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A quietly negotiated trade agreement with Indonesia is a bad deal for Canada

Through its subsidiary Paper Excellence, the giant Asia Pulp & Paper conglomerate already controls much of Canada's pulp industry. The company is now suing Nova Scotia for $450 million, and the new deal will expose Canadians to even more corporate litigation before judges who are not appointed by elected governments. It's the latest "bilateral trade agreement" that threatens labour and environmental protections.

July 25, 2022 By Joan Baxter 6 Comments

Nova Scotians have a huge lawsuit hanging over their heads, but they can be forgiven for not dwelling on it in the summer of 2022, given the never-ending storm of crises swirling around them — COVID-19, the climate crisis, biodiversity collapse, runaway inflation and disaster capitalism run amok, and disintegrating democracy around the world. Still, […]

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Investigation Tagged With: anti-globalization, AP&P, Asia Pacific Economic Conference, Asia Pulp & Paper, biodiversity collapse, Boat Harbour, boreal forest, Brazil, British Columbia, British Columbia Supreme Court, Canada, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, China, Chinese banks, climate change, climate crisis, comprehensive economic partnership agreement (CEPA), corporate interests, Council of Canadians, default, democracy, democracy index, disaster capitalism, Domtar, effluent treatment, Eka Tjipta Widjaja, Environmental Paper Network, Environmental Racism, fibre, flawed democracy, forest products, Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), forests, France, free trade agreement, Global Affairs Canada, global justice, greenhouse gas emissions, Greenpeace Canada, Greenpeace Indonesia, House of Commons, Indonesia, industrial approval, inflation, investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), judicial review, lawsuit, litigious, Megawati Sukarnoputri, Nike, Nikolas Barry-Shaw, non-tariff barriers, Northern Pulp, Northumberland Strait, Nova Scotia, Nova Scotia Environment, nova scotia supreme court, Oei Ek Tjhong, OKI pulp mill, Ontario, palm oil, Paper Excellence, Parliamentary Committee on International Trade, Pictou Landing First Nation, Policy Options, pulp and paper, pulp mill, Quebec, RCMP, Resolute Forest Products, rubber, Saskatchewan, Sergio Baffoni, Shane Moffatt, Shanghai, Sinar Mas Group, Southeast Asia, Suahrul Fitra, Suharto, tariff, United States, Wall Street Journal, Widjaja family, wood pulp

An Indonesian company is increasingly controlling Canada’s pulp industry, but regulators seem unwilling to act

Paper Excellence, already Canada’s largest pulp and paper producer, now plans to swallow Resolute Forest Products.

July 6, 2022 By Joan Baxter 3 Comments

Today news broke that pulp and paper giant Paper Excellence is about to swallow up Canada’s Resolute Forest Products in a deal worth US$2.7 billion. “We are very alarmed by this development,” says Shane Moffatt, head of Greenpeace Canada’s Nature and Food Campaign. “It calls for much greater scrutiny of the ownership of Paper Excellence. […]

Filed Under: Commentary, Environment, Featured Tagged With: AP&P, Asia Pulp and Paper, biodiversity, Brazil, British Columbia, British Columbia Supreme Court, Canfor, Catalyst Paper, China, Chinese banks, Companies" Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA), Comprehensive Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA), creditors, Darrell Dexter, default, deforestation, Deutsche Bank, Domtar, Eldorado mill, Environmental Paper Network, environmental record, forests, France, free trade agreement, greenhouse gas emissions, Greenpeace, Hervey Investment BV, Howe Sound, Indonesia, Inter-corporate ownership, logging, MacKenzie pulp mill, Netherlands, Northern Pulp, Northern Timber, Paper Excellence, Paper Excellence BV, peat fires, Powell River, pulp and paper, pulp fibre, pulp mills, Quebec, Resolute Forest Products, Saskatchewan, Sergio Baffoni, Shane Moffatt, Sinar Mas Group, SMG, Statistics Canada, tax haven, Timothy Mapes, United States, Wall Street Journal, Widjaja family

The “weird” legal mechanism being used by Northern Pulp in its $450 million lawsuit against Nova Scotia

Northern Pulp's biggest debt is a paper debt to its owner, Paper Excellence, and that indebtedness is being used to circumvent Nova Scotia's environmental laws.

