Alberta farmers tout new digital technologies to save costs, time

Lisa Johnson 


Some Alberta farmers say fast-advancing digital technologies have already become ingrained in their multi-generational family operations.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal

 A barley field south of Edmonton.

Willie and Nick Banack help operate a 2,800-hectare (7,000 acre) grain farm in the Camrose area. They spoke at a panel discussion Thursday with farmers from across Canada about their adoption of new agricultural technologies, from light bar GPS guidance for machinery to auto-steering technology and more sophisticated apps that collect and analyze data from the field.

“This technology is easier to use than it ever has been,” said Willie Banack, who said the digital age has produced profound changes for his industry since he started farming in the early 1990s.

“Our farm has expanded almost three-fold in that time frame,” he said, adding digital tools have allowed operators to work longer with less fatigue, and end up with less overlap or miss in the field, especially when spraying herbicides or pesticides.

The panel was hosted by Matt Eves, a representative from Bayer’s Climate FieldView, a digital agriculture platform that collects and analyzes data from the field to help producers track things like crop yield.

An agribusiness market study from the Calgary Economic Development Forum published in 2020 noted the “precision farming” market, including the use of information technology and GPS, was estimated to grow from US $7 billion in 2020 to US $12.8 billion by 2025. Producers on Thursday’s panel said they’ve bought into digital tools to help them make better decisions about where to invest resources.

“One of the biggest things that has changed for us, as in keeping track of data, is the ability to really look at where input costs are, making sure that we’re putting the right amounts of product on the right fields in the right time and the right place,” said Willie Banack.

Nick Banack said during last summer’s heatwave, using an app to quickly find where crops were being affected by drought conditions helped the farm to determine where in the fields they should apply fungicide.

“That was a pretty big cost savings for us this year because for a pretty large portion of our fields, we were really not going to do anything with that fungicide,” he said.

Brian Witdouck said at the panel he knew his family’s Lethbridge-area seed production operation needed to adopt digital tools for the long term.

“I knew if we did not take advantage of it, you were already checking out, it was a slow decline for you,” said Witdouck.

Kevin Witdouck said his father and uncles used to check their irrigation equipment manually every morning, but now he uses an app to get notifications on his cellphone if an irrigation pivot shuts off. His message to older generations when it comes to adopting digital tools is to “get on it.”

“I guess we have a few headaches, but then there’s a huge (return on investment) on it,” he said.

MANITOBA

Art exhibit melds biology, Indigenous perspectives


Artist Mary Anne Barkhouse’s exhibit “opimihaw” at the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba is the culmination of a lifelong love affair with art and biology.

“Ever since I [was] a kid, I’ve been fascinated with biology and art,” Barkhouse said. “That separation between art and science — I don’t see it as having ever existed.”

Barkhouse is Namgis, Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw, and originally hails from British Columbia. Her experiences as an Indigenous person made her intimately familiar with issues like food sovereignty and ensuring the integrity of the landscape.

In her nation, the major issue is deforestation, Barkhouse said.

She comes from an Indigenous and European background and this is reflected in her art. Her mother is from a famous carving Indigenous family in British Columbia, while her father hails from Nova Scotia.

“From both sides of my family, I’ve had very direct experiences with [land] stewardship,” Barkhouse said. “I’m familiar with both coasts from Nova Scotia to British Columbia, and here I am in the Prairies.”

In her art, she looks to create juxtapositions between Indigenous knowledge and histories with European perspectives to play with audiences.

Her goal is to tease out conversations about the species impacted by changes to the ecosystem and the role people can play in the revitalization of the landscape.

“There’s these two threads that are going through the exhibition and through my artwork.

“I bring my own perspective and background to it, but I also hope that when people are looking at [it], they bring their own experience to it, and that the pieces themselves are open for interpretation, and that people can draw not only an aesthetic appreciation but a personal community thread from the different artworks.”

Barkhouse cited the return of bison to Wanuskewin in Saskatchewan as the major impetus behind the project. The bison are a critical image on the plains and are featured throughout her work in “opimihaw.”

Opimihaw is the name of the creek running through Wanuskewin.

A herd of bison was recently released onto the landscape at Wanuskewin set Barkhouse’s artist mind aflame.

“I was looking into the return of bison from both the ecological perspective and what that meant to the land, and I was also looking at it from the Indigenous perspective and looking for common threads from where I’m from originally,” Barkhouse said. “A lot of the time, things these species do are in direct competition to human interests, which [is] exactly why they’ve been killed over the past hundred years — but they have a job … it’s exciting for me to be showing.”

