namaqua national park: pic - SANParksClimate Change Park for SA.
The Namaqua National Park has acquired another 36 000ha of land on the West Coast and is now SA's fifth largest park. It is also SA's first park which will be designed to give species a better chance of survival in a warmer, drier future. By ultimately extending the park to include mountainous land, the park will stretch from sea level to an elevation of around 1 700m and would allow plant and animal species to migrate to different altitudes in response to a drier, warmer climate.

"There may be other national parks where this climate change accommodation could take place, but this is the first one consciously designed with that in mind," said Paul Daphne, SANParks managing executive of park operations. [IOL]

Manganism victims were "pressurised"

Suspected manganese poisoning victims were allegedly offered R800 000 each to undergo further testing while their employer refused to recognise the attorney representing them, a Labour Department inquiry investigating several cases of manganese poisoning heard recently.

Richard Spoor, an attorney representing 10 workers who have been diagnosed with manganism, told the inquiry that Assmang had offered affected workers R800 000 to be examined by an overseas medical expert and that Assmang had "gone so far as to hire chiefs (traditional leaders) to press them into accepting deals". [Pretoria News]

Toyota criticises SA's fuel quality
Toyota South Africa has lashed out at the quality of fuel in the country and delays in finalising vehicle emission regulations. Johan van Zyl, Toyota SA CEO and president of NAAMSA said local fuels were only adhering to Euro 2 emission standards, while Europe would be moving to Euro 5 next year. He said government should impose legislation on the fuel industry to go directly to the Euro 5 standard by 2012. He also said environmental taxes had been proposed and Toyota had the advanced technologies to reduce fuel consumption and vehicle emissions but it could do nothing to assist consumers because of the quality of fuel in the country.

"Improvements in the quality of our fuel are imperative to the achievement of environmental objectives, including improved air quality," he said. [Business Report]

Obama's camp: we will act quickly on climate change
Obama sent Jason Grumet, a policy adviser mentioned for a possible energy post, to an environmental conference in Washington to offer reassurances that there would be swift movement on climate-change legislation. "The whole transition team felt it important to be here," Grumet said. "I think it is going to be a very, very busy 2009, and I think we are going to need all of you to be on top of your game."

Grumet's brief appearance was widely seen as a signal that Obama, who for nearly two years of campaigning warned of a "planet in peril", was serious about following through on a 30-point environmental agenda that called for creating green jobs, cutting US oil consumption and moving to renewable sources of energy,

It was the second time in 24 hours that Obama had tried to reassure the world that he wanted a radical departure from Bush's policy on the environment. Obama has said repeatedly that the global economic crisis remains his top priority, and John Podesta, part of the troika overseeing the transition, said on Tuesday that the environment was at the top of the Democrat's agenda. "I anticipate him moving very aggressively and very rapidly on the whole question of transforming the energy platform in the United States from high carbon energy to low carbon energy," he said.[MG}