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After South Africa’s battle with the record-breaking drought of 2015, Prof Andries Jordaan from our Disaster Management Training and Education Centre for Africa(DiMTEC) saw room for improvement in dealing with this kind of disaster.
Drought impact
Commercial farmers who are usually net exporters of food crops and communal farmers who own the bulk of the country’s livestock, were all hit hard in 2015. Most of the latter had no resources to spare as the drought progressed. The concern about the drought’s impact on the country’s food production and availability resulted in a joint goal of preventing food scarcity during future droughts.
Prof Jordaan’s visit to the National Drought Mitigation Center (NDMC) in Lincoln, Nebraska, in the US, several years ago prepared him to better equip communities in South Africa to deal with drought situations. “I recognised that in spite of the impact DiMTEC has been able to make on disaster preparedness, a gap remained in disaster response in South Africa.”
Sharing knowledge
In August this year Prof Jordaan again visited the NDMC. This time he requested a few key players in South Africa’s agriculture and disaster response communities to join him. With him were Janse Rabie, head of Natural Resources at AgriSA, a nonprofit organisation that functions as an interface between the government and about 28 000 South Africa farmers, and Moses Musiwale Khangale, director of Fire Services for the South African Ministry of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs.
The South African delegation met with and learnt from climatologists, geospatial technologists, and outreach and planning analysts.
Kovsie Rugby best in town
2009-06-24
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| Photo: Volksblad |
The Shimlas and the Irawas, the first and second rugby teams of the University of the Free State (UFS), recently played in the final of the Bloemfontein city cup. According to Mr Dougie Heymans, Kovsie Rugby Manager and assistant couch of the Shimlas, it was a tough match and the Shimlas won 42-17. The last time that the Shimlas and Irawas played against each other was in 2004. On this day, against all expectations, the Irawas won the “Stadsbeker”.
The UFS’s U/21 team also played against the UFS third team, the Ritsims, in the final of the second league and won 22-14. It was the first time in history that the Ritsems played in the final of the Second League in the City League, and that against the UFS’s U/21 team.
All four the teams who competed in the final for the “Stadsbeker” and Second League of the “Stadsbeker”, are from the UFS’s Rugby Club.
The UFS will also for the first time since 2006 have a team in the national club championships.
The Shimlas are participating at the Universities Sport South Africa (USSA) rugby tournament that is currently being presented at the University of Johannesburg.
“We at Kovsie Rugby are proud of our teams, our couches and support staff,” said Mr Heymans.