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Transboundary water management under conditions of climate and political uncertainty

07 September 2020 | Story Nitha Ramnath | Photo istock

The Middle East and Africa are facing the highest impact on water and food security, with the potential to aggravate the existing conflict in both regions. Soaring temperatures are expected to exceed global norms, and an arid future and environmental catastrophe is looming. Israel and South Africa are both arid countries challenged by water scarcity in the face of growing demand. Both countries are in some way water insecure and most of the water in both countries is transboundary. There is a compelling need for leadership to provide strategic thinking on how to mitigate the impact of climate change on scarce water resources.

Join our webinar, where a panel of international speakers will discuss the myriad challenges brought on by water scarcity and consider strategic initiatives to leverage expertise in order to improve resilience to water vulnerability.

Welcome:

Prof Heidi Hudson, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, University of the Free State

Panellists:

Dr Theo de Jager, The Southern African Agri Initiative (SAAI)

Prof Kevin Winter, University of Cape Town

Mr Oded Diste, CEO Tal-Ya Agriculture Solutions

Monther Hind, Palestinian Wastewater Engineers Group, Palestine

Moderator:

Dr Clive Lipchin, Arava Institute for Environmental Studies

Closing remarks: Prof Hussein Solomon, AHD, Department of Political Studies and Governance, University of the Free State

Date: 10 September 2020

Time: 17:00 (SAT)

Registration: To register for the webinar, please go to https://forms.gle/PknmhZLsvjPh91N28

The webinar can be accessed at https://zoom.us/j/94893202166

News Archive

UFS starts lecture series on reconciliation and empathy

2012-02-28

Attending the inaugural Dialogue between Science and Society lecture were from left: Profs Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, Jean Decety,Dr Melike Fourie, a researcher at the University of Cape Town, and Prof. Driekie Hay, Vice-Rector: Academic.
Photo: Johan Roux
28 February 2012

The University of the Free State has begun with the first of a series of lectures that will deal with issues of humanity.

The Dialogue between Science and Society Lecture series, hosted by Prof. Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, will bring together different disciplines such as Psychology, Psychoanalysis, Neuroscience and Literature to explore the broad field of reconciliation and empathy.

Prof. Jean Decety, a leading scholar in the social neuroscience of empathy at the University of Chicago delivered the inaugural lecture on 23 February 2012. He spoke about the social neuroscience of empathy and moral reasoning.

Drawing lessons from US president Barack Obama’s book, The Audacity of Hope, Prof. Decety opened his speech with a quote on empathy as the glue that makes much of social life possible. He said a feeling of empathy means putting yourself in somebody else’s shoes. Prof. Decety discussed in depth the link between empathy and helping, saying that it linked to morality.

Prof. Gobodo-Madikizela, author of the bookA human being died that night: a South African story of forgiveness, on her interviews with convicted Vlakplaas murderer Eugene de Kock, recently joined our university.

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