COMONDI

Your Dollars

As part of Comondi's commitment to improving the world we inhabit, we donate 5% of our sales (not simply profits) to organizations working towards positive social and environmental change.

We have chosen Global Action Network, a Canadian based animal advocacy organization, as our first recipient.

Global Action Network is a nationally incorporated non-profit organization, dedicated to fostering environmental awareness and action. They believe that animals, the environment, and human welfare are inextricably linked. Simply put, animal abuse and the destruction of our environment has an ultimate consequence - the degradation of the human species. They achieve their mandate through education, grassroots organizing, coalition building, and political networking. Global Action Network works in seven program areas: Sustainable Agriculture, Oceans, Wildlife, Animals in Entertainment, Globalization, Animals in Biomedical Research and Companion Animals.

GAN has already achieved significant victories for animals. In 1998, they cancelled plans to stage a cruel bullfight in Montreal. The following year, they obtained three municipal bylaws prohibiting animal acts in entertainment and in 2001 they stopped plans to build a captive dolphin facility in Quebec.

Recently, they convinced Jacob, a major Canadian retailer with 200 stores across Canada, to go completely fur-free. Currently, Global Action Network is working on several vital campaigns, including:

• countering the heavily subsidized public relations campaign waged by the Canadian fur industry
• achieving legislation banning cetaceans in captivity in Quebec
• establishing bylaws forbidding the use of animals in entertainment in several municipalities
• lobbying for a Quebec animal welfare act, as well as stronger animal protection laws in Canada's Criminal Code
• blocking two factory farms from setting up in rural Quebec communities
• gathering video evidence of criminal code and regulatory violations in Canadian factory farms, slaughterhouses, animal transport, and stockyards for their national campaign

Education is the foundation of many of their activities. To this end, GAN provides presentations for schools and universities, and coordinates many public lectures on animal issues. To date, they have organized well attended events by Dr. Neil Barnard (PCRM), Ralph Nader (Green Party), Dr. David Suzuki (Suzuki Foundation), Howard Lyman (Earthsave), Paul Watson (Sea Shepherd Conservation Society), Jeffrey Masson (author, When Elephants Weep), Steve Wise (author, Rattling the Cage), and Ric O'Barry (author, To Free a Dolphin), amongst others.

At present, Global Action Network has a dedicated staff of four, as well as an extensive volunteer base, including communications, legal, political, medical, and veterinary professionals. They rely on government and foundation grants, and contributions from the general public.

Please visit their website at www.gan.ca for more information.