Tag: Environmental Education

Deputy Minister Buti Manamela on launch of Nature Africa

Message of support by South Africa’s Deputy Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Buti Manamela on the launch event for Nature Africa

It is a great pleasure and privilege for me to deliver a message of support to you on the occasion of this historic event. For more than 150 years, Nature has been one of the most authoritative voices of global science. The launch of a dedicated platform supported by Nature to communicate news and results from African science to an international audience is, thus, most welcome and in fact long overdue.

The South African Government, through our Department of Science and Innovation, would like to congratulate Nature on this initiative. In Africa, as elsewhere in the world, science has been at the forefront of the response to the Covid-19 pandemic, from both a public health and economic recovery perspective. To progress African science requires better communication and enhanced global partnerships, and Nature Africa can play an important role to foster such efforts.

Ladies and gentlemen, over the decades Nature has gained global recognition for the steadfast pursuit of its mission to serve scientists by publishing after rigorous review results of scientific advancement and then disseminating these results to enable science to serve society. This should also be the mission of Nature Africa. I would like to share with you three suggestions of ways through which Nature Africa could contribute to enhancing the role African science plays globally.

Firstly, Nature Africa should assist to raise increased international awareness of the crucial, often essential roles, African scientists are playing to respond to global challenges such as Covid-19, global change and food security. These contributions are often not appreciated or celebrated as they should be. Our world will for example not be able to confront pressing global concerns with regard to poverty, inequality and unemployment without the contributions of African social scientists.

We will not achieve the objectives of the Sustainable Development Goals set by global leaders without the contributions of African scientists.  

Nature Africa should help to raise this awareness that support for African science is an investment in a better world for all. There is no lack of material for good news stories to be communicated but what we do need is more communication platforms with global reach, and Nature Africa will help to fill this gap.

As a second action, I would like to recommend that Nature Africa should critically interrogate the existing practices of, and serve as a platform for debate, to find the best modalities for Africa’s participation in global science partnerships. From a South African perspective, it is crucial that values such as co-ownership and shared responsibility underpin international cooperation.  African scientists should be regarded as full and equal partners in global collaboration, and sadly this is at times, not the case.

International funding as important as it is also has the dangerous potential to divert focus away from Africa’s own research priorities. The best response to avoid these pitfalls is for African Governments and bodies such as the African Union to assume our own responsibilities to fund and support African research.  We count on Nature Africa to keep a vigilant eye on the design and implementation of international cooperation instruments, and the honoring of commitments by all concerned, to ensure the full potential of African science to advance equitable and sustainable global development is unleashed.

My third and last call to Nature Africa is to inspire, especially the next generation.  I am delighted to see the participation of many of Africa’s best emerging young researchers in today’s event.

African scientists continue to make us proud on the global stage and their stories must be told to encourage the next generation who will follow in their steps, and awake and sustain general public interest in science.

South Africa is proud to host with Australia the world’s largest radio telescope, the Square Kilometer Array radio telescope, the SKA. Our MeerKAT telescope, a precursor to the SKA, designed and built by African engineers, is already delivering groundbreaking scientific discoveries.  African scientists are, thus, leading the charge to fight pandemic disease and fight hunger, but are also playing their part as leaders in frontier science.

This is the vision for the Africa we want – a better Africa in a better, more just world enabled by science. We look forward to good cooperation with Nature Africa as we continue to pursue this mission, reinforcing global solidarity and partnership. We also look forward to welcome all of you to South Africa for the World Science Forum in 2022, which will be convened under the theme of Science for Social Justice, as well as our annual Science Forum South Africa in 2021. The objective of our Science Forum is to ignite conversations about science, exactly as Nature Africa will be doing. I thank you.

Courtesy: www.gov.za

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VIDEO | Let the environment guide our development

TEDGlobal2010

Human growth has strained the earth’s resources, but as Johan Rockström reminds us, our advances also give us the science to recognize this and change behavior. His research has found nine “planetary boundaries” that can guide us in protecting our planet’s many overlapping ecosystems.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by our editors on the home page.

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Creating Liveable Green Spaces

Environmental open spaces are a Metropole’s soundest investment, they pay rich dividends in greater human health, happiness, and efficiency.

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The buck stops at Vergelegen

The arrival of the eland (Taurotragus oryx) at Vergelegen in Somerset West forms the latest stage of the Gantouw Project.  This is a programme of the non-profit organisation Cape Town Environmental Education Trust (CTEET) and has been in operation since 2015 under its Nature Care Fund. The project mimics the historic migration of eland, using them as a natural driver to boost ecosystem diversity.

The CEO of CTEET, Dr Anthony Roberts explained that the word “Gantouw” derives from the Koi language and means “the way of the eland.” He added that this refers to the path that the eland carved into the land as they migrated back and forth from the Cape Flats over the Hottentots Holland Mountains. 

Roberts further explained that introducing eland would help restore the ecosystems that have been damaged by urbanisation. 

“Urbanisation has resulted in fragmented ecosystems, many of which are collapsing. By introducing eland and allowing them to browse vegetation and prevent bush encroachment ‒ one of the main threats to the ecological health of these systems ‒ the characteristic diversity of the veld starts to return and the ecosystem functions more effectively,” Roberts said. 

The impact of the eland on the Vergelegen veld will be monitored using drones and spectral imaging, as well as on-the-ground flora and fauna surveys. This will indicate the animals’ grazing preferences, their impact on flora and fauna, and estimations of veld carrying capacity.

The eland group comprises three cows and two neutered bulls, transported from Elandsberg, Wellington.  The project will run for five years then be reviewed. 

Vergelegen has provided a fenced 10 hectare camp near the hilltop wine cellar, secluded from its hospitality and management operations. CTEET has erected a boma in this camp to shelter the eland and estate management has undertaken to monitor their health. CTEET will conduct research to obtain baseline data as well as ongoing ecological monitoring and will submit an annual report.

The first phase of the Gantouw Project focused on Cape Flats Dune Strandveld, which is endangered and only found on the lowlands of Cape Town. At Vergelegen the eland will graze on various species of fynbos including renosterbos, osteospermum, searsia, helichrysum, oxalis, various grasses and restios.

Vergelegen MD Wayne Coetzer explained that much of the original vegetation at Vergelegen has revived since the estate management embarked on South Africa’s largest privately funded alien vegetation clearing project. Completed in 2018, the project has restored 2200 hectares of fynbos vegetation, while supporting job creation and skills development in local communities.

“We are delighted to be able to play a part in this far-sighted project and look forward to seeing the research findings in due course. We hope the knowledge gained at the estate will help to protect other precious natural habitats,” said Coetzer

The eland research will form part of a PhD thesis by ecologist Petro Botha, the Gantouw Project Manager.

The estate has a long history of collaborating with both local and international universities so that students and professionals can further their education through various projects at Vergelegen, said Coetzer. By end-2018 there had been 24 formal studies: seven undergraduate, eleven postgraduate and six PhD studies. Of these, 19 were from local institutions and five from international institutions.

Vergelegen was the first Biodiversity and Wine Initiative Champion in 2005 and was awarded the Wildlife and Environment Society of South Africa (WESSA) 2019 corporate award, which recognises the wine estate’s sustained commitment to environmental initiatives.

The Gantouw Project is proudly sponsored as an environmental responsibility project by Quemic, a unique and dynamic provider of integrated risk solutions within the safety and security environment.

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