Latest news with #rivers
The Guardian
a day ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
The Guardian view on England's riverbanks: landscapes that everyone should be able to enjoy
In a country often said to be racked by division, criticising the condition of rivers is one of England's few unifying pastimes. Sewage dumping, which occurred for nearly 4m hours in English rivers and coastal waters last year, has become a potent source of anger, inspiring campaigners to push for cleaner water. Despite the concern that people show for England's rivers, however, it is remarkably difficult to stroll along their banks, let alone take a dip. The Guardian's recent reporting on the River Dart in Devon has shown that large stretches of its bank are privately owned, and many of these are difficult to access. The researcher Lewis Winks, who used Land Registry data to map the Dart's ownership, found the 47-mile long river has no fewer than 108 separate owners. The Duchy of Cornwall owns 28 miles of riverbank; two aristocratic estates own a further 13; 11.6 miles are owned via offshore companies. Wilks's map gives a snapshot of a national problem. Only 4% of English rivers are open to the public. As the demand for swimming spots has surged, many paddlers and kayakers have been reprimanded for trespassing. Paths alongside rivers often meander far from their banks to avoid privately owned land; one can 'walk' along the River Test in Hampshire, for example, yet much of its bank is inaccessible. In 2020, visitors to one of its few access points found it blocked by a barbed wire gate. The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs told the Guardian that England is a 'nation of nature lovers'. But the nation's feudal patterns of land ownership put much of nature off limits. Forming a deeper connection with the environment can inspire people to care for it. Campaigns for bathing water status, which compel the Environment Agency to improve water quality in rivers designated for swimming, are testimony to this. They are driven by people who directly experience these landscapes, and so want to protect them. Labour pledged to improve access to nature and protect wildlife in its 2024 manifesto, but its ministers have since diluted both promises. The government's new planning bill will weaken environmental protections by allowing developers to offset their destruction of natural habitats, rather than avoiding such destruction to begin with. In opposition, Labour vowed to introduce a right to roam. In government, it U-turned on this promise, bending to pressure from landowner groups. Its plan to create nine new 'river walks' is a paltry compensation. The government has given no detail on where these walks will be located or how it will create them, and its plan will probably be thwarted by the same 'permissive' model of access that campaigners object to, where rights of way depend on the goodwill of individual landowners. To create a walk along the length of the Dart, each of its 108 landowners would have to voluntarily allow the public to use their land. The Dart is small: longer rivers will pose even greater challenges. Landowners have long attempted to shield their estates from public view. 'Concealing wealth,' writes the land campaigner Guy Shrubsole, 'is part and parcel of preserving it.' A plan by the housing minister Matthew Pennycook to open up the Land Registry will make it easier to see who owns England's riverbanks. But this doesn't go far enough, since there is no guarantee that landowners will allow the public to enjoy these landscapes. This, surely, has to change.
The Herald
a day ago
- Health
- The Herald
‘Anyone can drown but no one should': SA urged to act on preventable tragedy
The National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) has reiterated the urgent need to treat drowning as a public health crisis that is almost entirely preventable. NSRI CEO Mike Vonk said days such as World Drowning Prevention Day us that 'while anyone can drown, no one should ... This is not only a statistic; it's a call to action.' The NSRI said while South Africa's extensive coastline, rivers, lakes and dams make it particularly vulnerable to water-related fatalities, drowning remains a largely overlooked issue despite its deadly toll, especially among children in under-resourced communities According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), drowning is the third leading cause of death for children aged five to 14 years with more than 90% of deaths occurring in low- and middle-income countries. The WHO said most of the tragedies happen in rivers, lakes, wells and household water containers. The UN general assembly officially recognised the crisis in 2021, declaring July 25 World Drowning Prevention Day. This year's theme, 'Your story can save a life', encourages people to share their personal experiences to raise awareness and influence behaviour. In response to the ongoing crisis, the NSRI has shifted from primarily being an emergency response organisation to one that prioritises education and prevention.
