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JOHANNESBURG- A South African and a Mozambican company are to construct a R4-billion liquid petroleum pipeline between the two countries, reducing South Africa's reliance on Durban harbour and offering some hope that inland fuel prices might drop in the long term.

The National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) has issued a licence to build the pipeline from Maputo to Kendal in Gauteng, via Nelspruit, to Petroline RSA. They will build the pipeline jointly with Petroline SARL of Mozambique.

This pipeline follows the construction of 865km of pipeline to supply natural gas from Mozambique to Mpumalanga and Gauteng, successfully completed in 2004.



Nersa agreed with the option to build the new pipeline from Mozambique, instead of a larger 24-inch line from Durban to Johannesburg, because it would be cheaper. Detailed design and environmental impact assessments for the project, already approved by the two countries, are currently under way.

According to Petroline RSA director Pinky Moabi, construction will start at the end of the year and the pipeline should be fully operational by the end of 2009.

"We hope that fuel prices will drop in Mpumalanga and some parts of Gauteng, because we will be getting fuel directly from the coast of Mozambique, and we know that fuel prices are lower on the coast than in inland cities," Moabi said.

According to Petroline, the pipeline will carry 3.5-billion litres of fuel a year and supply 25% of the fuel demand in Mpumalanga and Gauteng.

The pipeline will run from an existing coastal fuel storage depot at Matola Harbour in Mozambique to Nelspruit, where an inland depot will be built, complete with rail and road loading infrastructure.

ABSA economist Chris Hart said that the pipeline's effect on prices would in all probability be felt in the long term. "The pipeline is unlikely to have an effect on fuel prices in the shorter term as the consumers would have to pay for it," Hart said. However, the pipeline "might cut costs to a certain extent in the main market in the long run.

"Currently, about two thirds of South Africa's fuel is imported," Hart added. "There is refinery capacity shortage in the country."

The licence to build the pipeline went to Petroline ahead of state-owned Petronet, which Nersa spokesperson Nhlanhla Cebekhulu put down to Petroline's strong empowerment credentials.

Separately, it emerged that another pipeline is under consideration from Phalaborwa to Maputo.

Palabora Mining, the country's biggest copper producer, may develop a steel plant with the Mozambican government in Maputo, a project similar to that investigated by Enron in 1997.

The project under consideration includes an expansion of the port and a pipeline to transport magnetite, a type of iron ore, from Palabora's mine in South Africa, the chief financial officer Charles Asubonten said on Friday.

Palabora produces the steel making ingredient, magnetite, as a by-product of copper mining. Palabora, controlled by Anglo American and Rio Tinto, plans to raise magnetite production further after a 27 percent jump in output last year. Iron ore prices rose 19.5 percent last year and will increase 9.5 percent to a record this year, their fifth consecutive annual gain.

Shares of Palabora rose R2.68 to close at R71.68 on Friday. The shares more than doubled in price over the past 12 months. Palabora had between 240 million and 270 million tons of magnetite, Asubonten said.

That would be sufficient to support a steel plant at the port in Mozambique's capital. He declined to comment on the cost of the project, the size of the steel plant being studied and the steel makers that Palabora has talked with.

Enron, which filed the biggest-ever corporate bankruptcy at the time in 2001, and the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) had planned to develop a steel project in Maputo port nine years ago.

The mill, costing $2 billion (R14 billion), would have produced 4 million tons of steel annually, using Palabora's magnetite and gas from Mozambique's Pande field, which is now operated by Sasol.

Enron's bankruptcy in 2001 ended plans to build the plant, while the IDC quit the project two years earlier.

"The original project was going to be a steel slab plant," Abrie Audie of the South African Iron and Steel Institute said on Friday. "Both Highveld Steel and Vanadium and Mittal Steel are expanding, so you have to ask if there is a market."

The pipeline from Phalaborwa to Maputo would have been about 300km long, according to a 1997, Mozambique News Agency report, citing then transport minster Mac Maharaj. Magnetite could be transported through the pipeline in slurry form, Asubonten said.

