumper crop of oats last year. Méthot says even if he has lost only 10 per cent of his land, it will hurt him financially.
"I have taken that revenue away from my financial outlook," said Méthot. "I'm not counting on it because it's quite unclear if I'm going to be able to recoup any of that."
Pride in local production
Submitted by Claude Méthot
Méthot was drawn to to the Charlevoix region by its agricultural history and its renowned cheese, meat and milk products. He says now, that has "eroded away."
"Agriculture is important in itself but that's bigger than just agriculture. It's part of the heritage of Charlevoix. It represents what Quebec is, in the hearts and minds of a lot of people. When you drive around, when you look around, when you taste [products]," said Méthot.
He says there is a sense of pride in producing locally and contributing to the region's output.
"Talk to all the farmers around here," said Méthot. "Everybody is going to express that. They work 18 hours a day. And they're proud of that contribution, they're proud of what they're doing and it's all that [work] that's being nibbled at [by the flooding]."
A third of seedlings lost
Nicol Simard, a farmer, dairy producer and president of the Charlevoix branch of the agricultural producers' union, has also suffered damage, losing about 12 hectares of arable land.
"I just lost the feed for at least 25 animals," said Simard.
"Land in Charlevoix is quite rare. The lowlands bordered by the Rivière du Gouffre are the warmest places in the region because of a microclimate. They are practically all gone with Monday's flood."
He says he hopes there will be support for farmers in the region and prevention measures for future floods — such as building retaining walls.
Colin Côté-Paulette/Radio-Canada
Elsa Girard, the co-owner of a family business that grows grain and raises organic poultry, says the river has claimed part of the fields, ruining part of the crop.
"Usually we buy about $100,000 to $120,000 worth of seedlings. I would say to you that perhaps a third of what was planted will not see the light of day," said Girard.
"With all the rocks, all the mud on the fields right now, I don't think that it will be recoverable."
'In Charlevoix, people are resilient'
Girard says they were fortunate their animals were not injured in the flooding and their employees are okay.
"For sure there are losses, but it's nothing compared to loss of life," said Girard referring to the two firefighters who died after being swept up in the river. Girard noted that the body of one of the firefighters was found close to her property by the water.
"In Charlevoix, people are resilient. I think that's what defines us ... This is not our first storm."
Rachel Watts/CBC
Yves Laurencelle, president of the Quebec City and North Shore branch of the agricultural union, says the mud will prevent crops from growing and will have to be removed in the next few weeks.
"Six farmers have called us to talk about land loss. We know that there will be total crop losses for certain crops," said Laurencelle.
In an emailed statement, Quebec Agriculture Minister André Lamontagne called the situation in Baie-Saint-Paul "difficult," and said he has been in communication with the agricultural union since the start of the flooding.
"The primary objective is to ensure the safety of people and animals. We have yet to assess the overall impact on agricultural businesses. Various insurance programs exist to mitigate this type of event," read the statement.
