Culture and the Environment

The environment is everyone's concern!

Ontario is home to over 60 different cultures, with major language groups (outside of French and English) that include Chinese, Italian, German, Portuguese, Indo-Iranian, Greek, Polish, Spanish, Dutch, and Ukrainian. 

The challenge for Ontario's environmental movement is to ensure that everyone, no matter what culture or first language, is involved in protecting the environment.

This can be achieved in three ways:

• with environmental contacts and programs in the major cultural associations,

• by making educational material available in different languages, and

• by developing environmental projects with cultural groups

For more statistics on multiculturalism in Canada, see "Multicultural Canada: A Demographic Overview" on the Canadian Heritage - Multiculturalism website.

  

Multicultural Contacts

 
How can I contact Ontario's multicultural groups?

Settlement.org is an excellent source of information for new Canadians. The website has an extensive list of organizations, organized alphabetically, by category (including environment), or you can use a search engine to look for a specific keyword or language.  Best Bet!  

Settlement.org is managed by the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI).  Many of Ontario's multicultural agencies belong to OCASI.  Their website includes a directory of member agencies, which is also a good starting place to find multicultural agencies in your area.

In Toronto, perhaps the best place to start is Community Information Toronto (CIT), a service of the City of Toronto.  CIT publishes the Blue Book which,  for $54, will give you information on community, government, and social services in Toronto.  You can also find a copy at your local library.  The CIT website also has a list of Community Information Centres across the province.

In Peel, contact the Multicultural Inter-Agency Group (MIAG): they have a directory of agencies for the Region of Peel.

National Contacts
Cultures Canada is a project of the Canadian Ethnocultural Council.  The website has sections on cultural communities, a database of organizations that can be searched by region, and a links section.

The Canadian Heritage - Multiculturalism website has a list of links to Canadian organizations. 

 

Who is working to connect the environmental movement with cultural groups?

The Sustainability Network has published a Directory of Ethno-Cultural Organizations and the Environment.  The Directory lists contacts and case studies of groups working to connect Ontario's cultural groups with the enviornment.

In particular, here are several groups that have the environment and multiculturalism at the core of their mission: 

   Ontario Healthy Communities Coalition (OHCC)

1900 - 180 Dundas St. West, Toronto, ON M5G 1Z8
Ph: (416) 408-4841
Toll free: 1-800-766-3418
E-mail: ohcc@opc.on.ca 

The Ontario Healthy Communities Coalition seeks to achieve social, environmental, and economic health and well-being for individuals, communities and local governments. The Coalition brings together a broad-based group of communities and provincial organizations, spanning the social, environmental, economic, and political spectrums. 

  Environmental Centre for New Canadians (ECENECA) 

contac:t: Yuga Juma Onziga,, Executive Director of ECENECA 
590 Jarvis Street, 2rd Floor, Toronto, ON M4Y 2J4, Canada P
Phone 416-927-1333  E-mail: yugaonziga@eceneca.org 

ECENECA (Environmental Centre for New Canadians) is a not-for-profit, community-based, provincially incorporated environmental organization. The agency was founded in 1993 with the support of the Toronto City Hall through the Healthy City Office. Its mission is:

• To deliver environmental education through workshops, seminars and audio visual training materials so as to assist new immigrants to adapt to Canadian culture pertaining to environmental issues.
• To promote health care education for new immigrants to Canada to ensure that medical examinations are performed as soon as they enter Canada by providing education and list of treatment centers.
• To provide job skills training to the unemployed, needy or low skilled immigrants.
• To assist needy or other underprivileged immigrants with a variety of settlement and other charitable programs with a view to assist with their adaptation to Canadian civic society.

  Multiracial Network for Environmental Justice (MNEJ) (no website available)

#204 - 1076 Bathurst Street, c/o Hispanic Development Council (HDC), Toronto, ON M5R 3G9
Phone: 416-760 - 2120
Email: mnej@canada.com 

MNEJ works in close cooperation with various ethno-cultural communities to implement environmental education programs, and community walking tours of Toronto neighbourhoods.  They help raise community awareness of the environmentally significant sites in and around the local area.

  Toronto Chinese Health Education Committee (TCHEC) (no website available)

Contact: Alice Lam
168 Bathurst Street, Toronto, Ontario M5V 2R4
Phone: 416-703-9602
e-mail: alam@ctchc.com 

TCHEC seeks to raise community interest in and awareness of environmental issues including issues related to environmental health.  They run an Environmental Ambassadors program to train community volunteers in environmental issues (see Major Projects below).

  
Where can I find environmental information in different languages?

We haven't been able to find many sources of information, but here's a few places to start.

City of Toronto  
Access Toronto offers information in more than 140 languages through Language Line Services. People who cannot speak English can call 416-338-0338 for assistance in whichever language they speak.  Access Toronto also offers translations of most city factsheets.  The information is not available on the website, but can be ordered by phone or e-mail. Phone: 416-338-0338, TTY: 416-338-0TTY (0889), e-mail: access_toronto@city.toronto.on.ca 

Provincial Government
At the provincial level, the Ministry of Natural Resources has a few publications available in other languages (eg. fishing regulations in Chinese). Call the Information Access Service at 1-800-667-1940

Other Options
BabelFish:  Alta Vista's online translation service:  It's full of errors, but you can get any web page translated into French, Spanish, German, Italian,  Portuguese, Korean, Japanese, or Chinese. It even keeps the format of the original web page.

 

Major Projects

What are some of the best multicultural / environmental projects?

Environmental education and community involvement are two important ways to introduce new Canadians to our environment and our environmental practices. Here are two examples of successful projects that can be adapted for other communities, cultural and language groups. 

For these and other success stories, see the Sustainability Network's 2001 Directory of Ethno-Cultural Organizations and the Environment.
 

Environmental Ambassadors
One of the more innovative and successful projects was the Toronto Chinese Health Education Committee's (TCHEC) Environmental Ambassadors project.  Based on the "train the trainer" concept (which was also used by the Recycling Council of Ontario in their Master Composter program), volunteers learn about environmental issues through workshops and field trips.  The volunteers graduate from the course as "environmental ambassadors" and help spread the message to Chinese community groups and businesses across Toronto.  During the 1990's, the project has targetted climate change and waste in restaurants.

This is one project that needs to be revived!