Staff Reporter

It was Booker Prize week, so Lemmer will kick off with something of a literary nature. Oom Krisjan might be an old fuddy-duddy, but he still clings to old-fashioned notions such as that those who send out press releases should have at least a passing acquaintance with the topic they’re attempting to communicate about. These thoughts were occasioned by an e-mail from Exclusive Books about its Publishers’ Choice list.

Group turnover for South African consumer products and services group AVI Limited increased by 5% in the first quarter, chairperson Anthony Ardington said on Wednesday. He told shareholders at the group’s annual general meeting that although local consumer demand had slowed, the outlook generally remained positive.

The problem of human trafficking in South Africa is coming under greater scrutiny as the state investigates new legislation to plug existing loopholes. According to the International Organisation on Migration, South Africa is the regional centre of an intricate trafficking network that recruits women and children.

Judge Hillary Squires, who is presiding over the Schabir Shaik fraud and corruption trial, on Wednesday again lashed out at the media for inaccurate reporting regarding evidence which was led in the trial on Tuesday.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?cg=BreakingNews-National&ao=123995">Witness did not want to be involved</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?cg=BreakingNews-National&ao=123967">Shaik lawyer refutes assistant’s claims</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?cg=BreakingNews-National&ao=123960">Media rebuked at Shaik trial</a>

"This is a sad place, all these people are angry — nobody is happy here." Nomsa Sibaya sits with her arms crossed, staring at the women in the queue at the Johannesburg Family Court. Collecting maintenance is an uphill battle for many mothers in South Africa. Progressive laws are in place, but implementation is proving difficult

Have you always ached to know how to make the best tacos ever? Probably not, but Ian Fraser thought you just might. In his bag of useful (and useless) goodies this week, you can get a <i>Lord of the Rings</i> bargain, convert any currency into rands, compare local PC prices to international ones, learn how to sell poo on eBay, enlist the services of rifle-wielding childminders, spice up your lexicon and more.

The discontent over the trajectory of black economic empowerment (BEE), long simmering within the African National Congress alliance ranks, has finally burst into the open. The Congress of South African Trade Unions’s Zwelinzima Vavi and Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel have both criticised the get-rich-quick mentality among the super-empowered (the BEE-llionaires) and the aspirants on the lower rungs (the wanna-BEEs), writes Jeremy Cronin.

Donors are belatedly coughing up cash to fight locusts in West Africa, but agricultural experts warned on Monday that it will take two or three years to reduce the number of insects to the point where they no longer present a significant threat to agriculture. Nearly half the crop-spraying aircraft in West Africa have been sent to Senegal.

<b>Manager: Environmental Education, North West Department of Agriculture, Conservation, Environment and Tourism</b>

Lebo’s dream is that all the young people in North West province will grow into ardent conservationists. She develops environmental education programmes for the schools in her province and she also teaches communities to improve their lives by using their local resources in sustainable ways.

<b>Manager: KwaZulu-Natal Conservation Leadership Group, a working group of the Endangered Wildlife Trust</b>

Do your children know which endangered species occur in your area? Janis’s job is to ensure that they do. She teaches rural children about their environment and the fauna it supports.

<b>Deputy Director: Biodiversity Planning, Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism</b>

Originally a town planner, Wilma wants to build monuments of conservation for descendants by preserving South Africa’s biodiversity. “I want my grandchildren to see animals and plants in the wild, not in a book."

<b>Development Facilitator: Agro-biodiversity, Community Public Private Partnership, Department of Trade and Industry</b>

The meaning of Mapule’s name is “she who brings rain”, so it is appropriate that she helps to bring good fortune to marginalised rural communities. She helps people to set up their own businesses, based on indigenous food sources such as goats and African vegetables.

Gold miner Gold Fields on Monday said it has rejected a takeover bid by world number-six gold miner Harmony to create the world’s leading gold mining group, saying it is not in its interests. "Harmony’s true agenda has not been revealed," Gold Fields official Andrew Davidson said.

<b>Head of Communications: SANParks</b>

When SANParks speaks, it’s usually with Wanda’s voice. Managing communications for 20 national parks is “a bit of a challenge… But the biggest challenge is to ensure the public knows that SANParks is about more than Kruger Park and Table Mountain,” she says.

<b>General Manager, Social Science Research, People and Conservation Directorate, South African National Parks</b>

Sibongile has two masters degrees in arts and is now doing a PhD in environmental education through Rhodes University. Among her passions is South Africa’s multifaceted cultural heritage.

<b>Corporate Communications and Marketing Manager, IUCN-SA</B>

Tzila says she became an environmentalist in her first year at high school. “We had a passionate geography teacher who reinforced this message all the time … My career aim is to promote environmental responsibility, through communications and marketing."

<b>Project Manager: Custodians of Rare and Endangered Wildflowers, SANBI</b>

“I have had a passion for trees since childhood but didn’t know I could get a job related to plants, so I opted for veterinary science,” says Domitilla. “For part of my BSc, I studied botany and realised this was for me. Ever since, I’ve worked in plant conservation, researching threatened fynbos and arid plants.”

<b>International Coordinator: Lubombo Transfrontier Conservation Area</b>

Not many people can boast they work for three countries. The Lubombo TFCA will link up huge areas between South Africa, Mozambique and Swaziland to create one of the first elephant strongholds along Africa’s eastern coastline. But not only animals live within the TFCA.

I have been under attack in recent weeks for suggesting that the extraordinary concrete wall that the Israeli state is building around itself, designed to keep Muslim Palestinians out of its borders, is racist. I am attacked for being racist myself – why shouldn’t Israel be allowed to do what it likes, considering the anti-Israeli assaults that are constantly being launched against it.

The fact that investors channelled a net record R15-billion into unit trusts into the third quarter is an indication of improved sentiment towards the market as a result of recent strong gains from the lows of March last year, according to Investec Asset Management director Jeremy Gardiner.

In a bold attack on the compound housing the United States and Iraqi government headquarters, insurgents penetrated Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone and set off bombs at a market and a popular café on Thursday, killing seven people, including two Americans, the United States military said.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?cg=BreakingNews-InternationalNews&ao=123691">Iraq’s killing fields</a>

Do you know that some products you are buying are fitting with miniature transmitters? From that "VIP membership" card for a clothing store in your wallet or purse, to razor blades and shirts — you are being spied on. And there is a slow but increasingly vocal movement growing to force companies to ‘fess up to using them to track consumers.