Violence on Zimbabwe's commercial farms has intensified two weeks after the government signed the landmark Abuja agreement in which it undertook to respect the rule of law in land redistribution, farmers and analysts said this week.

Advocates of genetic engineering say the technology could eliminate the parasitic weed Striga - commonly known as 'witch weed' and 'buda', in the Swahili language - which has devastated crops in East Africa.

A long term collaboration between the governments of South Africa and Lesotho to protect the biodiversity of the Drakensberg and Maloti Mountains received a boost last week when the World Bank approved grant funding worth $15.24 million for the five year Maloti-Drakensberg Transfrontier Conservation and Development Project.

Botswana's Vice President Seretse Khama Ian Khama has been awarded the “Statesmanship Award of the Endangered Wildlife Trust”. The award is presented to “a statesperson who has made an exceptional contribution to conservation”.

Biologist Dr Michael Fay of the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society(WCS) has made an impassioned appeal to save the Langoue Forest, a pristine area of more than 600,000 acres within the Congo jungle in Gabon, Business Wire reported on Tuesday.

One distinguished traditional ruler, Okyenhene or King of Akyem Abuakwa, Osagyefuo Amoatia Ofori Panin is championing biodiversity conservation to sustain and broaden exemplary tradition left by his forefathers and extend its benefits to all communities in Ghana.

'Keep It Working' aims to be an instrument that field staff can use to support communities in managing their own water supply. The book will provide useful insights and practical guidance through fact sheets, tools and checklists. Eveline Bolt and Catarina Fonseca, Keep It Working: a field manual to support community management of rural water supplies, Delft, 2001, ISBN 90-6687-030-3, Euro 24.00

At least 30 people, including six children, have died in bush fires fanned by high winds across South Africa's bushveld over the past two days, police said this week.

The number of households affected by last month's tremors in Rungwe District southern Tanzania has risen to 259 from the previous 181 following a house to house check by ward leaders.

Nigerian Information Minister Jerry Gana warned on Wednesday that Mount Cameroon, across the border, could erupt again soon and pose a serious health hazard to Nigerian border communities.

A bull called Mwalimu helped save the lives of hundreds of cattle in Kenya's Baringo District during a recent drought by teaching other cattle to eat cactus. Two successive years of drought had so much reduced the amount of fodder available in Baringo that cattle were starving to death.

A deadly fire that devastated the Pretoriuskop area of the Kruger National Park over the past two days has been brought under control.

The network for environmental education and advocacy team is a non-governmental, non-profit, independent organization for the promotion of sound environmental management practices.

We are inviting project proposals for a study on HIV/AIDS and land issues in Southern and Eastern Africa with four country studies. Total budget of the study is US$20,000 for a duration of two-three months including a co-ordination of four country studies and synthesis paper. We encourage organisations rather than individual researchers to apply for the funds so that the study will be conducted with common methodology and good co-ordination. The countries of special interests include Malawi, South Africa, Lesotho, Zambia, Uganda, Botwana.

Floods have swept through many villages in Kano State, northern Nigeria, killing dozens of people and rendering many thousands homeless, local officials said on Thursday.

As floodwaters in northern Sudan recede, displaced communities are facing increased health risks from water-borne diseases and lack of clean water and sanitation, the IFRC reported Wednesday. "We fear the spread of disease and cases of eye and chest infections have begun to be reported," said Spanish Red Cross relief delegate Joan Nadal.

Widespread flooding in northern Sudan after two consecutive years of serious drought have displaced tens of thousands of people, destroyed crops and threatened food security, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FA0) said Wednesday.

Efforts to save the world's last, critically important forests, should initially focus on just a handful of countries, a new report has found. A unique satellite based survey of the planet's remaining unbroken forests, which include virgin, old growth and naturally regenerated woodlands, has found that more than 80 percent are located in just 15 countries.

Earlier this month in Bredell, near Kempton Park on the East Rand, South Africa and some say that ‘land grabbing fever’ has hit South Africa, hot on the heels of the Zimbabwean debacle.

The land is owned by government, Transnet and a private company. Thousands of homeless people invaded the Bredell land allegedly after paying the Pan African Congress R25 a plot.

An interim Court order was granted allowing the government to evict the ‘squatters’. In coming to his decision, Judge Rabie made a reference to the irresponsibility displayed by the PAC.

Predictably, there has been a war of words between the PAC and the ANC over the land invasion. PAC leader Stanley Mogoba has warned that should the matter not be resolved satisfactorily resolved there could be a ‘revolution’. “If government wants to go the route of confrontation, they are asking for very big problems”, he said (www.iol.co.za).

ANC spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama called the PAC “an organisation of agents provocateurs masquerading as a caring liberation movement when, in fact, they are the worst hypocrites and opportunists who will jump at the slightest opportunity to exploit the plight of our people, with the sole purpose of lining their pockets” (www.iol.co.za).

Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane said that he found it paradoxical that the government was so quick to commit to a multi-million rand arms deal with not a visible enemy in sight, but at the same time so slow to respond to an issue it billed a top priority in the run-up to the 1994 general election (www.iol.co.za).

According to the South African Sunday Tribune, a group of black tenant farmers have invited Robert Mugabe to come to SA to advise them on how to proceed to get land. Joachim Hlatswayo, a tenant leader was quoted in the same newspaper as saying that they wanted to hear Mugabe’s views on land restitution and land seizure. The invitation to Mugabe has been confirmed by the Zimbabwean High Commission in Pretoria, but they noted that in terms of diplomatic protocol, only the President of SA, Thabo Mbeki could invite the president of another country for a visit.

What is clear is that the Bredell ‘land invaders’ have become political pawns. While government’s land restitution has been largely ineffective, it is equally clear that landless people are getting impatient (www.iol.co.za).

The squatters are now appealing the eviction order. In the meantime, local PAC leaders have not been able to account for the money collected from the squatters.

The Zimbabwean experience has suddenly made land grabbing an alternative to remaining landless. This week, saw the establishment of the National Landless People’s Movement. NLPA representative Lucas Mufamadi says they support “the gallant actions of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe”. He also said that land occupations are inevitable as land reform has been slow (www.mg.co.za).

Clearly, the Bredell land occupation is illegal and governments all over need to take quick action to avert this from happening by stepping up the pace of land reform and where land occupations have occurred, they must take action too.

However, should our laws not reflect an African reality as far as land is concerned? Should there be private property clauses in our constitutions, or should there be communal property provisions, or should there be both? Civil society and governments must start seriously debating this and other human rights issues to make sure that we do not prescribe to a Eurocentric definition of human rights which does not fit into the African context. The landlessness issue must be looked at from this perspective.

In the interim, government must start pouring its resources into land reform. In addition, land grabbing must be strongly discouraged.

Overfishing is far more devastating than is commonly understood and was taking place long before its magnitude began to command public attention over the past century, say scientists.