Kelowna

Photo: Contributed

Paul Tukey

One of North America's leading environmental advocates will be in Kelowna this week as a guest speaker at a film screening.

Paul Tukey, the executive producer of the film 'A Chemical Reaction', will speak on how the cosmetic use of pesticide is a public health issue, particularly for children.

While the documentary A Chemical Reaction tells the story of a  community initiative that eventually resulted in Canada’s first by-law to ban the use of all chemical pesticides and herbicides, in the town of Hudson, Quebec. The by-law withstood a challenge by the chemical industry in the Supreme Court of Canada.

The film discusses the particular challenges and opportunities faced by a community’s leaders and decision-makers with restricting the use of pesticides.

Tukey, a former journalist changed careers in the late 1980s and followed his love of the outdoors by founding a landscaping company. In the early 1990s, he started hearing about the links between a synthetic weed killer and numerous illnesses, including cancer. Then his physician suggested that his recurrent headaches, nosebleeds and blurred vision were attributable to exposure to those same chemicals he used as weed killers.

He quickly transformed to organic gardening and in the last five years, he has emerged as the leader of the SafeLawns movement across the U.S. and Canada.

The screening will be hosted by the Canadian Cancer Society, at the UBC Okanagan letter Theatre #130 in the Arts and Sciences building on Tuesday, March 5 at 7 p.m.

Watch the trailer here: