Roy Brady
The Peterborough Examiner reports that, “Peterborough will phase in a ban on the sale of bottled water at municipal facilities over the next several years, city council decided Monday night.”
“The city will stop the sale of bottled water as current contracts with food service providers expire and as the city installs alternative drinking water systems in city facilities. It would be a long-term transition. Pepsi Bottling Group, for example, has contracts that expire in 2013 and 2016 for supplying products at locations such as the Memorial Centre and Kinsmen Civic Centre.”
Council of Canadians Board member and chapter activist Roy Brady adds that, “Immediately the ban applies to City facilities where there is potable water available and no binding supplier contract including bottled water.”
Brady notes that there were nine speakers at the city council meeting, “including two from Sustainable Trent (a university environmental group which has worked with the Peterborough-Kawarthas chapter for two years), two speakers from Jamaican Self-Help Youth Action Group (secondary students who linked with us three weeks ago), a Trent student who has been working on a bottled water project managed by the Trent Centre for Community-Based Education, and with our chapter as the host organizer.”
John Challinor of Nestle Canada argued against the move, but failed in his attempt to “urge council to work with the company on recycling initiatives rather than banning the sale of bottled water in municipal facilities.”
The full article is at http://www.thepeterboroughexaminer.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2562016.
