Latest News Archive

Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items

Gift of the Givers nutrition packs ensuring that no student goes hungry during lockdown

16 July 2021 | Story Nonsindiso Qwabe

Givers_web read more — UFS Qwaqwa Campus social worker, Selloane Phoofolo, and primes and deputy primes of female residences on the campus.

Food insecurity is one of the greatest plagues that students face during their academic careers at university.

A working relationship between national non-governmental organisation (NGO) Gift of the Givers and the No Student Hungry (NHS) office on the Qwaqwa Campus has provided students with nutritional care as they navigate the difficulties brought on by the pandemic.

A little goes a long way

The NGO has been delivering nutritional food parcels for more than a year, with the first batch having been delivered in February 2020. The partnership was again renewed for 2021. Two hundred food parcels were meant to be delivered on a monthly basis, but are currently delivered on request, says Qwaqwa Campus social worker, Selloane Phofoolo. The parcels last a few months, before the next call is made for more. “We are so lucky that Gift of the Givers has continued their partnership with us this year. Without their support we would have struggled, especially during this pandemic. They are always just a call away.”

Phoofolo said the NHS was relying mainly on the food parcels to cater for students, as no other collection drives have been possible to sustain since the lockdown began. She said in 2020, shortly after the lockdown began, they were flooded with requests for food. Since then, students have been able to collect the food parcels from Protection Services on campus. This year, requests surged again in March and April 2021 when the academic calendar kicked off. She lauded Protection Services for their dedicated efforts to ensure that students receive food parcels seamlessly while the campus remains inaccessible to most.

“We have a significant number of students who are really lacking; so, while we subject them to a vetting process, each case has its own merits because some are really compelling and dire since everyone is going through a difficult time.”

Female residences donate sanitary towels to NHS recipients

She said another kind gesture that landed on the NHS’ doorstep was a generous donation of sanitary towels collected by primes and deputy primes from female residences on campus. Phoofolo said the donation came as a welcome surprise. “We are very grateful for the sanitary towels. Now every female student who collects a food parcel also receives a pack of sanitary towels.”

“Everyone is going through a difficult time and despite the pandemic, we are happy to see the passion for students and dedication to Ubuntu prevailing,” she said.

News Archive

Four modernised controlled environment cabinets inaugurated

2006-07-27

Photographed in a controlled environment cabinet were at the back from the left: Mr Adriaan Hugo (head of the UFS Electronics and Mechanisation Division), Prof Herman van Schalkwyk (Dean: Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the UFS) and Prof Koos Terblans (lecturer at the UFS Department of Physics). In front is Mr Koos Uys (engineering consultant from Experto Designa who helped with the cooling systems of the cabinets).
Photo: Leonie Bolleurs

Different look for research in controlled circumstances at the UFS

Research in controlled circumstances at the University of the Free State (UFS) turned a new page today with the inauguration of four modernised controlled environment cabinets of the Department of Soil, Crop and Climate Sciences.

“The controlled environment cabinets, which are situated next to the glass houses on the eastern side of the Agriculture Building on the Main Campus in Bloemfontein, were installed in the early 1980’s. The cabinets, used for research purposes in controlled circumstances by the UFS for many years, became dysfunctional and needed to be repaired and put into use again,” said Prof Herman van Schalkwyk, Dean: Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the UFS.

“The cabinets are used by the agronomics, horticulture and soil science divisions of the Department of Soil, Crop and Climate Sciences to control factors such as the temperature, the intensity and quality of light, synthesis and humidity. This is done 24 hours a day, with hourly intervals,” said Prof Van Schalkwyk.

The cabinets are ideally suited to determine the joint and separate effects of these factors on the growth of plants. The adaptability of plants to climate can also be investigated under controlled circumstances. All of this leads to a better understanding of the growth and development process of plants, more specifically that of agricultural crops.

“The effect of these environmental factors on the effectiveness of insect killers such as fungus killers, insecticide and weed killers can also be investigated and can help to explain the damage that is sometimes experienced, or even prevent the damage if the research is timeously,” said Prof Van Schalkwyk.

A new cabinet can cost between R2-3 million, depending on the degree of sophistication. “Although controlled environment cabinets have been used for agricultural research for a long time, it has become costly to maintain them and even more impossible to purchase new ones,” said Prof Van Schalkwyk.

According to Prof Van Schalkwyk the cabinets were re-built by die UFS Electronics and Mechanisation Division. Some of the mechanisms were also replaced and computerised.

“The re-building and mechanisation of the cabinets were funded by the faculty and because the work was done by our own staff, an amount of about R1 million was saved. The maintenance costs will now be lower as the cabinets are specifically tailor made for our research needs,” said Prof Van Schalkwyk.

Where all monitoring was done manually in the past, the cabinets can now be controlled with a computer. This programme was designed by Prof Koos Terblans from the UFS Department of Physics.

According to Prof Van Schalkwyk the modernisation of the cabinets is part of the faculty’s larger strategy to get its instruments and apparatus up to world standards. “With this project we have proved that we can find a solution for a problem ourselves and that there are ways to get old apparatus functional again,” said Prof Van Schalkwyk.

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

Back

Economic and Management Sciences

Education

Health Sciences

The Humanities

Law

Natural and Agricultural Sciences

Theology and Religion

Open Distance Learning

Business School

We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful. To better understand how they are used, read more about the UFS cookie policy. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this.

Accept