Palabora's magnetite exports rose about 30 percent in the past year and will increase again this year, according to the annual report. Asubonten declined to disclose volumes.

Labels: development, mozambique, nelspruit

Impoverished villagers living next to the Kruger National Park in rural Mozambique have pledged 53,000ha of their land for conservation, providing a shot in the arm for South Africa’s ambitious cross-border “Peace Park” initiative.

The bequest will become part of the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park (GLTP), from which the 2,000 villagers hope to make money out of tourism, hunting and game meat production. They pooled their communal land to form the Cubo Community Nature Reserve, said Simon Munthali, regional head of the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), an international NGO working with communities on the Mozambican side of the peace park.

“It’s the first community reserve in Mozambique joining the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park,” he said. “Depending on its success, we want to replicate it.”

There are no human settlements in the Cubo reserve, which is not ideal for commercial livestock or crop production because of sandy soils and low rainfall. The community members live on adjacent land on the southern bank of the Massingir dam, where fishing is their main livelihood.

The Cubo community exercises usufruct on the reserve land, which is being denuded by charcoal-makers from outside the area and over-grazing by livestock. The AWF secured funds from the USAids Global Development Alliance to fence the reserve. Once it has been secured, the community plans to negotiate via the Mozambican government for the opening of the GLTP fence to allow free movement of wildlife across the border between the two countries.

“The project demonstrates that local communities can be allies in fostering nature conservation,” said Munthali. “This is particularly relevant for these communities located adjacent to the GLTP, which face possible eviction by the state to create space for wildlife.”

The GLTP joins the Limpopo National Park in Mozambique, which covers one million hectares, to the Kruger. Eventually, if things go according to plan, the GLTP will become one of the world’s biggest wilderness areas, covering more than 3.3 million hectares.

Five years ago, the future of the transfrontier project hung in the balance because it appeared that more than 30,000 villagers living on the Mozambican side of the peace park did not want to move. But, in recent months, at least 6,000 villagers have indicated they are willing to relocate to areas where they will be provided with better access to infrastructure and social services.

The German Development Bank offered to help source funding for the move, on condition that resettlement is voluntary. The move is expected to start at the end of this year or early next year.

Villagers who do not want to move out of the park are welcome to stay on in fenced-off enclaves. But, said project manager Arrie van Wyk, many villagers only moved into the area after Mozambique’s civil war ended, and they are not used to living with wild animals.

“They want to resettle,” he said. “They accept that the government wants to develop the park and realise they will benefit in some way.”

In an area where the illiteracy rate is more than 70% and the average monthly household income less than R200 a month, tourism and rehabilitation work on the Massingir dam are the major sources of employment.

Three tourism destinations have been opened in recent months on the Mozambican side and a unique “bush to beach” experience is being marketed by operators. Within three weeks of the opening of the Giri-yondo access gate between the two countries last December, 1,057 cars had passed through, generating R153,000 for the Peace Park.

“Although this is not a large amount, it illustrates a turnaround point in the development of the Limpopo National Park. For the first time, tourism is beginning to contribute to the ultimate sustainability of the park,” said Willem van Riet, CEO of South Africa’s Peace Parks Foundation, which initiated the cross-border initiative.

Van Riet said at least half the fence in the Kruger separating South Africa and Mozambique had come down last year. With the dropping of the fence, wild animals- including about 350 elephants- are reclaiming ancient migration routes across the border.

Members of the Cubo community envisage generating jobs through the construction and maintenance of the fence around their reserve, management of the reserve, ecotourism business operations and the creation of related small, medium and micro-enterprises.

At present, they share one primary school, one small health clinic, one broken water pump and one bad road linking their village to the district headquarters.

Munthali added that, in creating a reserve, the community had a capital asset to leverage other financial support, and were protecting their communal land against unscrupulous private investors.

