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Today's New Messages
ZIMBABWE (3 new messages)
Land Issues - State- and privately-owned land giveaways (2 new messages)
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Farm News from 8-2002 (1 new message)
SA's gen-crops also feed starving Zimbabweans (1 new message)
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ZIMBABWE
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Message 86 in Discussion |
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From: AdrianaStuijt
Experts warn of mass starvation in Zimbabwe
Harare - May 20 -- A team of international food experts has concluded that Zimbabwe faces starvation on a massive scale because of serious disruptions in its farming activities.
The warning of mass starvation was contained in a study concluded last week by a team of food experts from the World Food Programme (WFP), the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and the early warning unit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
The team was in Zimbabwe to establish the impact of the disruptions in farming activities by restive war veterans and supporters of the ruling Zanu-PF party.
The team confirmed estimates by Zimbabwe's own farming industry that the nation would face a 600,000 ton deficit of maize, the country's staple crop, this year. The country needs at least 1,8-million tons of maize annually to feed its population of 12-million.
This year farmers are expected to produce only 800,000 tons of maize in addition to the 500,000 tons that would be drawn from the strategic grain reserves, leaving a deficit of about 600 000 tons.
Most of the maize crop this year can only be drawn from subsistence peasant farmers scattered throughout the country. The large-scale commercial farmers who have always provided Zimbabwe's annual needs hardly engaged in maize production last season because Mugabe's storm troopers stopped commercial farmers from sowing new crops and refused access to their own farms and seed stocks.
The team also estimated a massive deficit exceeding 200 000 tons in wheat output. A possible wheat deficit has already been confirmed implicitly by the Zimbabwe government, which last month banned all wheat exports.
Zimbabwe needs about 450 000 tons of wheat annually and might find itself having to import a substantial part of this.
The SADC, FAO and WFP team forecast deficits for other crops such as sorghum, peanuts, soya beans and an assortment of vegetables.
In rural areas, people are already complaining that they cannot buy basic foodstuffs because of rampant inflation.
The price of bread was raised by an average 12 percent this year, and even reports in state-controlled media warn that the new prices of basic foodstuffs had gone far beyond the reach of poor families.
The price of bread will rise again soon after Zimbabwe runs out of its wheat stocks and must start importing the grain. However, the country has no hard currency to pay for imports.
Mark Prior, the chairperson of the National Bakers' Association, said there was not much the bakers could do as they could no longer absorb the ever-escalating input costs.
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From: Wotknott
Dear All,
I received this analogy via email from Charles W and in spite of its racial implications I have decided to publish it here. After all, I am an African.
Apologies to anybody who may feel offended, but I feel that this analogy quite accurately describes the unhealthy situation in Zimbabwe today. A situation which would not be tolerated in the USA, Canada or Europe.
IMAGINE THIS:
Imagine that one day an unpopular American President decides that all his woes are the fault of black Americans. Using all the resources at his disposal (press, police, army, party followers, US treasury resources, supportive neighbouring countries) this President declares that African-Americans should "Go back to Africa".
Using spurious judges and legislators, he makes black Americans non-citizens unless they can renounce any vague claim they might have to citizenship of a country in Africa in which their parents or even grandparents were born; without this, they lose American citizenship.
Next he declares their businesses illegal and gives them 90 days to close down and leave.
After the 90 day period, and in spite of numerous court cases proving the President's case illegal, he sends in the army, police and mobs of drunk, drugged, illiterate white Americans to force the black Americans out of their homes. They are forced to close their businesses, to pay compensation to their workers (who are now all out of jobs), and to hand over the keys and title deeds of their homes and businesses either to mobs of axe-wielding, drunken, illiterate white youth or to senior white civil servants, policemen or army commanders, and even to the American First Lady.
If these black Americans refuse to go, they are arrested and locked up in filthy overcrowded cells awaiting their "court cases". Can you imagine the uproar around the world?
Now substitute "Zimbabwe" for "America" and exchange "black" and "white", and you will understand exactly what is happening in Zimbabwe, right now.
Are you still outraged? Good.
Then forward this to your representative in your country's government, and to anyone you know anywhere in the world who might feel the same way you do about the situation in Zimbabwe today.
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From: AdrianaStuijt
More of the same in South Africa, too
Sept 3 2002 -- Thousands of slum-dwellers marched on the Earth Summit on Saturday,
protesting about issues from Aids to globalisation and marshalled by heavily
armed police.
Singing very odious anti-white chants such as "Kill the Boer, kill the farmer" and carrying banners asking Bin Laden to bomb Sandton, the 10,000 slum dwellers marched to Johannesburg's plush Sandton convention centre from the shanty township of Alexandra - an 8km walk that President Thabo Mbeki said symbolised a "global apartheid" between rich and poor.
"Hello Sandton!...It's a pity you're barricaded, preventing us from coming in and
showing you the real world!" organiser Virginia Setshedi yelled across the
razor wire at the building.