Barkhouse is known for her work with bronze sculptures, but the “opimihaw” art installation draws on several different materials, including textiles and ceramics.

As visitors make their way through the installation, she hopes they are considering why different animals and materials are featured and what makes them important.

“It goes back to their own personal relationship to land. Their own personal relationship to whatever community they belong to,” Barkhouse said. “They think about those relationships and how there is that cause and effect between the smallest thing you can do and the daily choices that we make.”

Her pieces do not attempt to anthropomorphize the animals. Instead, she focuses on how the animals have been perfectly crafted by evolution to fit their ecological niche.

Barkhouse works to push the idea of the Prairies being the animals’ home so viewers think about what types of guests they are; to help promote this analogy, they are placed in domestic settings.

“Are we terrible house guests?” Barkhouse said with a laugh. “That’s part of what I’m trying to get at by placing these animals.”

Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba curator Lucie Lederhendler said it was challenging bringing the exhibit together due to the size of some of the pieces, but she has tried to arrange the displays in a way that gets the audience thinking.

The exhibit speaks to concerns regarding the changing landscape of the Prairies, Lederhendler said, which is a message Westman residents can relate to.

The show is a special exhibit to Brandon, she added, because of Barkhouse’s ability to incorporate biology into her work, inspiring conversations and meaningful dialogue about humanity’s place on the natural landscape.

She added “opimihaw” creates a unique worldview that can teach people to see the landscape in new ways.

Lederhendler cited the large Wanuskewin tapestry with bison as an example.

“It’s about creating an interior space and showing how things reference each other,” Lederhendler said.

“opimihaw” has its opening reception, featuring the Sweet Medicine Singers, today at the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba at 7 p.m. A guided tour of the exhibit with Barkhouse will be available Friday at 1 p.m. The art installation will be on display at the AGSM until April 9.

» ckemp@brandonsun.com

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Chelsea Kemp, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Brandon Sun

Canada's Calvalley says it suspended oil operations in Yemen's Hadramout

ADEN (Reuters) - Canada's Calvalley Petroleum has suspended its operations and exploration in Yemen's Hadramout province due to deteriorating security conditions after having resumed activities in the war-torn country in mid-2019, the company said.

It confirmed a Jan. 17 notice to staff and contractors, seen by Reuters, announcing suspension of activities in block 9, citing production and transportation disruption since Dec. 14 from checkpoints outside the company's gate and road blocks.

"The company will not be resuming its production and development operations until solutions are found to the deteriorating security conditions," the firm said in an emailed response to Reuters last week.

Tribal members in Hadramout in South Yemen had blocked roads in protest over several issues including power outages, unpaid public sector wages and the province's share of oil sales, according to a Jan. 25 letter by local authorities on Facebook.

Hadramout is under control of the internationally recognised government that is backed by a Saudi-led coalition, which intervened in March 2015 against the Iran-aligned Houthi movement that now largely controls the north.

Yemen had been pumping some 127,000 barrels per day (bpd) but the war choked energy output, which now stands at some 60,000 bpd, according to government data.

Like other international oil firms, Calvalley shut down work in 2015, but it resumed production in July 2019 in block 9, where it has a 50% interest, at 3,500 bpd, with output rising to 6,700 bpd in November 2021, it said.

It launched a 3D seismic programme for new exploration prospects in block 9, which contains total proven and probable reserves of around 42.2 million barrels, according to the firm.

(Reporting by Mohammed Ghobari and Reyam Mokhashef, Additional reporting by Nia Williams; Writing by Ghaida Ghantous; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

What Indigenous people can teach us about fighting climate change

Catherine Clifford

CNBC

Julian Brave NoiseCat is a writer and advocate for Indigenous people. He himself is a member of the Secwepemc First Nation and a descendant of the Líl'wat Nation of Mount Currie of British Columbia.
He says change is a call to re-evaluate the relationship humans have with the world, and that can start with on a personal level.

He also notes that modern practices in areas like wildfire control and fishery management are returning closer to Indigenous practices.

© Provided by CNBC Julian Brave Noisecat

Julian Brave NoiseCat is a writer and advocate for Indigenous people. He himself is a member of the Secwepemc First Nation and a descendant of the Líl'wat Nation of Mount Currie of British Columbia.

