How do you take an eyesore and an environmental liability and turn it into an asset that will have immediate economic benefits for the local community? Anglo Coal’s Aapiesdoorndraai, near Burgersfort in Mpumalanga, was up for the challenge. The company’s rehabilitation of an old magnesia mine, closed since 1978, and its transformation into a residential and industrial area, has a Cinderella aspect to it.
Activists in the Ekurhuleni municipality are claiming that informal settlements on the mining belt are being unlawfully demolished as a "clean-up" operation for the 2010 World Cup Soccer event and in order to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) of eradicating urban slums by 2015.
Norway hopes to follow in Sweden’s footsteps by criminalising the purchase of sexual services. This would keep prostitution legal but make pimping or buying sex illegal. By forcibly cutting demand, both countries are hoping to bring down the supply of prostitutes.
Backsberg Estate Cellars in the Western Cape is bragging about its green credentials after becoming the first wine producers in South Africa to do a full carbon audit of its product. It has subsequently reduced its carbon footprint by off-setting carbon emissions by planting 907 indigenous trees in the nearby Klapmuts community.
"In this particular month that it comes through, a 70c increase in the petrol price will probably push inflation up by 0,6%. If the petrol price had not increased, inflation would have been 5,4% in the month of April, but now it is going to be 6%. That is negative for the Reserve Bank, as it might persuade them to raise interest rates, which is the direct impact," says Dennis Dykes, chief economist at Nedbank.
We have been warned about pirated CDs and DVDs, but now — shock! horror! — watch out for illegal toilet paper. It may sound ridiculous, but it’s true. You might be buying illegal toilet paper, even though you don’t know it. The South African Tissue Manufacturers’ Association (Satma) has announced that illegal toilet paper exists, and has been around for some time already.
In a pleasant red-brick building, at the corner of two streets, is where you will find Dorah’s Ark, a soup kitchen in Roodepoort. Here Dorah Mazibuko (69) and her husband David feed more than 100 people daily, helping communities from informal settlements, particularly those from the nearby squatter camp Mathole.
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/ 27 February 2007
A Soweto community has chosen to clean up and green their area and a Lonehill community has decided to start a recycling programme. Although these projects encounter some challenges, they are slowly but surely brightening formerly unattractive neighbourhoods.