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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.
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Shifting Rights: Dispossession of Pastoralists by Predatory Stealth
Pastoralist communities are effectively losing their rights to their communal lands through an obscure and predatory engagement process that involves conservation NGOs and self-seeking community leaders
Warning to KZN: Cyclone Ana highlights climate risks faced by vulnerable populations
As Madagascar, Malawi and Mozambique mop up after Cyclone Ana, scientists caution that South Africa’s east coast could be hit by intense tropical cyclones.
Over the past week, the first seasonal cyclone in the Southwest Indian Ocean killed at least 34 people in Madagascar and two in Mozambique, and left large swathes of Malawi without power.
Somalia’s Famines, Government Apathy and the Aid Industry
Failed government leadership, the lack of accountable partnerships between aid partners and the government, rampant corruption, and psychological dependence on aid have kept Somalis on life support.
Another Chinese Company Tries To Evict Villagers For A Coal Mine
YET another Chinese miner, Monalof, is embroiled in a bitter wrangle with villagers in Binga who are resisting is bid to evict them from their ancestral lands.
The villagers were recently given a three months’ notice to vacate their homes and pave way for the establishment of a coal mine by Monalof.
This was revealed during a consultative meeting held between the villagers and management from the Chinese company last week.
The forgotten, cascading crisis in Madagascar
The world’s first famine caused by climate change rather than conflict continues amid insufficient domestic and global attention.
“The scramble for Lagos” and the urban poor’s fight for their homes
Nigeria’s smallest yet most populous state continues to destroy informal settlements in defiance of the courts.
On the night of 8 April 2017, the people of Otodo Gbame went to bed thinking they were safe. The previous year, the Governor of Lagos had promised to destroy this crowded waterfront community, but a November 2016 court ruling had forced the state government to suspend its plans.
Attack on environmental lawyer’s home alarms DRC rights defenders
- Armed men, including two dressed in police uniform, attacked the home of Congolese lawyer Timothée Mbuya earlier this month and told family members they were sent to kill him.
- Mbuya is also facing a defamation lawsuit after publishing a report alleging encroachment of a protected area by a farm owned by former DRC president Joseph Kabila.
- Campaigners say both the lawsuit and the violent assault on the lawyer’s home fit a pattern of harassment of environment and human rights activists in the country.
AGRA’s Green Revolution Has Failed, Critics Say
Fifteen years later, and a billion dollars in funding, AGRA’s promise to double productivity and incomes for 30 million smallholder farming households by 2020 while reducing food insecurity by 50 per cent has not been fulfilled.
Mozambique: Recovery of mangroves key to climate change adaptation
The recovery of mangrove forests is key to climate change adaptation and to mitigating the effects of cyclones and floods, according to Maria Salazar of the Spanish International Cooperation and Development Agency (AECID).
According to a press release from AECID, a project repopulating and conserving the mangroves in Mozambique’s capital city, Maputo, is in its pilot phase under a programme run by the Covenant of Mayors in Sub-Saharan Africa (CoM SSA). The project is being co-financed by the European Union and AECID.
African cities, COVID and climate: public knowledge on urban planning is needed
African cities are rapidly urbanising and already experiencing considerable negative impacts of urbanisation. The production of urban spaces in African cities is frequently characterised as unsustainable.