Tausi Insider

Dr. Marie Delorme is currently CEO of the Imagination Group of Companies, which she founded in 2000. Chief Lady Bird/Tausi Insider After an 18-year career in the telecommunications industry, Dr. Marie Delorme completed an interdisciplinary PhD in business, anthropology and sociology. Dr. Delorme is currently CEO of the Imagination Group of Companies, which she founded in 2000. The Imagination Group is an Indigenous corporation made up of three entities that provide services to industry, governments and Indigenous groups in the areas of brand management, business consulting and ceremonial tobacco. Dr. Delorme’s work has been widely honoured – she was awarded the Indspire award in Business & Commerce in 2014, the Order of Canada in 2018 and an honorary doctorate of laws from the University of Calgary in 2018. How has your upbringing influenced your career? I am a citizen of the Métis Nation. I was born in Manitoba, but I have made Calgary my home for over 30 years. The Métis are a ...

Pam Farrell started Grow Community Food Literacy Centre, a charity that provides nutritional food to low-income families and information on food literacy. CARLOS MARQUEZ/Handout The organizer: Pam Farrell The pitch: Founding Grow The reason: To help address food literacy. Pam Farrell was in the midst of a postgraduate degree in education a couple of years ago when she began exploring the concept of food literacy. “It kind of intrigued me,” Ms. Farrell, 45, recalled from Calgary. “Because I’ve heard of it before, but I never really knew what it meant.” She started researching ways to improve the understanding of how sociocultural factors affect and influence food literacy. And soon her topic became much more than an academic pursuit. In 2019, Ms. Farrell launched Grow Community Food Literacy Centre in her hometown of Niagara Falls, Ont., where she has been an elementary-school teacher. “I witnessed some of the inequities in the food system,” she said. “What students brought to school ...

The Bank of Canada's recently released third-quarter financial results showed that for the first time, the bank incurred a net loss of $511-million. Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press Sonja Chen and Trevor Tombe are professors of economics at the University of Calgary. While the full effects of the Bank of Canada’s rate hikes are not yet known, there is an immediate effect on the central bank’s own finances: growing interest expenses and large financial losses. The bank’s recently released third-quarter financial results showed that for the first time, the bank incurred a net loss: $511-million. This is only the beginning. This matters, especially at a time of heightened political attention toward monetary-policy issues. The bank’s revenue is largely derived from its asset holdings, which mainly included Government of Canada bonds and treasury bills. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, these bond holdings cost the bank very little, and their returns normally exceeded bank expenses b...

Oil sands executives insist they are all in on cutting emissions and will make big investments in green technology, but they maintain there isn’t a place to invest that money yet. Many companies are coming off a year of windfall profits not because they pumped out more product, but because the war in Ukraine and global supply chain crunches pushed world oil prices way up. Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault has said repeatedly over the last year that the companies need to prove their commitment by putting some of that cold hard cash into climate initiatives. But in an interview with The Canadian Press, Cenovus CVE-T CEO Alex Pourbaix said the companies are moving “as aggressively as (they) can.” “We’re not yet at the point where we can invest billions in these projects,” Pourbaix said. Cenovus is one of six oil sands companies in the Pathways Alliance, a consortium created to work together to decarbonize their production entirely by 2050. The companies are looking to spend $24 bil...

The central bank’s raising of interest rates is probably at an end, but the debate over its merits and effects will dominate the year. Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press Trevor Tombe is a professor of economics at the University of Calgary and a research fellow at the School of Public Policy. The Bank of Canada raised its policy rate to 4.5 per cent Wednesday. That’s the highest level for Canada’s foundational interest rate since 2007, and the climb from 0.25 per cent one year ago is the fastest rise in a generation. These higher rates – along with the high inflation that prompted them – create significant burdens for many. It’s no surprise that conflicts between politicians, consumer groups, labour organizations and corporations are increasing as the economic pie is shrinking. Luckily, there is good news on the horizon: both rising interest rates and high inflation may soon be at an end, all without a recession. I say this for several reasons. First, the full effect of interest rate...

Canada’s financial services industry is strong, stable and competitive, and Canadians have plenty of choice when it comes to where to park their money. Duane Cole/Mark Blinch/Tausi Insider Leonard Waverman was the dean of the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University and the Haskayne School of Business at the University of Calgary. He is a former director of BNP Paribas Canada and the C.D. Howe Institute. As a former business school dean and as an economist, I’m happy competition policy is in the headlines these days, even for the wrong reasons. Why do people suddenly care? The Rogers-Shaw drama is certainly a big part of it. The Competition Bureau repeatedly lost in opposing a deal that gives it everything it wants. The Canadian debate always remains focused on the wrong things. We point a finger at the Rogers-Shaw takeover but endure trade barriers between provinces, supply management in sectors such as dairy and government monopolies in alcohol. Then there’s the public re...