Learning and Teaching
UWC boosts sustainable entrepreneurship through the green economy
Imagine, if you could, driving through Bitterfontein, Kleinzee, O’Kiep, Nababeep and Port Nolloth in the Northern Cape. Once, not long ago, these were thriving mining towns that yielded unimaginable wealth to an elite few. Today, its people and their land are asphyxiating – victims of collapsed industries and environmental desecration.
As these settlements perish so too do the dreams of the young people who inherited this land. Stuck in an infinite cycle of deprivation they have two choices: die of poverty or die in prison. Crime, in most instances, has become a viable vocation for matriculants who didn’t make the grade for university. They end up haunting the dusty roads, desperate to survive because our economy cannot absorb them either. Their forefathers could live off the land, but this has become the kingdom of the poachers who mine endangered succulents for the black market.