The swift collapse of Afghanistan puppet government when US troops withdrew from the war with the Taliban and left the country after 20 years has been likened to the fall of Saigon at the end of the 30-year ‘American’ war against the Vietnamese people. The scenes of Afghans trying to get onto US planes at the airport to escape seem startlingly familiar to those of us who can remember the last days of Saigon.

Private control over Canada’s agricultural sector now extends well beyond farms and into the food processing and retail space, effectively securing policy and regulatory influence along the supply and value chain. The harms perpetuated by this model are having grave consequences, expanding the power of corporate players at the expense of local producers—jeopardizing livelihoods that once existed within a well-balanced landscape.

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted many segments of Canadian society, including post-secondary institutions, given, among other things, the uncertainty surrounding enrolments of international students. With the international travel restrictions in place in Canada and requests by health authorities to practice physical distancing in most of 2020, the majority of universities have been planning to utilize online learning as the primary source of teaching for the 2020/21 academic year, which may have an impact on enrolment of international and domestic students.