NoiseCat suggests climate change is a call for humans to re-evaluate our relationships with the world, starting on a very intimate and personal basis.

In addition to his work as an advocate for Indigenous peoples, NoiseCat is a strategic political operator. He is credited with spearheading the campaign to get President Biden to nominate Deb Haaland to be the Secretary of the Interior, making her the first Native American to lead a cabinet-level agency.

NoiseCat is a fellow of New America and the Type Media Center and was the Vice President of Policy & Strategy at Data for Progress, a progressive think tank. And last year, for all of his leadership with his writing and politically, he was included on the "TIME 100 Next" list of emerging leaders.

Here, in this edition of CNBC's series on addressing climate anxiety, Noisecat shares how indigenous people's framework for relating to the natural world is worth learning from and why it is important for responding to climate change in a sustained way.

Here's a selection Noisecat's conversation with CNBC, lightly edited and condensed for brevity.

Humans are part of nature

The conceptualization of humanity and the natural environment as separate is one of the linchpin theoretical moves in Western political philosophy.

In my view, that separation of these two things — humans and the world we live in — make it possible to exploit and extract from nature because we are seen as a separate from it.

And that's a very distinct system of epistemology from one that you might might see in an Indigenous context.

We view ourselves as in relation to specific places, and maybe even in some instances, view those places themselves as having a spirit and a conscience.

I went fishing a number of times in August. I went dip netting for salmon at Farwell Canyon on the Chilcotin River with Williams Lake First Nation Chief Willie Sellars, Esk'et hereditary chief Francis Johnson Jr. and their families. And when we fish we, we pray to the river beforehand, and we give thanks for what we are going to bring home.

© Provided by CNBC Julian Brave NoiseCat (L) and Darryl Sellars

 fishing for salmon at Farwell Canyon on the Chilcotin River.

There is power and agency in honoring and recognizing who you are and where you come from. I think that's a very basic but important point. There's strength in that.

An attachment to place and respect of a place and where you are in the environment, in the natural world, creates an imperative to defend and protect and preserve those places.

That's what we see Indigenous peoples and movements doing all over the world. And in the broadest sense, that's what everybody should be called to do right now is to protect and preserve our world.

In the fast-paced modern world, we don't have any notion that we are in relationship with the natural world.

We don't have a notion that we should really give thanks for the things that we get from the natural world.

That sounds really hokey and kind of basic. But if you actually work to act on that in your life, profound shifts can come from just those very simple places.
A return to old ways

I am not saying that is enough to fight climate change.

We do need to scale up the share of renewables on the grid. We do need to figure out how to transition some of these industrial processes like steel production and cement to zero carbon forms of manufacturing. We do need to figure out how to clean up the agricultural sector.

But I think that more simply, we also need to figure out how to have a more reciprocal and just relationship with the resources and the natural world that sustain us.

And we are way off kilter right now. We are way out of balance.

There really were other ways of doing things that actually seemed to work. And in some contexts actually, ironically, we're already starting to pursue those other ways again as better ways of conducting ourselves and doing things.

In California right now there is a very serious conversation about controlled burns and forestry management that would look a lot more similar to the way Indigenous peoples managed the forest than to the way colonial economies did. The way that we manage fisheries has actually gotten a lot more close to the way that Indigenous peoples managed the fisheries back before colonization than it was in the very extractive overfishing relationship that brought us to a point where the fisheries are nearly collapsing.

In addition, there are places in the world like Canada, like parts of Amazon, and potentially now parts of the United States, where to preserve land as a carbon sink, one of the strategies and policies is being pursued is like Indigenous conservation of the land, protection of the lands to make sure that the carbon stays in the forest and in the soil.

In Indigenous contexts, the idea that we are related, that we have lots of relatives, is a really important one.

At first it extends to your blood relatives, but there is also an understanding that we are all related, which is biologically true, and that we're also related to parts of the natural world.

My people take the black bear as a relative, for example. My family from a particular part of British Columbia — our land relative is the black bear.

And that idea that we need to treat each other with reciprocity and love and compassion, because we are at the end of the day, all related, I think that that's a really, really important one.

To actually have love and compassion and to believe that we do actually have a responsibility to protect the non-human world from destruction.

We have a hard time as humans just having compassion just for each other, let alone for the salmon, for the wildlife, for the birds, for the water, for the mountains, the forest....