Some of the slogans displayed on posters, T-shirts and banners read "Osama bin Laden - Bomb Sandton", "Factory Gases and Waste are Killing", "Hands Off Iraq", "Globalise the Intifada", "Stop Thabo Mbeki's Aids genocide" or "Bush, you belong in the Bush".
At a smaller, pro-Regime rally, officials stifled a protest by about 1200 Zimbabwean opposition members who brandished posters saying: "Mugabe is a thief".
Many of the protesters in both rallies were pro-Palestinian and the head of the Palestinian delegation to the summit, Farouq al-Qaddomi, openly attacked Israel in a speech at
Mbeki's rally.
And later, at the convention itself, Mbeki chaired the meeting featuring government leaders -- and smiled happily as he allowed Nujoma's and Mugabe's vicious rampages against the only friend they still have left in the West, namely Tony Blair of Great Britain.
Clearly, when it comes to "making friends and influenting people," these African leaders not only never read the book, but they stole and destroyed the original manuscript before it could be published.
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Land Issues - State- and privately-owned land giveaways
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From: Frederick Malherbe
Maleoskop Police Training Centre, Groblersdal to be closed -- land scheduled for handover to local Pedi tribe.
From: "JR LE ROUX" <jreh@mweb.co.zaDate: Thu, 13 Jun 2002 21:12:50 +0200
To: <KeithKnott@CrimeBustersZA.com
Thank you for this web page, as a police officer I do appreciate the work you are doing.
As you are well aware that all police officers must do some kind of training at some stage in their lives, MALEOSKOP TRAINING CENTRE, situated near Groblersdal, Mpumalanga is such an Institution where all members get trained in advanced tactics and where at this moment student recruits are being trained to fulfil their duties when the training is finished.
Due to a decision that was made ("can't say") this wonderful place with it's beauty and serenity will be closing down the end of December 2002. There is more than meets the eye and I am really sorry to see this place that was started in 1973 must close down with out so much as an blink of the eye or a sound of remorse.
Thank you once again for lending me your ear. JR LE ROUX
insp.
Dear Inspector Le Roux,
Thank you for taking the time to write to us.
You are very welcome to make use of the message boards on our Crime Busters of South Africa web site, which we implemented to express ourappreciation for the good work, which our police officers undertake to safeguard us, often under very trying and dangerous circumstances.
Messages can be posted in any language. Where necessary, we will translate these messages into one, or more, of the 'lingua franca' of the world for the benefit of our world-wide visitors.
Ek persoonlik,
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From: AdrianaStuijt
CAPE TOWN -- Sept 3, 2002 -- A private seed company and the metropolitan council of Cape Town have teamed up in an urban agricultural project at the local primary school in economically-suppressed West Bank near Delft -- traditional organic kitchen gardens.
The company, BKS Limited, provides seeds and management expertise until the first complete harvest has been marketed. After that, the school will start managing its own kitchen gardens, which they hope to also expand with commercial floricultural gardens.
The organic kitchen gardens were launched five weeks ago in the Delft school grounds under the guidance of local schoolmaster Britz "Appleseed" van Wyk - who hopes to create "a green, food-producing oasis for the entire West Bank community."
Van Wyk has already initiated two other, highly successful botanical gardens at his previous post, Primary School Dennemere in Blackheath.
"There's a lot of unemployment and aimlessness in West Bank. We hope to involve the entire community in the kitchen gardens project to help give people new goals in life," he said.
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From: AdrianaStuijt
ANC is blaming the victims again --
"unprotected magistrates courting disaster:"
The country's 260 regional and district magistrates say inadequate security has made them vulnerable to criminals, both at work and when they travel to and from home.
In the latest attack, Parow regional court magistrate Marthinus Langenhoven, 61, was seriously wounded when gunmen in a passing car opened fire on him as he was about to get into his bakkie in the driveway of his Kuils River, Cape Town, home at about 8.30am on Friday. He is under police guard in hospital.
In recent years, at least two magistrates -- also Afrikaners, just like Langenhoven -- have been slain in work-related attacks, while others have been injured and had shots fired at them from ambushes near the law courts where they worked.
And in Cape Town's magistrate's court, only days after the attempted assassination of Langenhoven, a gunman from the public gallery of a Cape Town magistrate's court shot an accused man five times as he appeared in the dock. Police and justice department officials were "unable to say how the gunman (a henchman for a local gang warlord) had managed to slip through court security"...
Pinetown magistrate Antony Hoffert was murdered in an ambush on August 27 last year, while Cape Town magistrate Piet Theron was gunned down outside his Western Cape home on September 7, 2000.
Now, magistrates countrywide say their security is becoming a cause for great concern.
Regional court magistrates say members of the public, some carrying dangerous weapons, have "unlimited access" to their courts 24 hours a day.
