Castanet

grammafreddy wrote:
So they can ship the food to their country to feed themselves.

Exactly. And with a population of 1.4 billion it's not all that surprising. World population is expected to hit 9 billion within the next 20 years ... I imagine it's going to be quite a challenge to feed that many people.

CL: The side of it that I’m trying to pick up on is the issue of sovereignty. We may be able to say right now that Canada has great management structures in place, and equitable regulatory frameworks, and so on and so forth, even though I don’t think that’s the case, especially with first nations and…

GVH: I guess perhaps the point is, you can't really talk about Canadian ethical oil anymore: it’s really Chinese oil. It’s Chinese oil that, because of this deal, is insulated from regulations and legislation in Canada, so this deal makes it increasingly Chinese oil. Rather than Canadian. It comes out of the ground in Canada, but many of the decisions about whether and how to take it out of the ground are going to be made by the Chinese investors. And they’re going to be able to avoid, potentially, attempts by the Canadian parliament or a provincial legislature, Canadian governments, to put environmental, health and other kinds of standards on the exploitation of that resource.

CL: I guess the reality is that by going ahead with this deal we are relinquishing some of our decision-making authority about the way that these resources are developed. So you can’t just blanket it and say that this oil’s developed according to Canadian values, because that will no longer be the case. And, in fact, I don’t think it is the case right now. But, this is just a perfect point in case, where we are relinquishing our authority and our value base will change accordingly.

http://www.desmogblog.com/2012/10/18/china-canada-investment-straitjacket-interview-gus-van-harten-part-3

GrooveTunes wrote:CL: The side of it that I’m trying to pick up on is the issue of sovereignty. We may be able to say right now that Canada has great management structures in place, and equitable regulatory frameworks, and so on and so forth, even though I don’t think that’s the case, especially with first nations and…

GVH: I guess perhaps the point is, you can't really talk about Canadian ethical oil anymore: it’s really Chinese oil. It’s Chinese oil that, because of this deal, is insulated from regulations and legislation in Canada, so this deal makes it increasingly Chinese oil. Rather than Canadian. It comes out of the ground in Canada, but many of the decisions about whether and how to take it out of the ground are going to be made by the Chinese investors. And they’re going to be able to avoid, potentially, attempts by the Canadian parliament or a provincial legislature, Canadian governments, to put environmental, health and other kinds of standards on the exploitation of that resource.

CL: I guess the reality is that by going ahead with this deal we are relinquishing some of our decision-making authority about the way that these resources are developed. So you can’t just blanket it and say that this oil’s developed according to Canadian values, because that will no longer be the case. And, in fact, I don’t think it is the case right now. But, this is just a perfect point in case, where we are relinquishing our authority and our value base will change accordingly.


http://www.desmogblog.com/2012/10/18/china-canada-investment-straitjacket-interview-gus-van-harten-part-3