The Herald
22-07-2025
- Health
- The Herald
We lose out when excluding indigenous knowledge in conservation
Where I come from, biodiversity is not separate from us. It does not belong to any government agency or board. The forests and rivers belong to the stories we share and pass down through generations. Some stories make us laugh, while others teach children to respect nature by inspiring a little fear. We gather herbs from the shrubs and forests. In my village, there are no fences marking boundaries, no ranger stations watching over the trees, and no signs declaring these places protected. Yet despite this, biodiversity continues to thrive. Animals live freely, plants grow wild, and the sounds of the rivers splash alive among us. People have lived like this for generations, quietly and respectfully coexisting with nature. That is why, when someone in the village falls ill and there is no access to a clinic's treatment, we do not turn to a pharmacy but to an elder who knows the secrets of the forest. They go into the forest and come back with a healing solution that has no price tag. Their knowledge of the land allows them to get healing directly from nature, without expense, and this method has been used for years. Sometimes I wonder, what if those forests had been closed off, declared a 'protected area' where access for the local people was restricted, and the traditional knowledge of our elders ignored as superstition? We would not have been able to get plants such as isiqhuziso to protect our cattle from infections and keep them strong. We would lose access to umhlondlo , which helps women relieve menstrual pain, and we would have nowhere to get umashiqolo for treating bile-related illnesses. While many of these remedies have not been studied or certified through formal science, they have our loyalty because of how they have helped our communities over generations. Their value lives in our continued survival. Losing that access would not just mean losing these plants; it would mean losing part of our identity, our healing traditions, and the deep relationship we have always had with the land that sustains us in so many ways. We have seen it happen in other parts of the country that were declared protected, at the cost of the community. For example, the Dwesa-Cwebe Nature Reserve, which was established in the mid-1980s and resulted in the forced relocation of residents. Even today, some of the locals still feel a deep sense of loss, believing this modern approach to scientific conservation came at the cost of their livelihoods and wellbeing. Elders who once led controlled burns or visited sacred rivers now watch from a distance. Though this may have been beneficial for natural biodiversity, it was detrimental to their everyday life. Therefore, in their exclusion and silence, there is much that we lose. We lose stories, knowledge, and the balance of interaction. This is not how conservation should be, and thankfully, it is not how SA National Parks (SANParks) sees the future either. SANParks Vision 2040 speaks of a future rooted in collaborative conservation, inclusivity, and the empowerment of communities as partners in protecting nature. It envisions parks that do not stand apart from people but stand with them. Where local voices shape environmental decisions, where indigenous knowledge is not treated as optional, but as essential. This vision gives me hope because it stands for what we have always known — that true conservation does not come from separation. It comes from a relationship and continuous learning. The plants that heal us do not need to be locked away at the risk of their extinction. They are still here because we have protected them ourselves daily with our hands, not with documents and policies. So as SANParks works towards Vision 2040, it would be important to look towards communities such as mine, not just for consultation, but for leadership. To learn from those who have conserved without any formal recognition. Let us make sure that 'protected area' never means 'people excluded'. Let it mean 'people empowered'. As we imagine new pathways for conservation that include indigenous voices and leadership, we must also rethink how people visit and experience these landscapes. This is where regenerative tourism becomes essential. Unlike traditional tourism, which is often consumer-centric, regenerative tourism seeks to give back more than it takes, to heal the land, revive local economies, and restore cultural knowledge. Imagine travellers coming not to consume an experience, but to learn from indigenous practices, to support local guides who share stories of their ancestors, and to participate in restoration activities that align with community values. This type of tourism invites people into the ecosystem of care, rather than checking off destinations. It becomes a way of keeping knowledge alive, encouraging deeper connections between visitors and the land, and supporting the communities who have always been its guardians. In the rural areas, we have learnt from walking among the trees, not from observing behind fences. But if we continue to keep people out, we risk more than separation; we risk forgetting. One day, the plants may still grow, but no-one will remember what they are for. The stories, the knowledge, and the relationship, all could vanish. And when that connection is gone, the forests may no longer help anyone at all, not because they cannot, but because no-one remembers how to connect with them any more. If the forests and rivers were never close to us, we would not have received their healing benefits for children and livestock, nor would their spiritual guidance have been passed down through generations. Uviwe Mahlanza is a SANParks communications intern based in the Garden Route National Park. She was born and bred in Mkambati Village in Bizana, Eastern Cape. The views and opinions expressed in this article are hers and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of SANParks. The Herald
Daily Mail
22-07-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
The only way to really clean up our stinking rivers and seas is to send a few top water bosses to prison: GEOFFREY LEAN
You might think it next to impossible to mismanage water quite so grossly in a nation surrounded by seas, running with rivers and notorious for its wet climate. But that is precisely what our water companies and successive governments have done for decades, outrageously turning the 'stuff of life' into a massive polluter and danger to health.
CBC
20-07-2025
- Climate
- CBC
B.C. unveils new drought-tracking system
As the driest summer months approach, the B.C. government has unveiled a new system to track and report drought conditions in the province. The program will show how much water a community has stored for use and how well rivers and creeks are flowing.
