The Karoo, in South Africa, is a harsh environment in which to make a living out of agriculture—the area is mostly devoid of surface water. Its name is derived from the Khoisan word meaning “land of thirst”. The land was traditionally used by pastoralists but drought, overgrazing and predation by wild animals made this activity precarious. Predators were kept in check by … [Read more...]
Are cows drinking Australia dry?
Producers in Queensland’s north-west are facing an increasingly anxious wait for the wet season to arrive as water shortages compound an already dire feed situation. It is only two years since rivers were roaring and springs were overflowing in the Gulf in the wake of successive wet seasons, but producers have been left stunned by the rapid turnaround that has occurred … [Read more...]
Top retailer and WWF form sustainability partnership
In a first for African retail, the World Wide Fund for Nature South Africa (WWF-SA) and Woolworths have announced a broad-based, multifaceted partnership to drive greater sustainability through selected Woolworths products and operations. The collaboration is timely, reflecting a trend that recognises that the private sector and the non-governmental sector can work together … [Read more...]
Wiping out World Hunger – One Meat Burger at a Time
800 million of the one billion starving people in the world would have food to eat if Americans all became vegetarian. This is according to figures released by Cornell University’s College of Agriculture, and published in the recent December 28 issue of Scientific American. According to the article, “grain currently fed to some seven billion livestock in the United States … [Read more...]
Navigating the protein crunch
Twenty-five thousand people die per day from starvation, while as many die of obesity-related conditions. This was just the start of what I learned at the launch of Jason Drew and David Lorimer's new book, The Protein Crunch at The Bay Bookshop in Cape Town. If these words are a fracture of what's contained in the book, I thought, it is going to blow my mind. And that's … [Read more...]