Although it was still too early to say how the Cubo community reserve would fit in with the GLTP, Van Wyk said “it is an important initiative that is contributing to the bigger vision of the conservation area”.

Labels: great limpopo park, greater limpopo park, mozambique, restitution, transfrontier park

Government should prioritise funding of the Gonarezhou Transfrontier Park project and ensure the country derives maximum benefit since a lot still needs to be done in terms of infrastructural development.

Chairperson of the parliamentary portfolio committee on Mines, Energy, Environment and Tourism Mr Gabbuza Joel Gabbuza told the House of Assembly yesterday that the country was lagging behind in the giant project that was set to boost the tourism industry. Mr Gabbuza, who is the member of the House of Assembly for Binga (MDC), was presenting the committee's report on the developments in Gonarezhou Transfrontier Park and the impact of gold panning on the environment in the Midlands.

The transfrontier park, is made up of Gonarezhou National Park, Kruger National Park of South Africa and Gaza National Park of Mozambique.

Mr Gabbuza said little progress had been made in the Gonarezhou National Park, as a lot of infrastructure such as roads needed to be put in place. "The Gonarezhou National Park should be prioritised in terms of funding. There is a lot of infrastructure that needs to be repaired such as roads, the aerodrome, lodges and bridges," he said.

The lawmaker said in view of the 2010 soccer World Cup in South Africa, Zimbabwe should capitalise on the games by putting essential infrastructure that would bolster the tourism industry. He said land must be identified for resettling the Chitsa people who were still living in the park.

Labels: great limpopo park, greater limpopo park, mozambique, transfrontier park, zimbabwe

NELSPRUIT- Tourists can now travel through the Kruger National Park into Mozambique after the Giriyondo border post was opened on Wednesday.

The border post is part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park (GLTP), which straddles the borders of South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

"This (border post) will facilitate tourism flow by providing easier access within the GLTP," said spokesman of the GLTP ministerial committee, John Louw.

The Giriyondo border post links the Kruger to the Limpopo National Park in Mozambique.

The Mozambican part of the GLTP is only accessible in 4x4s, however.

Louw said tourists would also have to produce valid passports when using the border, and that the border is closed to commercial traffic.

The border will be open from 08h00 to 15h00 from April to September and 08:00 to 16:00 from October to March.

The GLTP was proclaimed in December 2002, when the presidents of South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe signed an international treaty in Xai-Xai, Mozambique.

The three presidents will officially open the Giriyondo border post early next year.

The GLTP covers a vast area of the lowland savannah ecosystem, which is divided by the Lebombo mountains running along the border between South Africa and Mozambique.

It is expected to boost eco-tourism and regional socio-economic development.

Read more about the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park here.

Labels: giriyondo, great limpopo park, greater limpopo park, mozambique, transfrontier park

The great elephant herds of the Kruger National Park, under threat of culling, are migrating in growing numbers across the border into Mozambique's adjacent Limpopo Park.

Flying by helicopter over Limpopo Park last Friday, we could see several herds and single bulls moving through the bush that had formerly been denuded of game by Mozambique's protracted war and by serving as a coutada, or hunting ground, under earlier Portuguese colonial rule.

Also on the helicopter flight, sponsored by South Africa's Peace Parks Foundation, was an excited Dr Markus Hofmeyr, head of Kruger's veterinary wildlife services.

He believes that the elephants are signalling each other that it is safe to return to their old stomping grounds in the Mozambican area now that the war is over and it no longer serves as a hunting place or as a "bush meat" abattoir for guerrilla fighters.

This is a remarkable change from four years ago, when most of the first group of 25 elephants, which were symbolically handed over to Mozambique by former president Nelson Mandela to start repopulating their park, made a dash back to the safety of Kruger.

Most found openings in the high-security fence at river crossings, but Hofmeyr says one bull trundled for many kilometres along the fence until he was able to round it where it meets the Limpopo River border in the far north.

