151
and other species. When disasters strike, like cyclone Idai which made landfall at
Mozambique’s port city of Beira on March 14, 2019, it might as well have been an
asteroid, in terms of Beira’s population of half-million people thoroughly unprepared; and stranded in the post-cyclone’s further inflictions of increased cholera and
malaria cases, and a grinding to the halt of much infrastructure, despite international
aid pouring in. Some 1.7 million people in Mozambique, and nearly another million people in neighboring Malawi and Zimbabwe, were hit by the hurricane-force
winds and flooding.
13
Across the continent, in Mali meanwhile, while UN officials were formally visiting Bamako, Mali’s capital, to discuss the rising tide of violence, at least 134 Peuhl
herders—elderly, children, women—were shot, burnt, and/or hacked to death with
machetes by a Dogon hunting militia. Months before, “Human Rights Watch had
warned that “militia killings of civilians in central and northern Mali [were] spiraling out of control.”
14
The systemic human aggression had continued to arise over a
slew of ecological issues—access to drinking water and grazing land, among them.
Such numerous shocks to the many systems escalate across all of Africa, in a far
less than stable dynamic. Environmental flash points that might traditionally have
persuaded individuals to simply tune out the broader risks and statistics have,
instead, by their magnitude and multiplicity, encroached in a continuum of human/
cultural and ecological whiplash. No one escapes the fall-out. Nor are there any reliable revisionist histories to make troubles go away. And, obviously—and in spite of
at least 7 million years of habitation by our kind/our hominid ancestors—the biosphere cannot continue to absorb all of the breaches.
Mozambique has more than 30 million residents. Her Total Fertility Rate (“TFR”
as of 2016) was at “5.24 births per woman” or more than double the global average.
15
According to sobering projections, by 2065, Mozambique could be staring
down the gunsights of 163 million inhabitants; or, were the nation to immediately
institute significant Family Planning reforms, a population possibly slightly less
than today.
16
Kenya, which is roughly a third smaller than Mozambique, hosts a
stunning 24 national parks, 16 national reserves, and another six marine parks/
reserves. She is the eighth wealthiest nation in Africa. Kenya lived through
Mozambique’s numeric profile—total population size and TFR—in 1998 and 2008
respectively and today numbers 50 million.
13 See “Cyclone Idai: How prepared was southern Africa?” BBC News, by Jack Goodman and
Christopher Giles, March 24, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-47639686, Accessed
March 24, 2019.
14 See “Death toll from central Mali massacre up to 134, says UN,” https://www.pbs.org/newshour/
world/death-toll-from-central-mali-massacre-up-to-134-says-un, by Baba Ahmed and Krista
Mahr, Accessed March 24, 2019.
15 See World Bank data, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN, Accessed March
24, 2019.
16 See
http://populationcommunication.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Mozambique-LegalLength-Redux.pdf, Accessed March 28, 2019.
17.2 Reversing the Tides
and other species. When disasters strike, like cyclone Idai which made landfall at
Mozambique’s port city of Beira on March 14, 2019, it might as well have been an
asteroid, in terms of Beira’s population of half-million people thoroughly unprepared; and stranded in the post-cyclone’s further inflictions of increased cholera and
malaria cases, and a grinding to the halt of much infrastructure, despite international
aid pouring in. Some 1.7 million people in Mozambique, and nearly another million people in neighboring Malawi and Zimbabwe, were hit by the hurricane-force
winds and flooding.
13
Across the continent, in Mali meanwhile, while UN officials were formally visiting Bamako, Mali’s capital, to discuss the rising tide of violence, at least 134 Peuhl
herders—elderly, children, women—were shot, burnt, and/or hacked to death with
machetes by a Dogon hunting militia. Months before, “Human Rights Watch had
warned that “militia killings of civilians in central and northern Mali [were] spiraling out of control.”
14
The systemic human aggression had continued to arise over a
slew of ecological issues—access to drinking water and grazing land, among them.
Such numerous shocks to the many systems escalate across all of Africa, in a far
less than stable dynamic. Environmental flash points that might traditionally have
persuaded individuals to simply tune out the broader risks and statistics have,
instead, by their magnitude and multiplicity, encroached in a continuum of human/
cultural and ecological whiplash. No one escapes the fall-out. Nor are there any reliable revisionist histories to make troubles go away. And, obviously—and in spite of
at least 7 million years of habitation by our kind/our hominid ancestors—the biosphere cannot continue to absorb all of the breaches.
Mozambique has more than 30 million residents. Her Total Fertility Rate (“TFR”
as of 2016) was at “5.24 births per woman” or more than double the global average.
15
According to sobering projections, by 2065, Mozambique could be staring
down the gunsights of 163 million inhabitants; or, were the nation to immediately
institute significant Family Planning reforms, a population possibly slightly less
than today.
16
Kenya, which is roughly a third smaller than Mozambique, hosts a
stunning 24 national parks, 16 national reserves, and another six marine parks/
reserves. She is the eighth wealthiest nation in Africa. Kenya lived through
Mozambique’s numeric profile—total population size and TFR—in 1998 and 2008
respectively and today numbers 50 million.
13 See “Cyclone Idai: How prepared was southern Africa?” BBC News, by Jack Goodman and
Christopher Giles, March 24, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-47639686, Accessed
March 24, 2019.
14 See “Death toll from central Mali massacre up to 134, says UN,” https://www.pbs.org/newshour/
world/death-toll-from-central-mali-massacre-up-to-134-says-un, by Baba Ahmed and Krista
Mahr, Accessed March 24, 2019.
15 See World Bank data, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN, Accessed March
24, 2019.
16 See
http://populationcommunication.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Mozambique-LegalLength-Redux.pdf, Accessed March 28, 2019.
17.2 Reversing the Tides