June 11, 2022 By Joan Baxter 5 Comments

This is the second of a two-part story examining how the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act is being employed in a lawsuit seeking $450 million from the province of Nova Scotia. Read Part 1 here. Three months before Mountain Equipment Co-op went to the British Columbia Supreme Court for creditor protection in 2020, Northern Pulp – […]

Filed Under: Featured, Investigation, News, Province House Tagged With: 1057863 B.C. Ltd., A’se’K, Anna Lund, AP&P, Asia Pulp & Paper, Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, Boat Harbour, Boat Harbour Act, British Columbia, British Columbia Court of Appeal, British Columbia Supreme Court, British Virgin Islands, Bruce Chapman, Bujung Wahab, CCAA, Chinese banks, Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, court monitor, creditor protection, creditors, debt agreement, Deloitte LLP, Deutsche Bank, Effluent Treatment Facility, environmental assessment, Environmental Racism, Erin Graces, Ernst & Young Inc, federal legislation, Hervey Investment BV (Netherlands), Howe Sound Pulp & Paper, Inter-corporate ownership, Justice Shelley Fitzpatrick, Justice Thomas Cromwell, Maurice Chiasson, MEC, mediation, Mountain Equipment Co-op, New York Stock Exchance, Northern Pulp, Nothern Pulp Nova Scotia Corporation, Nova Scotia, Nova Scotia Environment and Climate Change, nova scotia supreme court, Paper Excellence, Paper Excellence Canada Holdings Corporation, Pictou Landing First Nation, pulp mill, Robert Grant, Saskatchewan, Sinar Mas Group, Singapore, Statistics Canada, The Wall Street Journal, Timothy Mapes, Widjaja family

PRICED OUT

A collage of various housing options in HRM, including co-ops, apartment buildings, shelters, and tents
PRICED OUT is the Examiner’s investigative reporting project focused on the housing crisis.

You can learn about the project, including how we’re asking readers to direct our reporting, our published articles, and what we’re working on, on the PRICED OUT homepage.

2020 mass murders

Nine images illustrating the locations, maps, and memorials of the mass shootings

All of the Halifax Examiner’s reporting on the mass murders of April 18/19, 2020, and recent articles on the Mass Casualty Commission and newly-released documents.

Updated regularly.

Uncover: Dead Wrong

In 1995, Brenda Way was brutally murdered behind a Dartmouth apartment building. In 1999, Glen Assoun was found guilty of the murder. He served 17 years in prison, but steadfastly maintained his innocence. In 2019, Glen Assoun was fully exonerated.

Halifax Examiner founder and investigative journalist Tim Bousquet has followed the story of Glen Assoun's wrongful conviction for over five years. Now, Bousquet tells that story as host of Season 7 of the CBC podcast series Uncover: Dead Wrong.

Click here to go to listen to the podcast, or search for CBC Uncover on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast aggregator.

The Tideline, with Tara Thorne

Episode 91 of The Tideline, with Tara Thorne, is published.
Two photos: A young white brunette woman with a black mask that says "Take care make art", and a young white blonde woman smiling in a studio photo.

The Halifax Fringe Festival is celebrating its first full in-person festival since 2019, which itself was cut short by hurricane Dorian. And that’s not all — after seven festivals, executive director Lee-Anne Poole will head out the revolving door of Halifax arts org leaders and hand the reigns over to Sara Graham. Both are on the show this week to talk entrances and exits, why they do the work that they do, the festival’s present and future, and all the details you need to attend. Plus a song from the new surprise Hello Delaware album.

Listen to the episode here.

Check out some of the past episodes here.

Subscribe to the podcast to get episodes automatically downloaded to your device — there’s a great instructional article here. Email Suzanne for help. You can reach Tara here.

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Recent posts

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  • Canadian regulators giving Australia’s St Barbara what it wants August 18, 2022
  • The hallowed and ever-sustaining shrine of homemade pies August 17, 2022
  • The dreadful and dangerous habits of Nova Scotian drivers August 17, 2022
  • Nova Scotia Power, province discussing how to reduce rate shock from soaring fuel costs August 17, 2022

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