Juggling Dynamite

Portfolio Management Managing Director Norman Levine discusses Canada’s connection to oil. Gluskin Sheff & Associates Chief Economist and Strategist David Rosenberg also speaks. Here is a direct video link.

Interesting, David was wrapping himself in the Canadian flag as he toured to attract US investors to his Canadian based firm since 2009, talking up oil and commodities and a strong loonie…all after they had peaked.  Now he is calling for inflation in the hopes that will bring the bullish Canada story back into vogue. Better luck next commodities cycle…

We humans can be brutally slow on the uptake. But so encouraging to see sustainable practices spreading through the world’s urban centers.

Chulalongkorn University has opened an urban agricultural learning center called Siam Green Sky on the top floor of the Siam Square One shopping center. The project covers an area of 2,000 sq.m on the 7th floor and is considered to be the largest rooftop garden in Bangkok. Siam Green Sky is designed and developed from the three main ideas which are learning center, agricultural awareness, and social networking. The learning center idea focuses on the dissemination of innovative agriculture, landscape management, urban ecology, and safe food production process. The agricultural awareness is meant to bring the local way of life of Thai farmers to the city so that urban people can learn and absorb their wisdom. They also put an emphasis on space management, fully-integrated self-sustenance, the creation of green social network, and renewable energy from solar panels.

See: Siam Green Sky Largest Urban rooftop garden in Bangkok

It’s been said that the wars of the 21st century may well be fought over water. The Earth’s population has more than doubled over the last 50 years and the demand for fresh water — to drink and to grow food — has surged along with it. But sources of water like rainfall, rivers, streams, reservoirs, certainly haven’t doubled. So where is all that extra water coming from? More and more, it’s being pumped out of the ground. Here is a direct video link.