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xtv ekindsl6l9 i hs strange weather a result of global warming what is it going to take to make the connection weve all watched in disbelief over the past week or two as mother nature has crippled the province of quebec and a large section of eastern ontario weve sat in front of our televi sion sets each night staring in disbelief as montreal fell into darkness an entire field of hydro towers collapsed before our eyes and the nations business ground to a halt as ottawa fell siege to the ice and we still dont get it weve watched as the lights went out for three million people and weve wondered how we would cope in the same situation and we still havent figured it out a few weeks ago we walked around outside on new years day in our spring coats and lis tened to yearend recaps that told us that 1997 was the warmest year this century perhaps even the warmest year on record weve watched reruns of the years top stories and relived through the eyes of the camera the horror of last summers floods on the red river and we still havent made the connection we listened to the debate late into december as the worlds leaders tried to protect their right to pollute while insisting that other nations limit theirs we heard about canadas watereddown agreement to reduce our greenhouse gas emis sions by six per cent and then lis tened to the backlash from the provinces most of them insisting that it cannot be done without hurting the economy and now mother nature has dealt our economy a devastating blow the earliest estimates are that the ice storm has done a half a billion dollars damage it will be weeks perhaps even months before the electricity grid is fully restored and tens of thousands of people still continue to cope in emergency shelters it is a strange twist of fate that has brought all the pieces togeth er ironically it was quebec alone among the provinces once again that pushed for tougher green house gas limits quebec had the luxury of doing so because it uses hydro electric dams to generate its power rather than fossil fuels and now that power has nowhere to go the grid is down we have heard over the past week or two how powerless we are in the face of mother natures wrath and while that is true it is we who have fueled that fire el nino may have contributed to the ice storm but it was the effect of global warming that made el nino so volatile after decades of trying we are finally able to influence the weather and we dont like the results what it comes down to is this global warming isnt about the temperature slowly rising its about change erratic unpre dictable often violent change that will devastate our existing ecosystems primarily because of the rate of this change- adaptation takes time and thats one thing we dont have natural disasters like the one we witnessed last week will con tinue to increase in their frequen cy and ferocity as our atmosphere reacts to rising c02 levels when scientists first warned us about global warming they gave us a few options they said we were conducting an experiment on spaceship earth and we really didnt have a cli mate model that we could use to predict the outcome they said we could drastically reduce our greenhouse gas emis- your earth suzanne elston sions through energy conservation and the development of alternatives or we could simply go with the status quo and see what happens thanks to political inertia and our inability to grasp the severity of the problem we have opted for the latter and now we are beginning to see the results essay contest for students living on farms if last year is any indication more than 150 high schoolaged farm kids will be on the prowl for their share of 10000 this win ter the 10000 is the prize money for an essaywriting contest sponsored by the corn herbicide prowl and the ontario corn producers association ocpa last year six budding writers shared the prize the stu dents came from farms across ontario from pembroke in the east to petrolia in the west this years entrants will be asked to submit 500600 word essays about farmbased research a panel of teachers will judge the essays questions young farmers can answer in their essays include what is gained from farmerbased research how does it help in sustainable farming have you heard of any research experi ments on your farm or a neighbours farm did the research findings help local pro ducers become more productive what is learned from poor results why do farmers like to experiment is there a scientist in us all to enter mail in your 500600 word essay with a completed entry form by march 31 1998 call prowl at 18002631228 for a copy of the official entry form including full con test details mart correction notice a printing error has occurred on the back of the scratch for cash scratch card the rules and regulations should read the odds of receiving a specific scratch and win card are as follows and the list by which the odds are listed should also have the heading odds of receiving a specific card shoppers drug mart apolo gizes for any inconvenience this may have caused you a making the most of your finances a special feature appearing in the economist sunstouffvilleuxbridge tribune every tuesday and saturday from now until tax time ader pro 97179 633 468 36 257 234 309 ber of adults 18 y- total number 01 own mutual funds own savings bonds ovncana es own stock mar 5 puls household rncume dership study prepared by tap into the market by advertising your financial products services in our financial sections call your account representative today economist sun 9052942200 fax 905 2941538 the tribune stouffvile 9056402100 fax 905 6405477 uxbridge 9058529741 fax 905 8524355