Other game, notably giraffe, buffalo, wildebeest, impala and kudu, have joined the elephants in crossing from Kruger through gaps in the fence, mostly at river crossings.

From the helicopter, fair numbers were spotted moving about in the unspoilt and beautiful Mozambican terrain of high-cliffed river gorges, valleys and rolling hills.

Hofmeyr says they, too, have probably been taking their cue from game translocated over the past two years by truck from Kruger into a 30,000 hectare enclosure in the Mozambican part to get them used to living on that side of the security fence.

The translocation of 3,000 head of game should be completed this year, and the enclosure will then be opened at the furthest point away from Kruger for the animals to start making their own way into their new country.

Professor Willem van Riet, chief executive of the Peace Parks Foundation, says the voluntary migration to Limpopo Park shows that translocations can work in the short term if done effectively. It is the small translocated groups that are enticing the others across the border.

Only a relatively small portion of the high-security border fence separating the two parks has been removed since they were ceremonially joined together two years ago, with, in name only, Zimbabwe's Gonarezhou Park.

Together they are called the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park but the actual link-up across the Limpopo River with Gonarezhou in troubled Zimbabwe will take a while longer.

Security concerns, especially about illegal immigrants and the smuggling of weapons and four-wheel-drive vehicles, have been hindering the removal of more sections of the border fence between the Kruger and Limpopo parks.

But control systems are now in place that will make it easier to proceed with the removal of more sections of the fence, which was put up in the mid-70s at the height of the regional conflict that also involved apartheid South Africa.

The migration of elephants into Mozambique will relieve some of the pressure on Kruger where their burgeoning numbers have been causing serious harm to the habitat. But it is unlikely to stave off culling.

The elephant population has simply gone too far out of control since a moratorium was placed on it in 1995. Kruger has about 13,000 elephants, and its maximum carrying capacity is set at about 7,000. Limpopo Park can at most take 3,000.

At a million hectares it is half the size of Kruger and an even bigger percentage of it is not suitable elephant habitat. So soon it, too, will be under pressure if Kruger's elephants keep migrating.

A final decision on culling, already building into a major bone of contention among animal-rights groups internationally, should be taken some time this year by Marthinus van Schalkwyk, the environmental affairs and tourism minister.

Meanwhile, the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park's elephant migration should serve as encouragement for southern Africa's transfrontier-park programme, in which the Peace Parks Foundation is playing a major facilitating role.

According to the 2002 African Elephant Status report of the World Conservation Union, the estimated population for southern Africa - South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and Swaziland- now stands at 300,000.

Botswana has by far the worst problem, with an estimated 120,000 elephants in its Chobe Reserve and Okavango Delta.

This article is from the Sunday Argus online.

Have a look at the debate on Elephant culling on the Kruger2Canyons.com Discussion Board.

Labels: elephants, game relocation, great limpopo park, greater limpopo park, mozambique, transfrontier park

HOEDSPRUIT (Kruger Times)- Many Mozambican refugees, living in a village near Agincourt close to the western boundaries of the Kruger National Park, who have been living in South Africa for 15 to 17 years still regard Mozambique as their home.

Dr Fred Golooba-Mutebi, an anthropologist from Uganda, spent a year living in Kamasuko. He was based at Wits Rural Facility for two years as a research associate of the Wits Agincourt Health and Population Unit.

He wanted to examine three notions of replacement with the Mozambican refugees who settled in the village:

* a universal desire to return to a place of home;
* that the idea of home is not necessarily rooted in a place– it can be anywhere; and
* does crossing a border take away people’s identity?

The village has 2,850 residents of which 926 are Mozambican. Golooba-Mutebi spent the first five months ‘hanging–out’, getting to know the dynamics of the village and its people through observation, learning the language and allowing the community to get to know him.

One of the first things he noticed was the two distinct residential areas in the village– a South African and Mozambican section. This even extended to each community having its own cemetery. He later learned that the induna and his advisors designated the Mozambican burial place to the refugees as if they would go back one day and take their ancestors with them.

