Introduction
Canada is the second largest country in the world, constituting approximately 10 million square kilometers. The country covers the Atlantic, Arctic, and Pacific seas and is located in the northern portion of North America. The landscape of Canada is varied, including rough mountains, plateaus, lakes, and seas. Ontario, Quebec, Atlantic Canada, British Columbia, Western Canada, and the Territorial North are the six regions that make up Canada (Bone, 2018). However, the Ontario region and its economic activity, natural resources, population density, and periphery will be the main focus of this research. Ontario demonstrates strong economic health due to the vastness of natural resources and heavy investments in research and development. The region is densely populated and receives migrants from various backgrounds, which improves the local workforce. Great Lakes, the Atlantic coast, and Vancouver Island constitute the core of Ontario but the periphery development follows similarly high urbanization, which points to the strengthening of the region as a whole.
Economic Activities
Canada’s industrial core is located in Ontario, which also serves as the foundation for the country’s systems for both research and innovation. The economy of Ontario is twice as large as that of the next largest provincial economy in Canada, making up 37% of the GDP and 45% of the nation’s manufacturing output (Peter & Castle, 2022). In many respects, the success and recent failures in the automobile and telecommunications industries reflect the impact of federal policies. The reason is that Ontario’s development has been the primary focus of federal initiatives.
For instance, the automotive and telecom industries are crucial to Ontario’s economy. However, when the state dealt with severe economic challenges, most of the policy work was done in Ottawa (Peter & Castle, 2022). The region’s economy was greatly affected by the fallout from the collapse of Nortel Networks Corporation, the sudden reversal of Blackberry, and the consequences of restructuring in the car industry (Peter & Castle, 2022). The auto industry’s performance, has been mentioned in every provincial budget, but only one significant provincial program has been specifically targeted at it. This program is the 2004 Automotive Investment Strategy, a $500 million plan for enhancing the sector’s skills and luring investment (Peter & Castle, 2022). Nevertheless, the region boasts the greatest research and development effort in Canada, with nearly $13 billion in investments (Peter & Castle, 2022). This points to the significant strategic importance of Ontario and its industries.
Natural Resources
Ontario has the biggest market for products and services based on natural resources in Canada. It boasts abundant supplies of both renewable and non-renewable resources, with the notable absence of fossil fuels. After Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Manitoba, the province is in fourth place for agriculturally productive land (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). Over 50% of Canada’s Class 1 agricultural land, or soils with no substantial restrictions on usage for crops, is located in Southern Ontario alone (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). The favorable environment of the area supports productive, diverse livestock and crops.
Ontario is rich in minerals and is the largest mining region in Canada. A quarter of the entire worth of metal produced comes from Ontario. The region excavates other minerals such as gold, iron, silver, copper, and uranium (Wacaster, 2018). In addition, the region is involved in mining construction materials such as building stones, sand, and gravel (Wacaster, 2018). The primary driver of economic growth and value creation in the area and the economy as a whole appears to be mining. Even though the revenue varies annually depending on the price of various commodities, mining generates about $10 billion yearly (Wacaster, 2018). These figures indicate a strong base for economic growth and development.
The area is renowned for the density of its flora. The forest cover in central and northern Ontario supports a major forest-products industry. In 2016, Ontario harvested nearly 10 percent of the total timber volume in Canada (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). Forests cover a substantial amount of territories, make up about 85 billion trees, and are a valuable resource (Fig.1). This generates $14 billion in economic earnings for the province. The trees are utilized to produce various goods, including furniture, timber, and paper. Natural resource effects extend beyond the core industries (Bone, 2018). They are interconnected with other economic sectors, including equipment, transportation, and environmental management.
Many of the more accessible forested areas provide recreation opportunities, as do the province’s many lakes and rivers. The massive water resources of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River serve as major transportation routes, sources of hydroelectricity, and sites of recreation (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). Ontario has the highest capacity for wind and solar power generation in Canada (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). It produces more than one-third of Canada’s total wind-generated electricity, about 99 percent of which is produced by solar energy (Pawlowska-Mainville, 2019). The potential of Ontario’s natural resources is diverse and may sustain regional development indefinitely.
Population of Ontario
Ontario is the most populated region and the second biggest in land area. Ottawa, the nation’s capital, and Toronto, the Canadian metropolis with the biggest population, are located there. According to the 2011 census, 12.85 million people were living in Ontario, which indicates an increase of 5.7% from 2006 (Bone, 2018) (Fig. 2). This pattern shows a sharp increase in consideration of the development level of Canada as a progressive nation. The reasons for that are increased immigration and the growth of students.
Immigration had a significant impact on the growth of the local community. Latin Americans, Africans, and Asians who dwell in the province’s metropolitan areas are the most recent immigration sources to the area. Over time, the Aboriginal population in Ontario has grown more quickly than in the rest of the province. It is expected that more people will move to Ottawa and other major mining cities as they become more prevalent and populous.
The Core and Periphery Areas
Major powers and countries or regions with much wealth are considered core areas. On the contrary, the periphery consists of areas that do not profit from globalization and economic creation. Urban planning pioneer John Friedman is well known for examining the growth of cities worldwide (Sanyal, 2018). The core-periphery development model seeks to illustrate the development of the metropolitan system in four major stages, which coexist with the rise of the transportation industry. Disproportions are gradually eradicated from the initial level of inequalities in an area and brought to the urban system. This explains why certain areas of a city endure distinct types of poverty and shortage while others see substantial growth and development.
Economic, social, cultural, and political characteristics illustrate Ontario’s central and outlying regions. The core areas have been established in regions with advantageous geographic characteristics, including excellent transportation and communication infrastructure, abundant resources, and simple access to population centers and markets. Consequently, some cores were developed due to political decisions, while historical and cultural factors influenced others.
