Marley Giunta

This article is for the students who care about social and environmental issues but don’t know how to show it. Perhaps you don’t know where to start looking. You value supporting local businesses, farmers, and artisans. You want to learn more about growing your own garden or about composting. You could spare some time getting involved within the community, but you don’t know anyone. It is easy to feel overwhelmed if you focus on all of the social and environmental problems on a global scale.
It’s more productive and healthy to be a part of the solution on a local scale. It’s important to educate yourself on issues affecting people around the world, but it is frustrating and depressing to feel helpless in the face of these issues. Here in Thunder Bay there are many people who support and organize ways to be a part of the solution and you should check some of them out.
Every Saturday, local farmers and artisans gather for the Thunder Bay Country Market at the C.L.E. building on May St. (beside Silver City movie theatre) from 8 until 1:oo pm (www.thunderbaycountrymarket.com). You can also support locally owned grocery stores like Renco’s (on Court St. & Bay St.) or the Maltese (on Algoma St.).  Also on Bay St. is Thunder Bay Meats, where you can get cold cuts and homemade turkey sausages.  On River St. you can find a place called George’s Market. They sell all kinds of locally made food, and they are open always, even on holidays.
If you value growing your own food and you will be in town this summer, the Food Security Research Network is organizing a campus garden.  You can grow your own food and lower your food costs. Use of the plot is free and they’ll have support there to teach and assist you. All you need to bring are your own seeds. To get involved, email Amy at amy.vervoort@lakeheadu.ca.
Along those lines, Eco Superior is a Thunder Bay organization that facilitates all kinds of environmentally conscious choices. They have subsidized rebates for buying composters and rain barrels. They sell organic seeds and books on native plant species. They are also very helpful in helping you make your home as energy efficient as possible. They lend out devices that tell you which appliances are sucking the most energy and they do inspections for energy retrofitting your home. They have a great website www.ecosuperior.com or you can visit their office on 212 Miles St. East.
If you are keen to volunteer, but don’t know where to look, check out www.volunteerthunderbay.ca where people post their volunteer needs in various areas. Next year on campus you can get involved with sustainability through L.U.S.U. and by talking with the L.U.S.U sustainability director.  So next time you read the news and something is happening somewhere else which you can’t do anything about, remember all the things you can do right here in Thunder Bay. Even the smallest effort in the right direction makes a difference, because you are part of the solution.