Providing opportunity

A Nepalis woman said she could have used a website that offers information on the communities of Northwestern Ontario when she first arrived here more than half a year ago.

Northwestern Ontario Immigration launched its official website at the Italian Cultural Centre on Wednesday. The website provides information on opportunities in this region. The website contains 500 pages of information on 32 communities from Kenora to Wawa. It also includes 30 photo galleries.

The Ontario and federal governments provided nearly a million dollars of funding for the project.

Namoona Pokhrel immigrated to Canada from Nepal with her husband and two sons in August. She and her family first traveled to the United States and then to Toronto before they made Thunder Bay home.

"I like the community," Pokrel said. "It is a really nice community. Everyone is so helpful and I like the environment as well."

Pokrel said the website will help a lot by giving people information. She said people coming to Canada have their own assumptions about the country but information on the website helps to clear that up.

When Pokrel first arrived, she went to the Thunder Bay Multicultural Association for help settling into the city. She said she could have used a website like the one that had just been launched Wednesday.

The website offers 11 translated languages including both of Canada’s official languages. Arabic and First Nations languages are not yet available.

Cathy Woodbeck, executive director with the Thunder Bay Multicultural Association, said they are in the process of translating content into Arabic, but they have no plans for a First Nations language.

"This is phase one," Woodbeck said. "We chose 10 languages we could do fairly quickly with interpreters that we had in Thunder Bay and available to us. We are going to do more. We have to chose what Aboriginal languages we can put up but that would be in consultation with the Aboriginal community on what they think is appropriate."

The Canada-Ontario Immigration Agreement invested $920 million in funding for new settlement and language training programs and services in Ontario. Woodbeck said they took the opportunity to create a website that showcased Northwestern Ontario globally. The website took nine months to develop.

Some people around the world have little to no ability to go onto the Internet.
"There are going to be print versions of it but not huge documents," she said. "They will be small size post cards that people can pick up."

The launch of the website also coincided with the International Day for Elimination of Racial Discrimination breakfast. The event featured videos for the 2010 Racism. Stop It! national video competition.

Margaret Parsons, executive director of the African-Canadian Legal Clinic, spoke as a guest speaker at the event.

"There was a couple themes to my message," Parsons said. "We can’t forget our history as a country but also look at how far we have come in terms of our official policy to multiculturalism and that Canada is a leader throughout the world in terms of human rights and working to eliminate racism and discrimination."

Parsons said Canada still has a long way to go before it eliminates racism and discrimination. Parsons said she is concern that people aren’t paying enough attention and simplifying a complex issue.

"People are talking about diversity instead of racism," she said. "I think it’s taken a backseat and is ignored. Racism is still here and we are still addressing it."