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6- The Oakville Beaver, Wednesday June 13, 2007 www.oakvillebeaver.com OPINION & LETTERS The Oakville Beaver 467 Speers Rd., Oakville Ont. L6K 3S4 (905) 845-3824 Fax: 337-5567 Classified Advertising: 845-3824, ext. 224 Circulation: 845-9742 Editorial and advertising content of the Oakville Beaver is protected by copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited. THE OAKVILLE BEAVER IS PROUD OFFICIAL MEDIA SPONSOR FOR: The Oakville Beaver is a division of IAN OLIVER Group Publisher Media Group Ltd. NEIL OLIVER Publisher JILL DAVIS Editor in Chief ROD JERRED Managing Editor DANIEL BAIRD Advertising Director RIZIERO VERTOLLI Photography Director TERI CASAS Business Manager MARK DILLS Director of Production MANUEL GARCIA Production Manager CHARLENE HALL Director of Distribution ALEXANDRIA CALHOUN Circ. Manager Bigger is not always better Like too many Canadians, Halton residents are losing the battle of the bulge, placing their health in jeopardy and putting more stress on an already overburdened healthcare system. According to statistics recently released by Halton Region's health department, 37 per cent of residents are overweight, while another 13 per cent are obese. Even more disturbing are the statistics related to children -- usually the most physically-active members of society. According to the senior research advisor for Halton Region's Children's Services, 13 per cent of five year olds in the region are overweight, while eight per cent are obese. Moving to 15 year olds, 16 per cent are overweight and four per cent are obese. One quarter of children across Canada are either overweight or obese. Although what and how much we eat plays a significant role in maintaining a healthy weight, so too does activity -- or lack of it. According to those who study the problem closely, this is where society is failing its children. "The vast majority of our kids are not active enough," said Dr. Mark Tremblay, chair of Active Healthy Kids Canada, a non-profit organization advocating for quality, accessible and enjoyable physical activity participation experiences for children and youth. Tremblay's most damning claim is that Canadians are actually eating less, but continuing to get heavier; a sign we are at an all-time high for inactivity. He believes many children choose sedentary lifestyles -- where video gaming becomes their primary activity -- because of the environment adults have created for them. As a result, children are developing childhood onset diabetes -- one of several health consequences of obesity -- at an alarming rate. While Tremblay promotes simple spontaneous activities that don't require being driven somewhere, parents counter concerns for personal safety that didn't exist 30 years ago are limiting opportunities for unsupervised physical activity. If we insist on ignoring the risk of living a sedentary lifestyle, entire generations are going to be doomed to lives of chronic illness and shorter life expectancy. Still, in a society that markets bigger -- homes, cars and hamburgers -- as better, we shouldn't be so shocked when many don't see the long-term harm in living large. The Oakville Beaver welcomes letters from its readers. Letters will be edited for clarity, length, legal considerations and grammar. In order to be published all letters must contain the name, address and phone number of the author. Letters should be addressed to The Editor, Oakville Beaver, 467 Speers Rd., Oakville, ON, L6K 3S4, or via e-mail to editor@oakvillebeaver.com. The Beaver reserves the right to refuse to publish a letter. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR It was with some disbelief when I heard that David Suzuki, Canada's famed scientist and environmentalist, needed to dispose of a single bag of garbage per year from his household. After all, our household has been avid recyclers of everything Halton presently takes in the blue box program. In addition, for the past 30 years, our family has used a backyard composter for all of our kitchen scraps and we still seem to generate a bag a week. A couple of weeks ago, as I took my Environmentally-conscious resident offers recycling suggestions can of trash out I thought about how light weight it was. It was then I realized I was disposing a can of mostly non-recyclables and plastic bags. So I got busy and contacted the city, the Region and the Province. After all, Premier Dalton McGuinty was on the news telling us the distressing news of the seven million plastic bags thrown out each day in Ontario and how we should go shopping with reusable bags and so on. But the Premier had no answer as to what the Province might do in terms of recycling these bags. I contacted Halton Region and they told me to bring my plastic bags to the grocery store. At the grocery store there is a big bin to place your plastic bags for proper recycling. I contacted A&P Canada (Dominion) and they were delighted to hear from me. I told them I would tell everyone about their positive environmental efforts. For pet waste, or any other disposal purpose, there is also a substitute, recyclable, biodegradable plastic looking bag you can use. The bags are made by The BIOSAK Company. The bags are compostable, being made of corn starch and are available all over town. So the fact of the matter is if we are in our kitchen wondering how or if we can recycle our packaging, it's a bit late. We need to make that determination at the point of purchase. BY STEVE NEASE snease@haltonsearch.com One good way to promote the use of proper recycle-ready materials is to support only those manufactures who offer their products in the stores in readily-recyclable packaging. We all would love to hand over a clean and healthy planet to our grandchildren. We don't ever have to fill up the Halton landfill. So please contact the following agencies; they would love to hear from you. Taking our plastic bags to the grocery store is not a longterm solution. They belong in the Blue Box Program. Please encourage Halton to get this plastic bag recycling project into the Blue Box now. The Region of Halton: accesshalton@halton.ca mail to: accesshalton@halton.ca; The Province: Premier's website, dmcguinty@premier.gov.on.ca; the A & P Canada (Dominion Grocery): Fresh@metro.ca The Plastic Bag Recycling Company is Hilex Poly Inc.: Ed.Haenni@hilexpoly.com mail to:Ed.Haenni@hilexpoly.com. BERNIE GERMAN Pud The Oakville Beaver is a member of the Ontario Press Council. The council is located at 80 Gould St., Suite 206, Toronto, Ont., M5B 2M7. Phone 416-340-1981. Advertising is accepted on the condition that, in the event of a typographical error, that portion of advertising space occupied by the erroneous item, together with a reasonable allowance for signature, will not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisement will be paid for at the applicable rate. The publisher reserves the right to categorize advertisements or decline.