Cross posted from Border Jumpers, Danielle Nierenberg and Bernard Pollack.

The bus ride from Lusaka, Zambia to Harare, Zimbabwe with a company called EasyGo Bus company lasted four hours longer than it should have (total trip was nearly 12 hours). We spent four hours at the border crossing, where everyone’s belongings were examined, less for security and more to squeeze as much money as they could from undeclared goods. Baboons outnumbered people at the crossing, they have mastered the art of swiping food from unaware passengers, and they seemed to want to be near the humans most afraid of them (ie. me).

Once we got going our bus abruptly stopped. A wild elephant stood in the middle of the road, staring down our bus, ears flaring. It was mad, and ready to charge. Seeing all the Zimbabwean passengers freak out made me really scared about our safety. Slowly the bus began to reverse away, even the driver was scared, and we sat and waited in silence till the elephant got bored.

When we finally arrived in Harare, it was nearly midnight, and the bus station isn't exactly the friendliest place for a bunch of Americans to chill out at that hour looking for a taxi. Our backpackers hostel is called "One Small World" and every room is named after the capital city of a different African country (we stayed in Windhoek, Namibia). We had a series of jam-packed days ahead, so we passed out, only to awaken to the fact that the water didn't work and the power was out. Power outages are something we've gotten used to, spending nearly three days in the dark in Lilongwe, and facing outages nearly everywhere in East Africa.

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We spent a couple of days in Durban which is the third largest city in South Africa. We arrived exhausted from Maputo, Mozambique after a 24-hour bus ride on Intercape (gotta love when they breakdown for hours in the middle of the journey and you have to jump on a replacement bus seven hours later).

Durban has a population of almost 3.5 million, and is a major domestic tourist destination, close to national parks and the historic sites of Zululand and the Drakensberg. Similar to our experience in J'burg, people kept warning us about the crime rate due to the economic crisis that resulted in very high rates of unemployment, reaching over 30% in many parts of the city.

Again we felt pretty safe, never felt threatened in any way or scared, despite staying at a hostel right in the city center, where we took advantage of all the terrific hi-speed wi-fi spots, nightlife, and affordable restuarants in walking distance.

We want to share with you the terrific site visits we had there...

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Cross posted from Border Jumpers, Danielle Nierenberg and Bernard Pollack.

We spent a couple of amazing days in Lilongwe, Malawi - although it was cut short because we took an emergency flight back to Canada for the funeral of Bernard's grandmother (by the time you are reading this, we are back in Africa).

We arrived after a long journey that started in Kampala, Uganda -- and there's nothing better than arriving somewhere new and having a great place to crash (at only $30 a night for a double). What makes a good hostel in Africa? If it were just the fact that it was clean and the prices fair, we would have been content with our stay at the Mufasa Lodge. Add on hot showers, friendly staff, Wifi internet, and a fun lounge bar in the back, and you have one of the best hostels we’ve been to so far.

After arriving we visited the Lilongwe Wildlife Centre, a project, supported by companies like the Body Shop, providing sanctuary space for the rescued, confiscated, orphaned and injured wild animals of Malawi. While touring their facility we met Kambuk (which means “leopard” in Chichewa), who was soundly sleeping in his 2,500 sq meter backyard of fenced green landscape. He was rescued by the Lilongwe Wildlife Centre after poachers shattered his knee in Nyika National Park (making it impossible for him to ever return to the wild.) As we toured the facility nearly every animal we saw — from baboons to alligators — had a similar Cinderella story of overcoming insurmountable odds to survive and, in most cases, return back to the wild.

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Cross posted from the Worldwatch Institute's Nourishing the Planet.

Richard Haigh doesn’t look like your typical African pastoralist. Unlike many Africans who grew up tending cattle, sheep, goats, and other livestock, Richard started his farm in 2007 at the age of 40. He quit his 9–5 job at a nongovernmental organization and bought 23 acres of land outside Durban, South Africa.

He wanted to totally change his life.

Today, he runs Enaleni Farm (enaleni means “abundance” in Zulu), raising endangered Zulu sheep, Nguni cattle (a breed indigenous to South Africa that is very resistant to pests), and a variety of fruits and vegetables.

Richard is cultivating GMO-free soya, as well as traditional maize varieties. “All the maize tells a story,” he says. Like the sheep and cattle, many maize varieties are resistant to drought, climate change, and diseases, making them a smart choice for farmers all over Africa.

This sort of mixed-crop livestock system is becoming increasingly rare in South Africa, according to Richard, because of commercial farms that rely on monoculture crops rather than on diverse agricultural systems.

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from John Vidal, Environment Editor, guardian.co.uk, Friday July 3, 2009
(view source)

The acquisition of farmland from the world's poor by rich countries and international corporations is accelerating at an alarming rate, with an area half the size of Europe's farmland targeted in the last six months, reports from UN officials and agriculture experts say.

New reports from the UN and analysts in India, Washington and London estimate that at least 30m hectares is being acquired to grow food for countries such as China and the Gulf states who cannot produce enough for their populations. According to the UN, the trend is accelerating and could severely impair the ability of poor countries to feed themselves.

Today it emerged that world leaders are to discuss what is being described as "land grabbing" or "neo-colonialism" at the G8 meeting next week. A spokesman for Japan's ministry of foreign affairs confirmed that it would raise the issue: "We feel there should be a code of conduct for investment in farmland that will be a win-win situation for both producing and consuming countries," he said.

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