Manitoba Council on International Cooperation

Global Citizens in Manitoba

  • Brad Johnson

    Brad Johnson (18) of Gimli, Manitoba believes in the power of community. At the age of 16, Brad became a Councillor in Gimli’s Town Council, bringing the concerns of young people to local decision makers. In 2009, Brad and the Youth Community Partnership in Gimli worked with the Town Council to have Gimli declared a Fair Trade Town by Transfair Canada. Brad continues to promote fair trade in his community and plans to study Business at the University of Manitoba, “so I can bring my values of ethical consumption and trade into the corporate sphere,” says Brad.

    Click HERE to watch a video profile of Brad.

  • Breanna Wiebe

    Breanna Wiebe (19) had the opportunity of a lifetime when she met her World Vision sponsored child last year in Tanzania. “It was amazing to see how this boy was thriving because he had access to his basic needs,” she says. “More than anything he was thankful for an education.” As World Vision’s Youth Ambassador, Breanna works to inspire young people in Manitoba and get them involved in global issues. This year, she started a World Vision Club at the University of Manitoba.

    Click HERE to watch a video profile of Breanna.

  • Tito Daodu

    Tito Daodu (23) was born in Nigeria and immigrated to Canada as a child, settling in Winnipeg’s inner city. Drawing from a multi-cultural background, she decided to become involved in international issues at a young age – with a special focus on global health. She is now studying Medicine at the University of Manitoba and, upon graduating, plans to practice in Manitoba’s Northern reserves and eventually work for Doctor’s Without Borders. “Young people in Canada have so many options,” says Tito. “They have the privilege to gain skills to help those who haven’t had the same opportunities in life”.

    Click HERE to watch a video profile of Tito.

  • École Leila North Community School

    The middle-years students are getting MAD at École Leila North Community School in Winnipeg. They call it “making a difference.”

    Teachers at Leila North had always tried to raise awareness of global and local issues, but students really stepped up their own efforts after attending MCIC’s Generating Momentum conference in 2006.

    “Generating Momentum really taught us to think bigger and to make more of an impact with what we were doing,” says teacher Miles MacFarlane. “Instead of simply raising money and donating it to charity, we learned how to really educate our students with why we are raising money. We also learned how to communicate our message outside of the school and involve politicians and decision makers.”

    For example, the students at the school decided to abandon the 30-hour basketball marathon they had planned. Instead, they made a video using the idea of basketball to illustrate poverty issues for the Make Poverty History campaign (see http://tinyurl.com/2adeby). They held an assembly to premiere the video and had many guests attend, including school trustees, their MLA, and other politicians. CBC even came to cover the event.

    “One powerful image from the event was a large poster across the entire gym wall,” says MacFarlane. “Every three seconds, we found out, a child dies of issues related to poverty. So every three seconds, a student drew a face on the poster. At the end of the one hour assembly, 1,200 faces were drawn.”

    Since then, the school has kept up their efforts. Most classes scan the newspaper for stories of people making a difference. One group of students takes care of recycling, and collections for Winnipeg Harvest still happen as they did but with greater understanding of the bigger picture.

    Four classes are involved with PAWS—Positive Action in Winnipeg Schools. Some of their activities include visiting care homes, raising money for malaria nets and different charities, or graffiti clean-up in the school and in the community.

    “Everyone at the school is involved with things,” says MacFarlane. “There’s no specific social justice group—it’s just part of the plan and the culture here.”

  • Wayne McLeod

    The Co-operative Development Foundation of Canada (CDF) is forging connections between the Canadian business community and the developing world.

    “We don’t go overseas and tell people what to do,” says Wayne McLeod, chair of CDF. “We have conversations with the local folk, and they run and manage things based on their needs.”

    The goal of CDF is to raise money in the cooperative sector and use that money to support cooperatives and credit unions in developing countries in an effort to fight poverty.

    Wayne is CEO of Westoba Credit Union in Brandon, Manitoba, and became involved in CDF ten years ago.

    “I decided to step up to the plate, be a little less selfish and do what I can do,” he says. “I was in a position to help the less fortunate, and I seized that opportunity.”

    In a cooperative, such as those supported by CDF, farmers might come together so that they can sell their product as a group and also buy as a group to lower their costs. It’s a collective approach to managing their future.

    One of the great advantages of the organization is the expertise available from co-ops and credit unions. In 2007, 23 senior managers and staff travelled to Africa to provide hands-on coaching to credit union staff. The relationship is a reciprocal one where individuals from overseas will come to Canada to learn and share their experience.

    Credit unions are also set up so that people can improve their lives. For instance, a small loan to a woman with children in Africa helped her buy a sewing machine so that she could earn a living for her family. On a larger scale, CDF—with the support of MCIC—helped rebuild the credit union system in Sri Lanka after the December 2004 tsunami disaster.

    CDF maintains a relationship with the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) which multiplies most of what CDF raises. MCIC also regularly supports CDF through the Manitoba Government Matching Grant Program.

    “Manitoba is one province where the support received from cooperatives, credit unions, and the public in general has been extremely generous,” says Wayne, “and we’re very appreciative of that.”