In Ontario, the heartland-highland distinction, which describes the core-periphery duality, has been used for the discourse about regional geography. Its enormous geographical extent, proximity to the resource, and the inequalities in secondary and tertiary work prospects all play a major role in the core-periphery differences. These elements have affected how Ontario has growing population around the lower Great Lakes, the Atlantic coast, and Vancouver Island. Later, the region’s natural riches fueled the expansion and development of further cities. The entire evaluation concludes that the region’s economy is rapidly growing. According to Statistics Canada, greater Golden Horseshoe is the most urbanized region in Ontario. It comprises 9 Census Metropolitan Areas and roughly 100 municipalities, each with a population of over 100,000 people (Bourgeault et al., 2017). The present population expansion has concentrated in a region that stretches from the northernmost point of Oshawa to the western coasts of Lake Ontario.
Fault Lines
In Canada, multiple fault lines run between distinct regions. Ideally, these are the geological events that occur when tectonic forces cause fractures to emerge on the earth’s surface. There are political, economic, and social fault lines in Canada that have, throughout time, caused the division of people and regions as the country’s economy and integrity have become unstable. According to Bone (2018), Canada’s current fault lines exist between English and French Canadians, aboriginal and non-aboriginal residents, centrist and decentralist forces, and existing immigration pressures. These are the primary fault lines that have kept Canada as a country divided into several regions.
Indians, Inuit, and Métis (commonly recognized as First Nations) are some of Canada’s indigenous inhabitants. They are Canadians of North American ancestry (Rotondi et al., 2017). There is no clear blood or ancestry connection between non-aboriginals and native people. The lawful Indian citizens of Canada are free from several tax-related government regulations. The unregistered Indians in Canada do not have these privileges, but they can demonstrate their heritage through the signed treaties, resulting in their right to reside in reservations. The Métis have the legal right to live in Canada because they are also descended from Indians.
The most intricate fault line is still projected to exist in the foreseeable future. This occurs due to the historical interactions between European settlers and Aboriginal people. Tension in the Ontario region resulted from entanglement between the Aboriginals and the British monarchy. The federal government imposed rules on the Aboriginal people that greatly impacted how they lived in the area. They encountered bigotry, were marginalized by Canadian society, and were eventually forgotten (Petryna & Follis, 2015). Due to the ongoing fight for equal rights and the necessity to eliminate all forms of discrimination, the fault line is anticipated to be resolved over the next ten years.
Along with the activities of the federal, provincial, and local governments, several First Nations promptly put access to their territories under restriction as COVID-19 swept the nation. First Nations’ actions were not novel because they are permitted by Canadian legislation to proclaim states of emergency (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). However, despite the Band Council passing regulations, people still visited reserve areas across the nation despite obvious signage and disregarded emergency instructions and laws. For instance, the Rama First Nation, close to the Treaty-affected little city of Orillia in Ontario, saw an increase in the number of people breaking the reserve’s stated entry rules (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). Residents of Orillia appear to have determined that actions prohibited in their city may be carried out inside the confines of Rama’s reserve (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). These actions point to the disparaging attitudes towards First Nation citizens.
Non-reserve residents entered the area without the government of the reserve’s permission. It was by not keeping a safe distance when passing other pedestrians, purchasing cigarettes in a pre-pandemic manner, failing to wear a mask, or walking a dog in a park when they are closed (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). A dog walker in Orillia might not have ever heard of the term “terra nullius,” a colonial political-legal myth that asserts Indigenous territories were not occupied in legally and politically significant ways prior to the advent of the colonists (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). However, when she believes her decisions may supersede any norms and rules in existence in areas designated for indigenous people, she reaffirms that idea via her acts and exerting sovereignty over Indigenous Peoples (Flynn & Shanks, 2021). Increasing regulation control and educating citizens by nourishing their moral values could introduce detrimental changes to discrimination. The government is aware of the social discrimination present in the state. Therefore, various initiatives are being established to address the issue, such as public education and awareness plans with millions of dollars in investment.
Challenges and Solutions
In addition, the main challenge for Ontario in the future ten years is in the access to healthcare. The rural and distant setting of many First Nations communities in Northwestern Ontario, Canada, presents special challenges for physically obtaining healthcare (Chow et al., 2020). Indigenous peoples worldwide deal with comparable issues (Nguyen et al., 2020). Significant health disparities among First Nations populations, including a high incidence of cancer, can be ascribed to several conditions brought on by colonialism and Westernization (Chow et al., 2020). Providing easily available, practical, and culturally appropriate cancer screening programs that result in early identification and treatment represents one potentially effective strategy to reduce the burden of advanced malignancies (Chow et al., 2020). The Wequedong Lodge Cancer Screening Program was a pilot initiative designed to educate members of rural and distant First Nations communities about cancer screening (Chow et al., 2020). This will allow improving the life quality of indigenous populations.
Perhaps, the federal policies in response to the fault lines and challenges stated may eradicate the community divide. The state recognizes Indigenous residents as the rightful citizens of Canada. In ten years, the improvement of medical access and policies to improve the situations would be able to normalize the local perceptions of the fault lines. However, it is difficult to predict the exact timing for the change.
Conclusion
Ontario is one of the largest regions in Canada in terms of its physical geography, population, and for that reason, economically. The prosperity of the region could be traced in various fields. The abundance of natural resources ensures the industrial development of the region while hinting at agricultural strength, the recreational development of Ontario, and the prosperity of the foresting industry. Similarly, the increasing diversity and size of the local population hint at the region’s attractiveness for migration. However, it is possible to observe the fault lines in the form of the divide between the indigenous population and non-indigenous citizens, which was reflected in the community response to the reserve area’s policy implementation.
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