COVID-19 by the numbers By: Winnipeg Free Press Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Tuesday, Apr. 7, 2020 Last Modified: 5:08 PM CDT Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2022 Updates

Bayer Canada begins construction on new R&D facility in St. B

Instead of canola on Friday, there was sod.

But in two years’ time, by current estimates, the bare plot of land in a St. Boniface industrial park will hold canola samples and seeds for testing.

Bayer Canada officially broke ground on a 60,000-square-foot research and development facility Friday morning.

“It’s about bringing new and better innovation to farmers,” said Kacy Perry, Bayer Crop Science Canada’s country division head.

Adam Duncan

The threat from outside Canada

The 10-question referendum being held in Alberta on Monday, Oct. 19, is not the first time the unity of Canada has been threatened by a vote within one province. It is, however, the first referendum of this type to take place in an age of unfettered social media misinformation and deliberate foreign interference.

From mischievous comments by U.S. President Donald Trump about making Canada the 51st state to technology trillionaire Elon Musk’s urgings to Quebec and Alberta to separate, there are clear signs foreign interests are trying to influence Monday’s vote. But there are also less-obvious efforts at work to influence the referendum and destabilize Canada.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and independent think-tanks such as the Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Data and Conflict at the University of Regina have documented incidents involving Russian-linked automated content farms posting thousands of misleading articles about the referendum campaign on social media platforms. The content, CSIS has said, focuses on erroneous claims about the benefits of separation and the liabilities of remaining in Canada.

In the face of all that activity, Prime Minister Mark Carney has been alarmingly unconcerned. Campaigning in Alberta this week, Carney said Ottawa is closely monitoring disinformation campaigns. He added that, in his conversations with foreign governments, all have agreed to stand down from any activities that might be perceived as threats to democracy.

Endling wins Amazon’s $60K first novel prize

Ukraine-born, Vancouver-based author Maria Reva has landed another prize for her debut novel Endling, which follows a snail scientist in Ukraine who teams up with a pair of sisters to break up a mail-order bride operation in the country before Russia’s invasion throws them all for a loop.

Reva’s novel, which was published in June 2025 and released in paperback in May 2026, won the $60,000 Amazon Canada First Novel Award at a June 4 ceremony in Toronto which revealed the winner. Endling also won Reva the $60,000 Writers’ Trust Atwood Gibson Fiction Prize, was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for fiction and was long-listed for the Booker Prize.

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On Thursday at 6:30 p.m., retired Concordia University film and sexuality scholar Thomas Waugh will be at the Cornish Library (20 West Gate) to read from his memoir Writing in the Flesh: Essays on My Lives, My Bodies, My Families, My Place, My Movies, published in December 2025 by McGill-Queen’s University Press.