Africans must do their bit on 'climate change'

Even at the bar stool, the misfortunes of the Kings of the Bakwena occupy a larger space in conversations than the imminent threat of encroaching desertification, floods and the resultant damage to any agricultural prospects that the country still harbours.

Many years ago, when Dr Gaositwe Chiepe was Foreign Affairs minister, she returned to report to Parliament that she had seen something of a near-miracle in Guinea Bissau.  There, Amilcar Cabral's men had inherited a near-desert country.  But the government had launched a campaign to plant trees so widely that in a few years' time, there was more than enough rain to satisfy the needs of peasant agriculture.