Golooba-Mutebi wanted to find out from the Mozambican residents how their life in South Africa compared to that in Mozambique and if they ever wanted to return to Mozambique.

He found that although they had virtually no contact with Mozambique there seemed to be an intimate connection, but no ‘hunger’ to return.

Most were resigned to creating a ‘new home’ in South Africa but Mozambique remained their ‘real home’. When asked they would refer to their place of birth, Mozambique, as their ‘real home’.

Many said life in Mozambique was considerably better than in South Africa. One said, "There is no life in South Africa", but although he was miserable, he did not want to return to Mozambique.

According to Golooba-Mutebi, the consensus after several debates was that life before the war was far better in Mozambique. Those adamant never to return, had lost kin or property during the war when the rebels systematically targeted civilians. Despite the trauma, Mozambique remains ‘home’.

There are those who see the current state of affairs in Mozambique as uncertain and would not want to return. Others had logistical constraints.

"They arrived in South Africa on foot and have no means to return, even if they wanted to," said Golooba-Mutebi.

Some are pragmatic, "South Africa offers better educational facilities and the opportunity to learn English as opposed to Portuguese."

A minority of the Mozambican residents said that they would return if they could. According to Golooba-Mutebi, these refugees say life is not easy with unemployment, no land for farming and the negative experience in terms of discrimination they have to cope with here.

In Golooba-Mutebi’s experience the discrimination is obvious with little social interaction between the two nationalities. The Mozambican residents mix in larger groups with individuals moving freely from one group to another.

The South African social scene is characterised by much smaller gatherings and suspicions of witchcraft.

The two groups do not generally attend each other’s funerals and the South African residents employ the Mozambicans as maids and general workers.

Golooba-Mutebi said that although some refugees do not care either way, most are reconciled to the idea that they will live in South Africa permanently, thus they have created a ‘home-from-home’.

This has been aided by the locals’ refusal to accept them and therefore created a circle of solidarity amongst the Mozambicans.

Increasingly Mozambican residents also have greater access to social security benefits for their children. Although the locals do not mingle with the Mozambicans, they are not hostile to them and tolerate their presence in this area."

In conclusion, Golooba-Mutebi questions the idea that repatriation is a lasting solution to the refugee problem.

He said it seems the idea of home is tied to a place and that "crossing a border does not take away a person’s identity."

Golooba-Mutebi says that these are his initial findings, and more research could be done on this issue.

by Lynette Strauss, Kruger Times

Labels: immigration, mozambique

MAPUTO- A herd of 50 buffalos has been imported into Mozambique's Limpopo National Park, as part of an ambitious restocking programme, reports Thursday's issue of the Maputo daily "Noticias".

About 3,000 animals of various species have been imported by the park, so far, mostly from South Africa. This is around half of the 6,000 targeted by the programme, that started in 2002.

Gilberto Vicente, of the park management, said that the buffaloes were brought into the country after going through all veterinary procedures to ensure that they are not suffering from any disease.

All the animals are being monitored, and "if there is evidence that any animal is affected by any disease it will be either slaughtered or put in quarantine", he said.

He said that the veterinary authorities will be monitoring the herds to ensure that they will not spread any diseases in the about 35,000 hectares of the park.

Vicente explained that bringing in buffaloes is a pilot experience, to try and ensure ecological balance. Buffaloes play an important role in the food chain, he said, because they eat high grass, and open up areas for other herbivores to graze.

The Mozambican Conservation and Veterinary Committee, has expressed satisfaction with the strict observation of the restocking regulations, and hopes that this will be consolidated and extended to the so called "ecological corridors", that were opened with the removal of the border fence between Mozambique and South Africa.

The Limpopo National Park is part of the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park, which also includes South Africa's Kruger Park, and the Gonorezhou park in Zimbabwe.

Read more about the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park here.

Labels: buffalos, game relocation, mozambique