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"Loser." With a smile curling up on her face, Janet Podleski savours and stretches out the first syllable. She is talking about her sister and business partner, Greta Podleski - and not in private.

 The first formal advertisement in Canada was an offer of butter for sale that appeared in 1752 in an official government publication called the Halifax Gazette. In 1764 the Québec Gazette (later renamed the Chronicle-Telegraph) was founded, as much to carry news of merchandise as events.

Agricultural exhibitions probably began as bazaars or fairs.

In 1997 there were 247 manufacturers of agricultural implements in Canada, employing 11 101 workers. Only 2 establishments employed more than 1000 workers; 90% of establishments employed fewer than 100 workers.

Canada's agriculture and food industries have changed greatly in the years since the Second World War. Growth in Canada’s economy, and associated social changes, have altered the way food is produced, processed, handled, sold and consumed.

Agriculture is the practice of growing crops and rearing animals mainly for food. Farmers also produce other items such as wool from sheep and CBD oil from hemp plants.

In Canada, agriculture is an important industry. Only about 7 per cent of Canada’s land can be farmed. Other marginal (poorer) land can be used to ranch cattle. Aquaculture operations are found on the East and West Coasts and in the Great Lakes. Some crops such as tomatoes, cannabis and flowers are grown in greenhouses in urban centres. Canadian agriculture faces many challenges. Some of these challenges concern crop protection, soil conservation, labour, climate change and health.

Click here for definitions of key terms used in this article.

Agroforestry is an intensive land management system that integrates the benefits from biological interactions created when trees or shrubs are intentionally grown with crops or livestock.

As would be expected in a large, thinly populated country, air transport is a very important part of the Canadian economy.

The Asbestos Strike began on 14 February 1949 and paralyzed major asbestos mines in Quebec for almost five months. The Quebec government sided with the main employer, an American-owned company, against the 5,000 unionized mine workers. From the start, the strike created conflicts between the provincial government and the Roman Catholic Church, which usually sided with the government. One of the longest and most violent labour conflicts in Quebec history, it helped lay the groundwork for the Quiet Revolution

Leonard Asper wrapped up the last bit of business in the $3.5-billion deal that reshaped Canada's media landscape by cellular telephone in a car.

An asset is a useful and desirable thing or quality. The word is most often used in business, financial or accounting contexts. Canada has some of the world’s most impressive physical and natural resources. These resources may be viewed as “national assets.” The concept is also useful in personal finance, as housing is most Canadian families’ largest asset.

The automotive industry includes the production of cars and car parts. Since the early 20th century, it has been one of Canada’s most significant manufacturing industries, as well as a key driver of Canada’s manufactured imports and exports, employment and overall industrial production.

A bailout consists of providing financial help to a business or to the wider economy during times of trouble.

The Canadian baking industry consists of companies that manufacture bread, cakes, pastries and similar perishable bakery products.

WHEN JACK DZIERWA, a relative newcomer to Bay Street, wrote about bank mergers in a research report last July, he broached a subject still too sticky for some to want to discuss.

Martin is ready to table legislation as early as February to make it easier for foreign banks to open branches here. They are now required to set up Canadian subsidiaries with enough assets to back up any deposits they take in at Canadian branches.

Banking is a financial process carried out by an institution that accepts deposits, lends money and transfers funds. Canada's major banks play a vital role in the economy and today also engage in the insurance, trust and securities markets. Their business, the technology surrounding it and the regulations that govern it, have evolved continuously over the centuries.

This article was originally published in Maclean’s magazine on 8 March 1999. Partner content is not updated.

Watch what I do, not what I say. That, in effect, is how BCE Inc. chief executive Jean Monty explained the latest and boldest step in his campaign to reinvent the Montreal-based telecommunications giant as the dominant provider of Canadian content on the Internet.

If it's true that you've got to be smart to be lucky, then Jean Monty is one heck of a smart businessman. A year ago, the chief executive officer of BCE Inc. flirted with the idea of swapping the conglomerate's 39-per-cent stake in Nortel Networks Corp.