But maybe we should. Maybe we should care for those things because we're related to them. That's also a pretty different way of engaging with the world, and to me a compelling one.

Also in this series:
Climate psychologist says neither gloom-and-doom nor extreme solution-obsessed optimism is the best way to discuss climate change productively
Climate change is radicalizing young people — here's what that means and how to combat despair
Grief and anxiety over climate change drove this 30-year-old to write a letter to his future child
18-year-old climate activist shares how she finds courage to face a 'ticking time bomb'
The case for 'hope punk' when talking about climate change: 'To be hopeless is to be uninformed'
Yale psychologist: How to cope in a world of climate disasters, trauma and anxiety

CANADA
Pandemic highlights gaps in First Nation health care

The latest wave of COVID-19 is highlighting the gaps First Nations face in health care, pushing forward a conversation advocates have been having for decades.

The past two years have been the most challenging time in Melanie MacKinnon’s 25-year career. She is the lead for the Manitoba First Nations COVID-19 pandemic response co-ordination team, a partnership between the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakinak, First Nations Health and Social Secretariat of Manitoba and Keewatinohk Inniniw Minoayawin.

The fourth wave of the pandemic has been different because the omicron variant of the virus appeared quickly and aggressively.

“It was in a handful of communities to start and then, of course, that grew in more days and in the first couple of weeks,” MacKinnon said.

The pandemic response team has been trying to keep up with increasing volumes of infections, testing for COVID-19 and contact tracing, on top of traditional public health protocols and guidelines that have been actioned in previous waves.

“It was very apparent that the workload burden or the demand given our supply was going to be challenging to manage in those first couple weeks. The ability to pivot was also a pretty significant strength of all the partners,” MacKinnon said.

Omicron was also different because it arrived in nations during the holiday season — a time where staffing levels are already fairly low. Illness and absenteeism throughout the workforce have been additional obstacles.

These experiences create unique challenges in First Nation communities because resources are much more finite and need to be preserved and protected, MacKinnon said.

The pandemic response team was fortunate to deploy rapid molecular tests in several First Nation communities, but keeping up with the increased testing volume proved challenging, she added. While the province has stepped up to provide plenty of supplies, the team continues to advocate and lobby for more rapid tests, she said.

The team was able to access the federal stockpile of rapid tests in the last couple of weeks, securing about 50,000 for Manitoba.

“We’re continuing to work with our federal and provincial partners [and others] for those types of tools and technologies … to kind of pause and pull their existing resources to build that surge support roster so we can help that local finite health resources to ensure there is some sustainability there.”

For decades it has been well documented that First Nations are at higher risk when it comes to maintaining health supports, MacKinnon said, and this has only been further substantiated by the omicron wave.

Factors include overcrowded housing, lack of potable water, poverty, income insecurity and limited access to comprehensive health-care services close to home.

“There’s long-standing health status concerns with respect to long-standing chronic diseases, like hypertension and diabetes. The list goes on as to what puts us at higher risk,” MacKinnon said.

There are going to be long-term effects and consequences from the pandemic from a societal perspective, but there will also be opportunities that emerge during this time of adversity.

The pandemic has highlighted cracks in the health-care system when it comes to care available to First Nations, even if these issues were already known in communities or through advocacy and research for many years.

“This has been a conversation for most of my career and for others, much, much longer. It’s not new, unfortunately, but I do think we would all collectively be remiss if we didn’t take this time and this opportunity to reframe system improvements,” MacKinnon said.

Organizational leads are working to foster positive change, she said, including the Southern Chief’s Organization Federal Health Transformation Program, Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs and others.

The team is noticing a fatigued workforce throughout the health-care system across Manitoba and Canada. The recovery stage of the pandemic will require some intensive support, and possibly areas of other investments in regard to other losses the sector has experienced in terms of people leaving the industry.

“None of us have done this work alone in the past 22 to 24 months. It has been a real collaboration between both levels of government, as well as our First Nation leaders and our health system and health-care leaders, to really come together and build the biggest suspension bridge to overcome those jurisdictional gaps that we’ve experienced in the past,” MacKinnon said. “Our hope and our intent [is] for that degree of collaboration to continue well after this pandemic.”

