Good morning, and welcome to the weekend.
Grab your cup of coffee or tea and sit down with a selection of this week’s great reads from The Globe.
In this issue, Ann Hui reports on the changing agricultural landscape – and the unfolding cultural war over the promise of agtech, an increasingly popular term that covers the growing number of businesses harnessing technology to improve agricultural efficiency. There’s a wide gulf between the people who want to scale up production through vertical farming, which uses much less land or water, and those eager to see a return to smaller-scale, more “traditional,” farms. In many ways, it’s a familiar debate. But Hui says she was struck by how deeply dug in both sides are, even as they share the same goals: “They’re both concerned about the big question of climate change and the big question of how do we feed a growing global population,” she says. “They would seem to be natural allies, and yet, there’s this deep, deep division between the camps.”
Molly Hayes, meanwhile, looks at the effort underway to search a Winnipeg landfill, where police and grieving families believe two victims of an alleged serial killer are buried.
And Nathan VanderKlippe reports from Salt Lake City, where the International Olympic Committee’s hopes of making the Games more sustainable could take root.
If you’re reading this on the web, or it was forwarded to you from someone else, you can sign up for Great Reads and more than 20 other Globe newsletters on our newsletter sign-up page. If you have questions or feedback, drop us a line at greatreads@globeandmail.com.
QuantoTech founder Alycia van der Gracht in one of their hydroponic units that use LED light to grow vegetables in Port Coquitlam, B.C., on Jan. 16, 2023.Jimmy Jeong/The Globe and Mail
The challenge faced by Canada’s agtech industry isn’t a lack of demand, but a question of space. Those in the industry who choose a farmland route face a minefield of opposition from policy makers, neighbouring landowners and other, more traditional farmers with concerns about the changing face of the rural landscape. And it’s a story that’s playing out across the country. Ann Hui asks the crucial questions: What is a farm? And who gets to call themselves a farmer?
Inside the effort to recover bodies of slain Indigenous women from a Winnipeg landfill
Crows fly over snow-covered garbage at the Prairie Green landfill near Winnipeg.Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail
For Morgan Harris’s daughter Cambria, the Winnipeg police’s decision to rule out a search of the landfill for the bodies of her mother and Marcedes Myran – because, they said, too much time had passed and it would be a risky operation – sent a chilling message. To the greater Indigenous community, she said, it was akin to saying it’s “okay to continuously murder our women, and it’s okay to continuously dump them like trash, because no one will look for them.” Intense pressure from families and Indigenous leaders paved way for the creation of an Indigenous-led working group that’s now trying to assess the feasibility of a search.
Canada promised to fix health care before. How do we get it right this time?
The health care system was struggling to meet the needs of a growing and aging population even before COVID-19 struck.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the premiers prepare to gather in Ottawa on Tuesday for a “working meeting” on health care, the country’s top doctors, nurses and industry executives are urging all sides to learn from their mistakes. The health care system was struggling to meet the needs of a growing and aging population even before COVID-19 struck. This new deal, advocates say, must recognize that the system requires a fundamental overhaul, not small or short-term fixes.
Unless building codes catch up to extreme heat, Canada’s future summers will be even deadlier
A man cools off at a misting station during the scorching weather of a heatwave in Vancouver on June 27, 2021.JENNIFER GAUTHIER/Reuters
B.C.’s deadly “heat dome” in 2021 was a frightening glimpse of the hotter future ahead. Since then, there’s been a concerted effort among builders and researchers to put pressure on authorities to ensure buildings have better defences against rising temperatures. Extreme heat poses a different level of danger than other climatic threats such as tornadoes or floods because high temperatures don’t immediately threaten the integrity of a building. But the humans inside those structures are more vulnerable.
What could a permanent Olympic city look like? Salt Lake offers a glimpse
Olympic gold medallist Derek Parra, now the senior director of sport at the Utah Olympic Oval, poses for a photograph on Jan. 27. Salt Lake City is bidding for the 2030 or 2034 Winter Olympics, and is considered a front-runner.Nathan VanderKlippe/The Globe and Mail
Every Olympics ends with the passing of the proverbial torch – really, the Olympic flag – to the next host city. In Utah’s case, Salt Lake City may never fully let go of it. The city, considered a front-runner in its bid to host the 2030 or 2034 Winter Games, is also a likely contender for another hosting prize now being dangled by the International Olympic Committee: a permanent roster of host cities that could overcome some of the profligate overspending and authoritarian gamesmanship that has plagued past selection processes. Nathan VanderKlippe reports Salt Lake already has the makings of a permanent host city. Its rinks, ski hills and sliding tracks remain in such good shape that its bid for the 2030 or 2034 Games involves no new construction of competition venues.
Opinion: Israelis have turned against each other. Will the country hold together?
Tsafrir Abayov/The Associated Press
As Israel approaches its 75th anniversary this May, society is more divided than it’s been since the Oslo peace process in the 1990s. Opponents of the Netanyahu government accuse it of trying to destroy Israeli democracy and are threatening mass acts of civil disobedience. Netanyahu supporters accuse the opposition of fomenting anarchy, seeking to overturn the results of a democratic election. Israeli history warns that the loss of national sovereignty is invariably preceded by internal disintegration. Now, an ancient question is haunting Israelis: Can we hold together?
P.K. Subban’s honest perspective on a life with zero regrets
Former Montreal Canadiens P.K. Subban salutes the crowd as he is introduced during a pre-game ceremony in Montreal, on Jan. 12, 2023.Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press
Since hanging up his skates last fall, after 13 seasons in the NHL, P.K. Subban has become one of the most entertaining elements in ESPN’s hockey coverage, astutely dissecting both styles of play and player fashion. Now, Subban has signed on as an ambassador of Kraft’s Hockeyville promotion, giving local communities a shot at a $250,000 hockey arena upgrade and the chance to hold a pre-season NHL game. Simon Houpt and Subban discuss living without regrets, as part of the inaugural weekend question-and-answer feature in Globe Sports.
With Queen of Me, Shania Twain wants you to wake up feeling like a rock star
Illustration by Jacqui Oakley
Twenty-eight years after scoring her first country radio hit with Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?, the pride of Timmins, Ont., has reached a place of security. Shania Twain’s new LP, Queen of Me, is out, complete with a title track that declares independence despite her first marriage to Mutt Lange, which crumbled after it was revealed he had been having an affair. In an interview with Brad Wheeler, the pop-country icon talks about her “new” voice and a belated Nashville acceptance.