Marc Fawcett-Atkinson
Journalist | Vancouver |
English
French
About Marc Fawcett-Atkinson
Marc Fawcett-Atkinson is a reporter and writer covering food systems, climate, disinformation, and plastics and the environment for Canada’s National Observer.
His ongoing investigations of the plastic industry in Canada won him a Webster Award's nomination in environmental reporting in 2021. He was also a nominee for a Canadian Association of Journalists's award for his reporting on disinformation.
Marc has previously written for High Country News, the Literary Review of Canada, and other publications on topics exploring relationships between people and their social and physical environments.
He holds an M.A. in journalism from the University of British Columbia and a B.A. in Human Ecology from the College of the Atlantic.
Canadian farmers rely on 250,000 imported bees. This year, they almost didn't come.
Flying 250,000 bees across the Pacific is complicated. Especially in a pandemic. It’s a challenge Rod Scarlett knows well. When most international flights stopped in March, thousands of queen bees were stranded abroad.
B.C. imported $9.6M of vegetable seed last year — but that's not all bad, farmers say
Brent Harris’ bean crop relies on South American seed. He’s not alone. Commercial vegetable growers in the province like Harris — who owns an organic bean, pea, barley and potato farm in Delta, B.C. — depend on seed from around the world. And despite a pandemic-induced global rush on seed, that might not change.
Where in the world do B.C. farmers get their seed?
Brent Harris’ farm holds a world map — a map that grows. That’s because the Delta, B.C., pea, bean and potato farmer’s seeds were grown on farms from Chile or China — and places in-between.
The dirt on transformational soil and how it could help save the world
Anastasia Fyke doesn’t have time for millennials. Sort of. The fourth-generation farmer (and a millennial herself) wants to help farmers transform agriculture from Canada’s sixth-largest greenhouse gas producer into a carbon sink. It’s an attainable goal — with enough investment. “I hear a lot of flak, especially from my own generation, blaming farmers for all these climate things,” she said.
'Non-union' bees make blueberries thrive — but only if they have a home
In North America, bumblebees — a vital native pollinator — are estimated to have seen their relative abundance crash by 97 per cent, with the sharpest decline occurring in the past 30 years.
Kootenay company cooks up sourdough noodles - for $46K
Silvio Lettrari has several billion pets. Pets he cannot see. That’s because they’re bacteria — and they have a crucial job to do in the baker and pasta-maker’s sourdough pasta factory. “It’s kind of like a relationship with a dog or something,” he said. “I’ve always treated them with respect because they’re alive — even if you can’t see the little buggers.”
Laid off restaurant, hotel workers fear they're getting leftovers
Twenty-four weeks ago, COVID-19 brought Canada to a standstill. A wait that, for chefs, cooks, and other laid-off employees, has no end in sight. It’s a difficult situation, said Michelle Travis, a representative from UNITE HERE Local 40. “There’s no protection for workers to get their jobs back.”
Food banks are working overtime. Is that a good thing?
Mounds of mangoes and pallets of peanut butter sit on a monochrome concrete floor. They’re islands of sustenance, dwarfed in the Greater Vancouver Food Bank’s cavernous warehouse — and a fraction of the roughly 40,800 kilograms of food that pass through the distribution center each week, explained the organization’s CEO, David Long.
Craft distillers say hefty taxes have them over a barrel
Tyler Dyck lifts a dram of whisky to the light, musing that it holds a field — distilled. It’s the kind of taste the Okanagan-based distiller and president of the Craft Distiller’s Guild of B.C. says could spur renewal of B.C. farms — but only if there are changes to a tax that's deeply rooted in Canada’s history.
B.C. imports 99 million kilos of American onions. Why?
Paul Stewart cooks a thousand meals a day, none with American onions. That's no small feat: about four per cent of the onions consumed in B.C. are grown in the province. The remainder — 99 million kilograms — are imported, primarily from the United States.