» ckemp@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @The_ChelseaKemp

Chelsea Kemp, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Brandon Sun

CRIMINAL CRYPTO CAPITALI$M

The Wonderland DeFi community is scandalized after a Twitter user outed an anonymous executive with ties to one of the largest crypto Ponzi schemes in history

prosen@insider.com (Phil Rosen) 

Alice in Wonderland illustration by Sir John Tenniel,

19th Century Andrew Howe/Getty Images

A top executive at DeFi platform Wonderland was revealed to be Michael Patryn, a cofounder of failed crypto exchange QuadrigaCX.

Regulators concluded that QuadrigaCX was a Ponzi scheme after about $190 million of crypto went missing in 2018.

 
Wonderland's token, TIME, plummeted to an all-time low of $335 Thursday, down from its November peak of $10,000.

 
Fans of the popular decentralized finance platform Wonderland are reeling after a Twitter user revealed the identity of a top executive, who previously was involved in one of the biggest cryptocurrency scandals in history.

Until recently, Michael Patryn was known anonymously as "Sifu" within the Wonderland community and was in charge of managing its treasury. But he gained notoriety previously as a cofounder of the failed Canadian crypto exchange QuadrigaCX. And before that, he was involved in money scams, fraud, and burglary.

Since his identity was outed, he has stepped back from his role at Wonderland, which describes itself as the "first decentralized cross-chain reserve currency protocol on the TIME token."

Serviced on the Avalanche blockchain network, the DeFi platform offers yields of 83,000% for investors who lend crypto into the basket of assets backing its native token. According to its website, Wonderland's treasury balance is nearly $675 million, and there are over 820,000 TIME tokens staked.

The Wonderland Discord channel has over 91,000 members, and conversations include everything from memes to technical analyses to debates over price fluctuations. But the revelation of Patryn's involvement in Wonderland has spooked members of the community, who refer to themselves as "Frog Nation."

Even before Quadriga's collapse, Patryn – who has previously used the name Omar Dhanani, among others – had a criminal record. He served time in federal prison and was deported to Canada after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit credit-and-bank card fraud in 2005, and burglary, computer fraud and grand larceny in 2007.

Then in 2013, Patryn and Gerald Cotten cofounded QuadrigaCX, which ballooned into one of Canada's largest crypto exchanges. But in 2019, Cotten died on a trip to India just 12 days after modifying his will.

His wife didn't announce the death until more than a month later, and the Wall Street Journal reported Cotten had left approximately $250 million in a crypto vault to which he alone could access. The company filed bankruptcy two weeks later.

As heaps of money left the company's online accounts and moved through exchanges commonly used by money launderers, evidence began to mount that foul play was at hand.

Soon after, news broke that approximately $190 million worth of cryptocurrency owed to 115,000 customers was deemed missing. The Ontario Securities Commission has since determined that QuadrigaCX was a Ponzi scheme.

"What happened at Quadriga was an old-fashioned fraud wrapped in modern technology," the regulator said.

Patryn had kept a low profile since the QuadrigaCX scandal, operating under his online pseudonym. In September, Wonderland launched its TIME token. Patryn has been described as a core member of the founding team.

And then on Wednesday, Patryn's true identity was revealed.

"This needs to be shared @0xSifu is the Co-founder of QuadrigaCX, Michael Patryn. If you are unfamiliar [with QuadrigaCX], that is the Canadian exchange that collapsed in 2019 after the founder Gerald Cotten disappeared with $169m," said Twitter sleuth Zachxbt.eth, who in the past has exposed various shady actors in the digital asset space.

Given QuadrigaCX's reputation as one of the most notorious "exit scams" in digital asset history, Frog Nation's confidence in Wonderland has wavered.

"Lesson is, never invest in coins with ponzinomics!" tweeted Crypto Moon Coins.

Another twitter user lamented, "Everytime something like this happens it makes our industry look extremely incompetent. Ashame."

The native Wonderland token, TIME, crashed to an all-time low of $335 on Thursday from its November peak of about $10,000 after several mass-liquidations, making it one of the worst-performing coins, even amid a broader decline in the crypto market.

Meanwhile, the DeFi platform is currently in talks for a merger with crypto lending market Abracadabra.

Wonderland founder Daniele Sestagalli later confirmed Zachxbt.eth's allegations in a tweet and then in a formal statement. He noted "the past of an individual doesn't determine their future," but conceded that Patryn needed to step down as treasury manager until "a vote for his confirmation is in place."

To provide reassurance about the safety of Wonderland, he explained that all funds in Wonderland are safeguarded with "a multi-sign" process between himself and others on the Wonderland team.

