Topics and Regions
Rick has over 40 years experience working in the land sector in Southern Africa. He is part of the Land Portal knowledge engagement team working to research and develop knowledge resources including data stories, blogs and in-depth country profiles for Southern, Central and Eastern Africa.
Rick is also a Senior Research Associate with Phuhlisani NPC - a South African land sector NGO and the curator of specialist Southern African land news and analysis website https://knowledgebase.land
He tweets on land related issues Twitter account https://twitter.com/KnowledgebaseL
He has a PhD from the University of Cape Town. His research in Langa, Cape Town features as the central case study in a recent book Urban Planning in the Global South (2018), co-authored with the late Vanessa Watson, which examines the on-going contestations over land and housing in the rapidly growing cities of the global South.
Details
Location
Unearthing the truth: How mines failed communities in the Sekhukhune region of South Africa
This report is based on research into three mining companies operating in the Sekhukhune area of Limpopo and the experiences of local mining-affected communities. This research was undertaken by a team from Sekhukhune Combined Mining Affected Communities, the Centre for Applied Legal Studies and Amnesty International South Africa.
Two storms in two weeks carve trail of death and destruction in Madagascar
- Batsirai, a category 4 cyclone, struck Madagascar’s eastern coast on Feb. 5, leaving 10 people dead.
- The island nation is still recovering from another tropical storm, Ana, which made landfall on Jan. 22 and left dozens dead and hundreds of thousands homeless.
- Data from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration show that 12 storms of category 4 or 5, the highest level, made landfall on Madagascar between 1911; of these 12, eight occurred since 2000.
Cyclone Batsirai rammed into Madagascar’s coast on Feb.
New Investors Exposed Behind the Human Rights Crisis at the PHC Oil Palm Plantations in DRC
Communities living adjacent to the PHC oil palm plantations in DRC face arrests, beatings, and extrajudicial killings at the hands of private security and police.
Under the majority ownership of Kuramo Capital Management (KCM), conditions have recently further deteriorated — with violent repression of workers on strike.
Land conflict: Understanding reached between government and three communities in Massingir
Radio Mozambique reported today that Massingir district government and community leaders from three communities in the district in the north of Gaza province have reached consensus on the land boundaries of their villages after decades of conflict.
The communities of Cubo, Canhane and Tihoveni, in the locality of Massingir-sede, have for decades been in conflict over the delimitation of their lands.
The conflict had caused adverse social and economic repercussions in those communities, Massingir district administrator Esmeralda Mutemba said.
An estimated 45,000 people have been displaced by a cyclone in Madagascar
ANTANANARIVO, Madagascar — Cyclone Batsirai's torrential winds and rain are hammering Madagascar, after landing on the island's east coast late Saturday.
An estimated 45,000 people have been displaced by the tropical storm, the National Office for Risk and Disaster Management said on Sunday.
After gaining strength in the Indian Ocean with gale-force winds reaching peaks of 145 miles per hour, the cyclone made landfall near Mananjary, 500 kilometers (310 miles) east of the capital Antananarivo, according to the island's meteorology department.
New book: Researching land reform in Zimbabwe
Researching Land Reform in Zimbabwe is a new book compiling 20 articles the Zimbabwe Land Research team has published over the last 20 years. All the chapters bar one have appeared as peer-reviewed journal articles, with the material covering the period from early land invasions in 2000 to more recent developments. All the articles are available, many as open access, but there was a demand to have these all in one place.
Govt repossesses 1.3m unclaimed plots of land
A total of 1,315,890 plots of land from across the country have been temporarily registered to the Government, after their owners failed to meet the December 2021 deadline of registration of all plots of land in the country.
Speaking to The New Times, Grace Nishimwe, the Head of Land Administration Department at Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority said that any unregistered land in the country falls under this category.
Infographic: How wetlands can help fight climate change
Wetlands – land consisting of swamps or marshes – have, during the centuries, been demonised as places of pestilence, drained for agriculture or urban development, and polluted or paved over.
But today, they are emerging as crucial ecosystems in the fight against climate change.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate, has warned of the need to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels.
The world’s food systems are in crisis, and big agribusiness is at its heart
Public finance has a key role to play in agriculture. Instead of propping up corporate interests, it should learn from local producers
19 January 2022, 3.13pm
Public funds are being used to expand industrial livestock production – a sector that dramatically increases methane emissions, deforestation, and pollution