SEAmester – South Africa’s first class afloat

publisher versionFrom Introduction: Marine science is a highly competitive environment. The need to improve the cohort of South African postgraduates, who would be recognised both nationally and internationally for their scientific excellence, is crucial. It is possible to attract students early on in their careers to this discipline via cutting-edge science, technology and unique field experiences. Through the engagement of students with real-life experiences such as SEAmester, universities supporting marine science postgraduate degree programmes can attract a sustainable throughput of numerically proficient students. By achieving a more quantitative and experienced input into our postgraduate degree programmes, we will, as a scientific community, greatly improve our long-term capabilities to accurately measure, model and predict the impacts of current climate change scenarios. The short-term goal is to attract and establish a cohort of proficient marine and atmospheric science graduates who will contribute to filling the capacity needs of South African marine science as a whole. The SEAmester programme, by involving researchers from across all the relevant disciplines and tertiary institutions, provides an opportunity to build a network of collaborative teaching within the marine field. In doing so, these researchers will foster and strengthen new and current collaborations between historically white and black universities (Figure 1). The long-term objective of SEAmester is to build critical mass within the marine sciences to ensure sustained growth of human capacity in marine science in South Africa – aligning closely with the current DST Research and Development strategies and the Operation Phakisa Oceans Economy initiative

Shifting perspectives on coastal impacts and adaptation

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports reflect evolving attitudes in adapting to sea-level rise by taking a systems approach and recognizing that multiple responses exist to achieve a less hazardous coast.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Book ReviewUnderstanding Sea-Level Rise and VariabilityBy John A Church, Philip L Woodworth, Thorkild Aarup and W Stanley Wilson (editors) (2010)

September 2010, Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK454 pages, hardcover and softcoverISBN 978-1-4443-3451-7 (hardcover), 978-1-4443-3452-4 (softcover). Price £80.00/€96.0 (hardcover), £39.95/€47.90(softcover)African Journal of Marine Science 2011, 33(1): 189–19

Cape of storms : sharing the coast in the face of turbulent, rising seas

Increasingly stormy seas and sea level rise are beginning to show up the existing fault lines in the engineered, social and institutional strata of the South African coastline. Amidst a legacy of dispossession of black South Africans, privileged access for wealthy whites, and a balancing act of emerging risks, this impressive bulletin and backgrounder asks: who gets to use the coast? A draft policy has been incorporated into Cape Town City’s Spatial Development Framework. Municipal structures are working with provincial authorities to formalise it in terms of the Integrated Coastal Management Act

Shifting perspectives on coastal impacts and adaptation

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports reflect evolving attitudes in adapting to sea-level rise by taking a systems approach and recognizing that multiple responses exist to achieve a less hazardous coast