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Farm News from 8-2002
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From: Top Cop
Maize thefts from SA farm fields up by 80%
July 30, 2002 -- As already reported by Censorbugbear yesterday, the Transvaal Agricultural Union has warned of an 80% increase in organised thefts of ripening maize crops from farmers' fields -- especially those bordering famine-struck Zimbabwe.
Paul van der Walt of the TLU said it is widely believed by police and farmers alike that organised crime syndicates are stealing the maize from the SA fields and smuggling the staple food to famine-struck Zimbabwe, where huge profits are being made from black-market maize. Farmers demand that the regime increase security to help protect the South African maize crops. Farmers are reporting that organised, heavily-armed criminals pay farm workers to steal the crops from loaded harvesters at night.
Crop thefts lead to food insecurity:
If these crop thefts -- at the height of the maize harvest season in the countyr's only maize-producing regions -- are allowed to continue, South Africa could also be faced with an increasing food shortage, farmers are warning.
The TLU also slammed police for arresting victimised farmer Pieter Johannes Venter (27) of the farm Makoeispan at Biesiesvlei. Venter had allegedly injured one of four armed attackers -- who had been sent to kill him for R100 by a crime syndicate, the TLU claims.
The farm attackers had been sent to kill Venter in revenge for the arrests of organized maize robbers and the recovery of 11 tons of maize which had earlier been stolen from Venter's farm. The injured alleged maize robber -- now under police guard at Duff Scott hospital -- had laid a charge of attempted murder against the farmer. The TLU said it was disgraceful that the victim had been arrested and jailed after he had tried to defend himself from a gang of vicious, heavily-armed killers.
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From: AdrianaStuijt
Boegoe and Devil's Claw - desert plants grown commercially
- to save wild plants from overharvesting for indigenous African medicines...
Sept 3, 2002 -- Landbouweekblad writes of two indigenous South African desert plants which are now being cultivated commercially for the export parhmaceutical market -- namely Boegoe (also known as ibuchu, buchu) and Devil's Claw (Harpagophytum procumbens). Both are well-known traditional medicines used in Africa for centuries, and now also being increasingly exported to Europe.
Both are now being cultivated commercially in the Western Cape. The authorities are encouraging this to thwart the huge smuggling networks which are destroying especially the protected Boegoe plants in their natural habitat.
At present, more than 90% of the dried devil's claw root (Harpagophytum procumbens, pictured here ) is  still being harvested from the natural habitat in Namibia and Botswana -- but the more uniform, commercial version now is also being harvested from a commercial farm near Gouda in South Africa.
The project was launched by Prof. Earle Graven, who has made a twenty-year study of South African aromatic indigenous plants.
He heads the Grassroots Natural Products company and has developed commercial Devil's Claw cultivars. He also studies the genotype for further cultivation opportunities. He has recently closed a contract to export 100 tonnes annually with a German company.
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SA's gen-crops also feed starving Zimbabweans
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From: AdrianaStuijt
South Africa's genetically-modified crops also feed starving Zimbabweans:
Aug 8, 2002 -- A Dutch anti-GM food activist --Regien van der Sijp, director of a Harare-based anti-gencrop organisation -- today attacked only the United States for the "unethical dumping of gentech food aid in Southern Africa."
However, Van der Sijp somehow completely overlooked the fact that most of the present gentech food aid now being shipped directly to famine-stricken regions come from previously disadvantaged farmers inside South Africa -- who for the past three-four years have been growing gen-tech crops such as mais, soy, cotton and other cropsand marketing them in huge quantities with the direct approval of the South African government.:
SUMMARY in ENGLISH
Larger harvests with GM-maize, cotton and soya in South Africa:
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From: AdrianaStuijt
GM-maize: harmless to humans -- great for biodiversity of farms.. writes ... writes Patrick Moore, scientist, the founder of the Greenspirit movement and an early co-founder of Greenpeace (which he has since left in disgust) -- in an email to the Censorbugbears.
Sept 2, 2002 -- "The GM maize was made resistant to the borer by inserting a gene from the bacteria Bacillus thuragensis (Bt).
"This bacteria has been used for decades as a spray for biological control but it doesn't work on the maize borer because the insect is inside the maize.
"When the Bt gene is put in the maize directly then it kills any member of the moth family (Lepidoptera) that attempts to eat it but has no impact on non-target insects, unlike sprays the kill everything.
"So not only are yields increased but also the biodiversity of the farm.
Greenpeace are scare-mongerers:
"As to why Greenpeace and others oppose this technology outright it is because they can make a successful scare campaign -- because people are easily scared about what they eat.
Greenpeace will lose credibility:
" I believe they have made a big mistake to oppose the technology 100% and that they will eventually lose credibility because of their position.
INDIA NEEDS SECOND GREEN REVOLUTION -- WITH GM-CROPS
- By Gurcharan Das, "Times of India," August 25, 2002
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