In another succesful partnership between an environmental NGO and a responsible corporate sponsor, a hectare of carbon-balancing bamboo plants arrive for the benefit of a vulnerable community.

As the UN’s climate change conference begins in Durban, Survival calls for the ecological knowledge and insights of tribal peoples to be heeded in global decisions concerning climate change.

African women and children constitute the majority of the continent’s poor and play a vital role in food production in Africa. Therefore they will be the hardest hit by famine due to climate change, if they are not effectively prepared and food security issues are notaddressed properly. The continent will suffer as a result.

Drought, lack of funds and land ownership problems. This is but a few of the challengers the Blood River shack dweller community’s youth are facing.

In the face of rising food prices, malnutrition, obesity and poor land management, schools in the Eastern Cape are taking a stand. From the 3rd to the 7th of October, a Permaculture workshop run by School's Environmental Education and Development (SEED) took place at Project Lulutho, a burgeoning educational hub and resource centre in the centre of the Xhosa community of Mthwaku, 120km north of East London.

You remember that we wrote the story of Mr Leslie Steenkamp who tried to rid his Plumstead house of borer-beetles, but instead ended up losing it due to an over-application of a pesticide CTX 108 by a fumigation company, Pestokil.

'Engaging the Private Sector for Africa's Agri-Food Growth' was the theme of this year's AgriBusiness Forum held in Johannesburg.

In the Cape Town suburb of Plumstead stands a house poisoned by the over-application of a pesticide by a fumigation company some 11 months ago.

The imminent sale of De Beers' diamond mining operations on the Cape West Coast must be halted until full disclosure and proper consultation with all affected parties has taken place, says the community of Hondeklipbaai.

"We are worried about school; we have no bags, no stationery, no uniforms. We will fall behind in our education whilst other children will work".

Relief and charity organisations have initiated a wide-scale aid relief effort after tornadoes wreaked havoc in two provinces.

In previous years, the Diocese of Vasteras, the Lutheran Swedish Church and the Norwegian Lutheran Church Endowment, have been investing heavily in the expansion of pine and eucalyptus tree monocultures in central and northern Mozambique through the companies Chikweti Forests de Niassa, TectonaForests of Zambezia, Ntacua Florestas de Zambezia and Florestas de Messangulo.

Al Jazeera correspondent Gabriel Elizondo paints a shocking portrait of life in the Brazilian Amazon, where at least 212 environmental activists have been murdered since 1996 ' an average of 12 a year.

Survival International has been speaking to Bushmen from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve as they celebrate drinking water from the Mothomelo borehole for the first time in nine years.

Gift of the Givers has just been granted permission to set up base, medical teams, equipment and supplies at Banadir Hospital, the largest hospital in Mogadishu (the largest city in Somalia) where thousands of patients are flocking to from various refugee camps in and around Mogadishu and the South, and are in desperate need of life saving medical assistance.

Looking after the earth and vulnerable people at the same time always creates a beautifully holistic project, which simply makes total sense. Hence many townships now have initiatives where folk can bring recyclable waste to a central place and receive much needed items, food or money in exchange.

South Africa's Ubuntu Spirit knows no bounds. We are indeed making an emphatic continental statement that Africa is coming to the aid of Africans unreservedly. The power is not in the proclamation but in the execution: being the first African agency and the only agency in the world to fly 6 planes into Mogadishu in a two week period delivering 112 tons of aid, gave a very good feel being South African.

In our country the destructive effects of the World Wars are still prevailing, as was evidenced by the poisoning of innocent diners at the V&A Waterfront last week.

The Save Mapungubwe Coalition Group in co-operation with Green Renaissance is on a mission to prevent any further development of the intended opencast and underground coal mine that is to be located near Mapungubwe.

Many South Africans disagree with this decision. Intellectual and writer Vele 'Christopher' Neluvhalani believes that on a fundamental level, people have always been connected to the earth, visible by the traces they leave behind, like the ancient rock art on the sandstone outcrops in Mapungubwe. In July this year the South African government granted Australian owned mining company Limpopo Coal, a subsidiary of Coal of Africa Limited (CoAL) a series of permits to construct a large opencast coal mine in this ancient cultural landscape.

The Save Mapungubwe Coalition Group in co-operation with Green Renaissance is on a mission to prevent any further development of the intended opencast and underground coal mine that is to be located near Mapungubwe.

There are a number of sacred places in South Africa. Mapungubwe is one such place.
It is a World Heritage Site, the site of the earliest Southern African Kingdom, a National Park and a Transfrontier Conservation Area.

An offence to our ancestors

Neluvhalani feels a deep connection to this ancient place, because his ancestors lived there thousands of years before him. He is bound to the area not only by tradition, but when he visits there and climbs to the top of Mapungubwe hill, he feels he has returned home.

However, this new mining activity will change all of this. That's because for Neluvhalani 'it would be an offence to our ancestors to start mining in the area.'

Neluvhalani was involved in the reburying of his ancestors' remains at Mapungubwe, after they were recently reclaimed from a museum collection and restored to their rightful place.

'Once we tamper with Mapungubwe we will be tampering with the past,' says Neluvhalani, who feels that these ties to our ancient places, like Mapungubwe, compel us to prevent them from being compromised.  'Everyone in South Africa should be united in helping preserve Mapungubwe'.

Mapungubwe was the capital city of a flourishing African kingdom 1 000 years ago and was one of 24 sites around the world added to UNESCO's World Heritage List in 2004. It is a natural treasure holding the history of 50 000 years of human development and contains priceless archaeological and paleontological treasures.

