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13 B C B U S I N E S S . C A S E P T E M B E R 2 0 24 P h o t o s c o u r t e s y Ta r a M a r s d e n ; illu s t r a t i o n s : i S t o c k ; H o u d a M b a r k i / M a s K u r i n / N o u n P r oj e c t SOURCES: CANADAHELPS, IPSOS, STATISTICS CANADA, VGH + UBC HOSPITAL FOUNDATION, MEDIA SOURCES, PHILANTHROPY ROUNDTABLE • Eric Peterson and Christina Munck donated $92 million earlier this year to their own environmental and health charity, the Tula Foundation, with the last of the proceeds of the 2001 sale of their medical imaging company, Mitra (see p.55). Their hope is to make the foundation self-sustaining. Notable recent donations in B.C.: • An anonymous donor gave $33.8 million to the VGH + UBC Hospital Foundation in 2022 to support multiple sclerosis research and care, the world's largest known donation to fight the disease. • Investors Henry and Mary Rempel left a property portfolio assessed at $229.6 million to the Mennonite Central Committee B.C. following Henry's passing in June 2023. 57% of Canadian charities say they lack the resources to meet current demand PHILANTHROPY is correlated with social connection: 84% of people who report having 7-10 close friends donate to charity, while 53% with 0 or 1 close friends do. " One stream went from 20,000 spawners returning annually to as low as 100." —Tara Marsden , independent contractor with the Gitanyow Hereditary Chiefs says Marsden. "And our fish- ery feeds not only Gitanyow people, but First Nations people from all over—espe- cially the Fraser system where their fish have just tanked. They have no salmon left." Businesses from tourism to commercial food production have also been hit hard. According to Simon Fraser University professor Jonathan Moore, in many areas, warmer waters, lower river levels and damaged habitat are threaten- ing young salmon that rear in fresh water, while adult salmon are having trouble making it to their destinations. "Salmon are a cool-water species. So if the waters get too hot, they can get stressed. And if it gets really hot, they can have heart attacks and die. That's happening," says Moore. "In some rivers in some years, we're seeing 50 or 70 percent of adult salmon dying on their way upstream." What's more, flooding caused by atmospheric rivers can flush out buried salmon eggs, killing thousands of fish at the start of their lifecycle. There is a small silver lining, however: Moore says that in northern areas, climate change is heating up colder waters to the point where they're essentially a "Goldi- locks temperature" for salmon, and glacier retreat will open up new habitats—although in those areas, mining compa- nies are vying for previously inaccessible deposits, which can further interrupt salmon populations. UPSTREAM BATTLE Some rivers are seeing 50 to 70 percent less salmon year over year DEAD END The Meziadin River in B.C. no longer produces sockeye the way it used to MAKING WAVES Glacier retreat due to climate change could support new habitats for salmon

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