"I hope the community now comes together and decides what the future looks like and who they want managing their money," wrote Sestagalli.
Read the original article on Business Insider

THE YEAR KENNEY/UCP WAS ELECTED

Town of High Level still waiting for Alberta government to pay $2.6M for 2019 wildfire costs

Madeleine Cummings 

After racking up $2.6 million in debt from fighting a wildfire more than two years ago, the northern Alberta town of High Level says it has been shouldering costs that should be the provincial government's responsibility.

Mayor Crystal McAteer told CBC News on Friday that protecting High Level and other communities from the Chuckegg Creek wildfire cost the town more than $10 million. The town borrowed the money to pay for firefighting crews, equipment and other expenses.

A week after the fire broke out, in May of 2019, the town started submitting its costs to the province, expecting repayment through the Disaster Recovery Program (DRP).

McAteer said the province paid back a lot of the money quickly but the town has been waiting more than a year for the remaining chunk. Meanwhile, interest payments and human resources fees have exceeded $600,000.

"$2.6 million to a community our size is a huge deal," she said. The small town had a population of 3323 residents in 2020.

"A lot of projects don't get done when you're still owed that amount of money," McAteer said.

© Trevor Wilson/CBC Crystal McAteer says $2.6 million in missing disaster recovery funds from the province puts the small town in a difficult position.

About 740 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, High Level is surrounded by the boreal forest and its council has an annual budget of $12-$20 million.

The debt is affecting the town's borrowing power, McAteer said, as well as plans for a multipurpose evacuation centre.

McAteer said that in the past, the Office of the Fire Commissioner covered emergency expenses for other municipalities affected by wildfires but in 2019 High Level was asked to bear the cost because the provincial budget had not yet been passed.

The Chuckegg Creek wildfire forced thousands of people from their homes in northwestern Alberta and destroyed more than a dozen homes on the Paddle Prairie Métis Settlement.

By late August of 2019, the fire was under control and after burning more than 331,000 hectares, the province declared it was out in October of 2020.

The town has asked the government for the remaining funds, reimbursement for service costs and post-emergency funding.

"It is sadly a slow process," Peace River MLA Dan Williams told the town council in a meeting on Monday.

Williams told council he had spoken with Municipal Affairs Minister Ric McIver about the issue earlier that day and would bring it up with him again.

He said cash flow problems and lost opportunity costs have become a problem for multiple municipalities, including the Paddle Prairie Métis Settlement, Mackenzie County and the County of Northern Lights.

"I do not understand why," he said. "The best understanding I have is that, like I said, forensic level of accounting, and they're going through this in a very nuanced way."

"We recognize that the DRP process can seem to take a frustratingly long amount of time and the Minister wholeheartedly sympathises with those who have been impacted by natural disasters and their aftermath," said McIver's press secretary Greg Smith.

He said the remaining amount is being reviewed to ensure costs meet eligibility guidelines.

He said disaster recovery programs are typically open for five years to allow for multi-year construction projects to be completed and that before the provincial government can receive Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangements from the federal government, each program is independently audited and audited by Public Safety Canada.

The provincial government anticipates the balance will be paid in full by June 30.

UNIVERSAL BASIC INCOME #UBI

Meet a mom of 2 who gets $1,000 a month through a basic income program — which helped her family pay their bills after an unexpected crisis

jlalljee@insider.com (Jason Lalljee) - 

© Kimberly McNairMcNair has been a part of Magnolia since last March, and will continue receiving $1,000 a month for the next two months. Kimberly McNair

Kimberly McNair is receiving $1,000 a month for one year through a basic-income program.
The program is currently helping 100 low-income Black mothers like her in Jackson, Mississippi.
Most basic-income programs are designed to help those who typically experience higher rates of poverty.

When Kimberly McNair got into a car crash last year, she didn't know how she would pay for the damages.

McNair, 35, didn't have car insurance. Her vehicle was totaled. Without the insurance, she had to pay for a new ride out of pocket. She suddenly found herself in debt for two cars.

"I need a car to get to work, to get groceries, and to pick the kids up from school," she told Insider. "So that didn't leave me with a lot of other options."

McNair qualified to be a participant in the Magnolia Mother's Trust, a basic-income program in Jackson, Mississippi, that provides $1,000 a month to 100 low-income Black mothers for a year. Funded by a combination of individual and institutional donors, Magnolia has been giving out money since 2018, and is currently on its third cohort of mothers.

