Health was the focus of three resolutions at the March 31 annual meeting of the British Columbia Women’s Institute in Prince George, B.C.
BCWI president Susan Hoszouski said the 62 delegates gave a “resounding yes” to a resolution supporting the University of Northern British Columbia’s attempt to offer doctor training at its Prince George site.
She said university president Deborah Pouff talked to the convention about a proposed link between the University of B.C. in Vancouver and the northern interior facility.
BCWI delegates supported the proposal because “we assume that its graduates would stay and work in rural and remote areas,” Hoszouski said.
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GM food moratorium
The delegates also agreed to support a National Farmers Union proposal for a moratorium on “the production, importation, distribution and sale of genetically modified foods” until more questions had been answered. BCWI members led a campaign last year that saw the national WI group agree to ask the federal government for mandatory GM labeling of food.
Risk from insulin
A third resolution on health is still being drafted and will be presented at next year’s BCWI annual meeting. It asks for more research into synthetic insulin, which some have said is more harmful than the present form culled from cattle pancreas.
The Prince George meeting was a trial one for the BCWI, which has met on a provincial basis only every third year.
Hoszouski said delegates liked the annual format and a constitutional motion will be presented at next year’s meeting to go this route. Elections would be held every third year and are next scheduled for the June 2002 meeting in Cranbrook.
Hoszouski said BCWI’s 1,130 members did 222,382 volunteer hours of work for the group last year. They also donated $3,730 to the Queen Alexandra Foundation for Children and $4,365 to the B.C. Children’s Hospital. The Victoria and Vancouver hospitals were set up by the BCWI in the 1920s.
