Editor’s note: This article is the third in a series about the Ceres Roadmap 2030, a vision for sustainable business leadership in this crucial decade. The roadmap provides a 10-year action plan to help companies navigate and thrive in the accelerated transition to a more just, equitable and sustainable economy. You can find the first article here, and the second here.
As COVID-19 spread across the United States last year, meatpackers, farmworkers, grocery clerks and warehouse employees were among the hardest hit. Many were pressured to stay on the job, if not by their employers or the government, then by the need for a paycheck.
The pandemic forced us all to confront the disparities between the haves and the have-nots in this country.
On top of that reckoning came a series of brutal killings of African-Americans engaged in everyday activities of jogging, shopping at a convenience store and sleeping at night at home. These events further shocked our collective consciousness.
A renewed urgency has emerged to address and reject systemic racial and economic injustices that have been ignored too long. And to understand that human rights, racial equity and environmental justice are now squarely business issues.
The call for a just, equitable society and economy is spoken by individuals and institutions alike, by governments — and by companies. But for many companies, examining and improving their performance on these systemic issues is new territory.
How do they adequately analyze their human rights and racial equity practices both within their own operations and throughout their supply chains? How do they assess their impacts on the communities in which they operate?
The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights have provided a broad sweep of a vision. But the granular details of how to mark this reality in day-to-day operations of a business can be perplexing.
Business leadership becomes less about being at the forefront of a movement and more about creating a platform for those communities to meaningfully influence capital markets.
A new 10-year action plan released last year could help. The Ceres Roadmap 2030 details the steps companies can take to build a just and inclusive economy, stabilize the climate and protect water and natural resources in order to address the systemic threats most likely to disrupt the global economy in the coming decade.
The goal of building a just and inclusive economy may seem daunting and even impossible in the current context of racial tension, economic inequity and widespread systemic discrimination. But companies that refuse to embrace environmental justice, to advance equity of economic opportunity and to dismantle the systems that perpetuate systemic racism do so at their own risk. Businesses that continue to hold on to obsolete business models are in danger of losing customers, employees, access to talent and a social license to operate.
The minimum standard for doing business in the next decade is a respect for the fundamental human rights of employees, both direct and indirect, as well as for people affected by corporate activities. That includes communities in which companies operate, residents of neighboring cities with which they share an aquifer or a transportation system, and consumers who use their products.
For instance, when the large banking giant Citi makes financing decisions, it evaluates client projects against environmental and social risks using a risk management system. Technology giant Dell Technologies has established human rights-focused goals across all parts of its value chain. That includes engaging supply chain workers, developing diversity and inclusion goals for its own operations and ensuring privacy protection for its customers.
The Ceres Roadmap 2030 urges companies to recognize the value of an equitable, diverse and inclusive workplace and to provide all employees with equitable opportunity, wages and benefits, and respectful treatment.
For example, health retailer CVS recruits and hires people with disabilities through its Abilities in Abundance Program and seeks out diverse local suppliers from whom to procure products through its Supplier Diversity Program.
While individual corporate action is important to ensure we achieve the necessary change at the scale required, our framework challenges companies to act beyond their four walls and be strong advocates for changing the institutions and government policies that perpetuate inequities and injustices.
In 2020, we saw some companies take laudable steps in those directions. Netflix, Levi Strauss and Merck spoke out against police brutality. The Business Roundtable and many of its member companies, such as Apple and Facebook, condemned the government program that separated immigrant children from their parents at the border or that demonstrated bias against transgender people. And other organizations, Mars and Inditex, called for enhanced government regulation on human rights and business activities to level the playing field.
But for every step forward, we saw just as many critical missteps by companies undermining our shot at a just and inclusive economy. Most notably, the passage of Proposition 22 in California, which exempted Uber from having to classify drivers as employees, and the slow creep of similar legislative proposals and referenda to other states dealt a decisive blow to gig workers who are the epitome of a 21st-century workforce but lack even 20th-century worker benefits and protections.
Unquestionably, 2020 was an unprecedented and devastating year in so many ways. The toll of human suffering beyond most imaginations was only made worse by political and racial divides that exacerbated rather than healed the pain experienced by so many.
Corporations have a responsibility to take the experiences of the last year and learn from them.
As we listen to the voices of frontline communities whose life and livelihood require that we reverse the climate crisis, advance economic and racial justice and protect precious natural resources, business leadership becomes less about being at the forefront of a movement and more about creating a platform for those communities to meaningfully influence capital markets. It truly is a moment of opportunity for business and the planet. Companies can lead by putting others forward, and thrive in doing so.
OTTAWA – Canada’s unemployment rate held steady at 6.5 per cent last month as hiring remained weak across the economy.