Basic-income programs like Magnolia have been surging in popularity over the past few years across the globe, especially as the pandemic caused financial strain for many low-income households. Insider reported last month that there are at least 33 currently or recently active basic-income programs throughout the US.

Basic-income programs differ from traditional welfare programs in that they come with no strings attached: Recipients can do whatever they want with the money, and don't have to report what they use it for.

Programs like Magnolia specifically target low-income members of groups that typically face financial hardship. California, for instance, provides funds for programs geared toward pregnant people and young adults transitioning out of the foster-care system. Another program in St. Paul, Minnesota, specifically helps parents financially impacted by the pandemic.

"The reason the Magnolia Mother's Trust is focused on Black mothers in extreme poverty is for several reasons — including the facts that show that Black women and children are more likely to live in poverty than any other demographic," Aisha Nyandoro, who runs Magnolia, told Insider. "It's impossible to talk about economic justice without accounting for race and gender, yet so many of our economic policies fail to embody that."

In addition to helping her pay for her car, McNair said that the Magnolia funds help her pay for rent, groceries, and supplies for her kids. Vitally, she said, it's also helping her tackle medical debt from previous health complications.

"People struggle every day even when having full-time jobs," McNair said. "It's never enough to just be able to do everything on your own. So the money's a big help."

 
Basic income helped McNair replace her car and pay medical debt

McNair has been a part of Magnolia since last March, and will continue receiving $1,000 a month for the next two months. She said the funds have been vital, helping her get a car after her accident, pay medical bills, and even pay for her sons' youth football league.

McNair, who works at the local unemployment office, makes about $36,000 a year. Before this gig, she was working at a call center, making $30,000. That's usually been enough to keep her and her two sons afloat, but she was hit with unexpected medical bills last year.

"I got sick a few times last year, so I went to the hospital where I had to stay overnight. I had episodes where I became ill and I didn't know where it was coming from," she said, adding that she currently owes about $6,000 in medical bills.

She said that the money from Magnolia helped address a variety of her family's expenses. She pays for groceries with food stamps, but cash from the basic-income program means that her family has more options — and that her kids can have more than one serving of food more often.

McNair said that Magnolia allows her to budget for after-school activities for her sons. They're both interested in football, and she can use funds to pay for registration and equipment.

"The kids grow so much," she said. "You buy clothes one week and the next they're too small. Just making sure that they have enough, like a decent pair of shoes and school supplies, the money goes a long way… kids don't want to feel like they don't have a life, people need an extra boost to make sure kids are able to eat out once a month and do something special, to show them that they're appreciated."

ECOCIDE

Oil spill threatens corals in eastern Thailand

BANGKOK (Reuters) - Authorities are rushing to prevent an oil spill in eastern Thailand from damaging fragile corals, after officials said on Sunday the leak that began last week was drifting towards more coastal areas.

© Reuters/SOE ZEYA TUN Oil spills in Thailand's eastern coast

Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment Varawut Silpa-archa said it was crucial to try to prevent the main mass of oil from reaching the shore at Ao Prao, a small bay on Koh Samet, which is a popular resort island.

© Reuters/SOE ZEYA TUN Oil spills in Thailand's eastern coast

"If the oil reached inside this area it could impact the beach and cause heavy damage to the shallow water corals," Varawut said.

The oil began leaking from a pipeline owned by Star Petroleum Refining Public Company Limited (SPRC) late on Tuesday.

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Before it was brought under control https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/thai-cleanup-underway-after-oil-spill-off-eastern-coast-2022-01-26, an estimated 50,000 litres (13,209 gallons) of oil escaped into the ocean 20 km (12 miles) from the coastline of eastern Thailand 

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© Reuters/SOE ZEYA TUN Oil spills in Thailand's eastern coast

Mae Ramphueng Beach in Rayong province declared a disaster area https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/thai-beach-declared-disaster-area-after-oil-spill-2022-01-29 after some oil came ashore there late on Friday.

The latest satellite image from the government's Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency (GISTDA) showed the oil spill has spread to cover 67 sq km (25.87 sq miles) area of the sea.

Most of the oil had formed a thin film rather than a thick oil slick, navy spokesman Vice Admiral Pokkrong Monthatphalin told reporters, citing aerial photographs.

(Reporting by Panu Wongcha-um; editing by Barbara Lewis)

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