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16 October 2019 | Story Valentino Ndaba | Photo Rulanzen Martin
Dr Thuli Mphambukeli and Victor Okorie
Water is a fundamental human right, says Dr Thulisile Mphambukeli, (left) Senior Lecturer at the Department of Urban and Regional Planning. On the right is Dr Victor Okorie.

Research shows that “access to water and food remains critical to the survival and stability of any nation”. This is according to a team of academics that has been hard at work exploring ways in which to secure water and food in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS nations).

These scholars from the University of the Free State (UFS) and North-West University recently published a paper titled: Exploring the Political Economy of Water and Food Security Nexus in BRICS. Dr Thulisile Mphambukeli, Dr Victor Okorie, and Prof Samuel Amusan are members of the Food Security Research Cluster of the South African BRICS Think Tank that has been fervently tackling the water and food in(security) challenge.

Water as a key to social justice 

The team argues that unequal access and distribution of water has in the past led to violent conflict. The paper cites Qwaqwa as one of the many areas affected by water-service protests in the recent past. “Water and food crises are worsening thanks to the intensification of climate change, rapid urbanisation, nutrition transition and population growth. Solutions to these crises partly lie in cooperation and collaboration among nation states, regional economic commissions, and global power brokers.”

What are some of the local solutions? According to the scholars: “For agronomic and husbandry practices, there is a pressing need for research activities on innovative ways of supplying water to crops and animals such that water loss through evaporation and run-off is significantly reduced. 

“Similarly, research activities on redesigning toilets, especially the urinary section – where more than nine litres of water are used to flush less than one cubic centimetre of urine – are timely in the context of managing the water and food security nexus crises.”

Improving livelihoods

In an effort to achieve food security, BRICS aims to stimulate domestic capacity for production. Food and nutrition security cannot be achieved without water security, and vice versa. 

It is evident that the water and food insecurity issues are complex. However, concerted efforts are being made by various sectors to solve these challenges and improve the livelihoods of urban and rural citizens within BRICS nations.

News Archive

UFS law experts publish unique translation
2006-06-21

Attending the launch of the publication were from the left:  Prof Boelie Wessels (senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law), Prof Frederick Fourie (Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS), Prof Johan Henning (Dean: UFS Faculty of Law) and Adv Jaco de Bruin (senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law). Prof Wessels translated the treatise from corrupted medieval lawyer Latin into English, Prof Henning is the leading author and initiator of the publication and Adv de Bruin assisted with the proofreading and editing. Photo: Stephen Collett

UFS law experts publish unique translation of neglected source of partnership law

The Centre for Business Law at the University of the Free State (UFS) has translated a unique long neglected Roman-Dutch source of the law of partnership law from Latin into English.  This source dates back to 1666. 

The book, called Tractatus de Societate (A Treatise on the Law of Partnership), by Felicius and Boxelius is published as Volume 40 in the research series Mededelings van die Sentrum vir Ondernemingsreg/Transactions of the Centre for Business Law.  It is the first translation of this Roman-Dutch source into English and comprises of a comprehensive discussion of the South African common law of partnerships.  

“Apart from various brief provisions dealing on a peace meal and an ad hoc basis with diverse matters such as insolvency, there is no comprehensive Partnership Act in South Africa.  The law of partnership in South Africa consists of South African common-law, which is mainly derived from Roman-Dutch law,” said Prof Johan Henning, Dean of the Faculty of Law at the UFS.  Prof Henning is also the leading author and initiator of this comprehensive publication.

“Countries such as America, England, Ireland and The Netherlands have drafted or are in the process of establishing new modern partnership laws in line with new international guidelines, practices and commercial usages,” said Prof Henning.

“However, in South Africa the most recent policy document released by the Department of Trade and Industry explicitly excludes partnership law from its present company law reform programme and clearly regards this as an issue for another day,” said Prof Henning.

“Unless there is a political will to allocate the necessary resources to a comprehensive partnership law revision program, it is a practical reality that South Africa will not have a modern Partnership Act in the foreseeable future,” said Prof Henning. 

According to Prof Henning South African courts have been using the Roman-Dutch partnership law sources as authority.  “The English Partnership Act of 1890 is not binding and the English text books should therefore be approached with caution,” said Prof Henning.

“A treatise on the law of partnership that has been regarded by South African courts as an important common law authority is that of  a Frenchman by the name of Pothier.  This treatise was translated into English and was regarded as an au­thority of significance in The Netherlands towards the end of the eighteenth century,” said Prof Henning. 

“Pothier’s opinions are however not valid throughout in the Roman-Dutch partnership law as it did not apply to the Dutch province of The Netherlands and it sometimes also rely on local French customs for authority,” said Prof Henning.

For this reason the Centre for Business Law at the UFS decided to focus its attention again on the significance of the comprehensive treatise of Felicius and Boxelius on the Roman-Dutch partnership law.  Felicius was an Italian lawyer and Boxelius a Dutch lawyer.

This long neglected source of partnership law was published in 1666 in Gorkum in The Netherlands.  "A significant amount of Roman-Dutch sources of authoritive writers trusted this treatise and referred to it,” said Prof Henning.

The translation of the treatise from corrupted medieval lawyer Latin into English  was done by Prof Boelie Wessels, a very well-known expert on Roman Law and senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law.  Prof Wessels, who  has 15 degrees, spent almost ten years translating the treatise.  The proofreading and editing of the translation was done by Prof Henning and Adv Jaco de Bruin, a senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law.

“We want the South African courts to use Volume 40 in the research series Mededelings van die Sentrum vir Ondernemingsreg/Transactions of the Centre for Business Law as the primary source of reference when cases where Roman-Dutch Law partnership law principles are involved, are ruled on,” said Prof Henning.

The first part of the publication comprises of selected perspectives on the historical significance of the work as well as a translation of selected passages. “The intention is to follow this up expeditiously with the publication of a very limited edition of a complete translation of the work,” said Prof Henning.

A total of 400 copies of the publication will be distributed to all courts, the Appeal Court and the Supreme Court.

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel:   (051) 401-2584
Cell:  083 645 2454
E-mail:  loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
21 June 2006

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