Cultural landscape valuable to SA's history

The area encompassed by the Mapungubwe Cultural Landscape World Heritage Site includes rock art sites, Early, Middle and Later Stone Age sites and Iron Age sites and reflects Southern Africa's complex history. This is why the area has been declared a 'Cultural Landscape' and informs us about the long history of human interaction in this part of the world.

The information held by Mapungubwe is important to all of us, because like the people at Mapungubwe, we are facing various social and environmental crises today. People in this area interacted, co-operated and fought with one another long before South Africa was colonised, and understanding the history held here can shape the way that we interact with one another today.

The Coalition Group believes that mining should be conducted in a responsible manner and not within an area where there are better, sustainable options for land use. The group, which consists of local community members and experts within the heritage and conservation fields, further believe that certain areas should not be considered for mining, where such activities threaten the integrity of irreplaceable South African natural and cultural heritage.
 
The Coalition Group consists of a number of civil society organisations, namely:

• the Association of Southern African Professional Archaeologists (ASAPA),
• BirdLife South Africa (BLSA),
• the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT),
• the Mapungubwe Action Group (MAG),
• the Peace Parks Foundation (PPF),
• the Wilderness Foundation South Africa (WFSA), and
• the World Wide Fund for Nature (South Africa) (WWF).

The group is currently appealing the mining right granted by the Department of Mineral Resources as well as the associated approval of the Environmental Management Programme. They launched interdict proceedings to stop CoAL from carrying on any mining or related operations on the Vele site, lodged a notice of intention to appeal the environmental authorisation granted to CoAL by the Department of Environmental Affairs in the first s.24G application for rectification of illegal activities and lodged an appeal against the water use licence granted to Limpopo Coal in March 2011.

CoAL not meeting environmental standards

CoAL initially applied for a mining license in March 2010, but in August 2010 it was forced to halt activity when development operations did not meet the standards of the National Environmental Management Act, with several regulations being transgressed and insufficient consultation with affected parties.

CoAL was then required to pay a $1.3 million fine to the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) for these environmental contraventions. Other sources state that after activities were stopped CoAL submitted two section rectification applications and paid a R9.25m administrative fine in May 2010.

At a press briefing on 20 July 2011 in Pretoria, Fundisile Mkhetheni, Deputy Director General of the DEA, said that emotions should be set aside in dealing with biodiversity issues. The DEA said that all legal and procedural requirements had been met and that the mine would have a positive economic spin-off for the province and South Africa, after environmental authorisation had been granted for opencast coal mining at the Vele Colliery.

At this press briefing, the DEA attempted to mitigate all negative impacts of mining coal near the Mapungubwe National Park, and made an assurance that monitoring and evaluation would take place at the area between the mine and the national park. The DEA confirmed that roads were already built at the site, and further indicated that the company would have to abide by special conditions due to the project's proximity to the park.

The Vele colliery construction phase is said to take 6-9 months, and it is anticipated that this will produce an initial one million tons of coal per year, increasing to over five million tons a year over a 25-year life-of-mine.

Nick Hilterman, chairman of the Mapungubwe Action Group, says it will appeal against the decision to the high court if necessary. "We do not believe that this mine should be there in the first place," Hilterman has said.

For more information, contact the Endangered Wildlife Trust Media Office at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 011 372 3600. Or watch a film with Vele Neluvhalani's views on Mapungubwe (see below).

Find out more about the campaign to Save Mapungubwe. Join the Save Mapungubwe community on Facebook.

"As the hunger took its toll a husband and wife left their two children in the 'forest'. They could not bear the thought of their children dying in front of their eyes nor did they want their children to sense that they (the parents) were dying".

Realist Foreign Policy refers to the policy of a sovereign state in its interaction with other sovereign states. It might seem strange that an article that opens with a line like this finds itself in an environmental publication.

Parts of Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia are facing one of the worst droughts for 60 years, and around 20 million people are desperately in need of food, clean water and basic sanitation.

Minister Susan Shabangu has informed Sarah Septhon, legal representative of the Amadiba Crisis Committee that the mining rights awarded in July 2008 to Australian owned Transworld Energy and Minerals (Pty) Ltd (TEM) and the Xolobeni Empowerment Company (Pty)  Ltd  (Xolco) have been revoked.

A community of Guarani Indians in Brazil has retaken part of its ancestral land in an act of desperation, having lived by the side of a highway for a year and a half.

In a country where child abuse and abandonment is rife, it is vital that the  children are valued and protected properly ' and that everyone understands what amounts to child abuse and neglect. This was one of the aims of Child Protection Week that took place last week.

Non-profit organisation, Mamelani Projects hosted their own 'Move for Health Day, Saturday, May 6th, 2011 at the Chris Campbell Memorial field in Khayelitsha.

Industrial conflict and protests that are currently taking place in South Africa may cause unwanted disruption, but it is a positive sign that those who are doing so have the freedom to express their sentiments in a peaceful way.

What do you do when temperatures reach single digits and its pouring rain outside? You cling to your hot water bottle or snuggle under a bunch of blankets - sometimes you don't even know how many. When you absolutely have to go outside, you wear a thick coat or a waterproof jacket and a scarf.

'I am excited and look forward to representing the Abuse is Abuse campaign as an ambassador against abuse,' says world acclaimed photographer Jodi Bieber. Jodi will act as an ambassador for the campaign aimed at raising awareness of abuse and highlighting the importance of taking action against all forms of abuse.