Statistics Canada’s labour force survey on Friday said employment rose by a modest 15,000 jobs in October.
Business, building and support services saw the largest gain in employment.
Meanwhile, finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing experienced the largest decline.
Many economists see weakness in the job market continuing in the short term, before the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts spark a rebound in economic growth next year.
Despite ongoing softness in the labour market, however, strong wage growth has raged on in Canada. Average hourly wages in October grew 4.9 per cent from a year ago, reaching $35.76.
Friday’s report also shed some light on the financial health of households.
According to the agency, 28.8 per cent of Canadians aged 15 or older were living in a household that had difficulty meeting financial needs – like food and housing – in the previous four weeks.
That was down from 33.1 per cent in October 2023 and 35.5 per cent in October 2022, but still above the 20.4 per cent figure recorded in October 2020.
People living in a rented home were more likely to report difficulty meeting financial needs, with nearly four in 10 reporting that was the case.
That compares with just under a quarter of those living in an owned home by a household member.
Immigrants were also more likely to report facing financial strain last month, with about four out of 10 immigrants who landed in the last year doing so.
That compares with about three in 10 more established immigrants and one in four of people born in Canada.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Institute for Health Information says health-care spending in Canada is projected to reach a new high in 2024.
The annual report released Thursday says total health spending is expected to hit $372 billion, or $9,054 per Canadian.
CIHI’s national analysis predicts expenditures will rise by 5.7 per cent in 2024, compared to 4.5 per cent in 2023 and 1.7 per cent in 2022.
This year’s health spending is estimated to represent 12.4 per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product. Excluding two years of the pandemic, it would be the highest ratio in the country’s history.
While it’s not unusual for health expenditures to outpace economic growth, the report says this could be the case for the next several years due to Canada’s growing population and its aging demographic.
Canada’s per capita spending on health care in 2022 was among the highest in the world, but still less than countries such as the United States and Sweden.
The report notes that the Canadian dental and pharmacare plans could push health-care spending even further as more people who previously couldn’t afford these services start using them.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
As Canadians wake up to news that Donald Trump will return to the White House, the president-elect’s protectionist stance is casting a spotlight on what effect his second term will have on Canada-U.S. economic ties.
Some Canadian business leaders have expressed worry over Trump’s promise to introduce a universal 10 per cent tariff on all American imports.
A Canadian Chamber of Commerce report released last month suggested those tariffs would shrink the Canadian economy, resulting in around $30 billion per year in economic costs.
More than 77 per cent of Canadian exports go to the U.S.
Canada’s manufacturing sector faces the biggest risk should Trump push forward on imposing broad tariffs, said Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters president and CEO Dennis Darby. He said the sector is the “most trade-exposed” within Canada.
“It’s in the U.S.’s best interest, it’s in our best interest, but most importantly for consumers across North America, that we’re able to trade goods, materials, ingredients, as we have under the trade agreements,” Darby said in an interview.
“It’s a more complex or complicated outcome than it would have been with the Democrats, but we’ve had to deal with this before and we’re going to do our best to deal with it again.”
American economists have also warned Trump’s plan could cause inflation and possibly a recession, which could have ripple effects in Canada.
It’s consumers who will ultimately feel the burden of any inflationary effect caused by broad tariffs, said Darby.
“A tariff tends to raise costs, and it ultimately raises prices, so that’s something that we have to be prepared for,” he said.
“It could tilt production mandates. A tariff makes goods more expensive, but on the same token, it also will make inputs for the U.S. more expensive.”
A report last month by TD economist Marc Ercolao said research shows a full-scale implementation of Trump’s tariff plan could lead to a near-five per cent reduction in Canadian export volumes to the U.S. by early-2027, relative to current baseline forecasts.
Retaliation by Canada would also increase costs for domestic producers, and push import volumes lower in the process.
“Slowing import activity mitigates some of the negative net trade impact on total GDP enough to avoid a technical recession, but still produces a period of extended stagnation through 2025 and 2026,” Ercolao said.
Since the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement came into effect in 2020, trade between Canada and the U.S. has surged by 46 per cent, according to the Toronto Region Board of Trade.
With that deal is up for review in 2026, Canadian Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Candace Laing said the Canadian government “must collaborate effectively with the Trump administration to preserve and strengthen our bilateral economic partnership.”
“With an impressive $3.6 billion in daily trade, Canada and the United States are each other’s closest international partners. The secure and efficient flow of goods and people across our border … remains essential for the economies of both countries,” she said in a statement.
“By resisting tariffs and trade barriers that will only raise prices and hurt consumers in both countries, Canada and the United States can strengthen resilient cross-border supply chains that enhance our shared economic security.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
