Located on the slopes of Devil’s Peak in Cape Town, the University of Cape Town is a leading, research-intensive university in South Africa and on the continent, known for its academic excellence and pioneering scholarship. The university is home to a third of South Africa’s A-rated researchers (acknowledged by the Department of Science and Technology as international leaders in their field) and a fifth of the country’s national research chairs. UCT encourages students and staff to use their expertise to speed up social change and economic development across the country and continent, while pursuing the highest standards of excellence in academic knowledge and research: developing African solutions to African challenges that are also shared by developing nations around the world.
UCT, like the city of Cape Town, has a vibrant, cosmopolitan community drawn from all corners of South Africa. It also attracts students and staff from more than 100 countries in Africa and the rest of the world. The university has strong partnerships and networks with leading African and other international institutions - helping to enrich the academic, social and cultural diversity of the campus as well as to extend the reach of UCT’s academic work.
Conçus pour garantir la cohabitation pacifique entre les nations, ces zones font face à une situation de plus en plus tendue. En cause notamment, la militarisation de la lutte anti-braconnage.
Public sector trade unions now dominate union membership in South Africa.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
Rising membership of public sector unions and the growing political influence of these unions have led to government workers earning a premium over their private sector counterparts.
Placards voicing the concerns of rape victims outside the High Court in Johannesburg.
EPA/Kim Ludbrook
Rape complainants who are perceived to have precipitated their own victimisation, whether through their conduct or their relationship to the perpetrator, are at a particular disadvantage.
South Africans are increasingly taking to the streets to demand accountability from government.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
South Africa has never reached an embedded democratic state. Its post-apartheid experience more realistically reflects ongoing oscillation between a deepening and a reversal of democratic liberties.
More South Africans are taking to the streets to hold government accountable.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
South Africans’ faith in the post-apartheid system of democracy is clearly slipping - and some even suggest that a return to apartheid would be a good thing.
Violence to protect rhinos in southern Africa’s peace parks is the complete opposite to what the parks were envisaged to stand for.
Shutterstock
There are very violent confrontations in southern Africa’s peace parks. This is partly due to a violent history dating back to the apartheid era that has never been adequately addressed.
President Jacob Zuma’s fleeting mention of universities in his speech was merely political expediency.
GCIS/Flickr
There was nothing in President Zuma’s speech to suggest that he’d really listened to people’s concerns about higher education - nor to suggest that any solutions will be forthcoming.
This is a new era of physics and astronomy - and scientists all over the globe, including in Africa, have a role to play.
NASA
The discovery of gravitational waves has ushered in a new era in astronomy and physics. Where will the next big discovery be made? There’s no reason for it not to be Africa.
Massive bodies can send ripples through space time in the form of gravitational waves.
NASA
The long awaited discovery of gravitational waves has sent ripples through the scientific world. Here top experts respond to the historic announcement.
Biodiversity is known to suffer in human-altered agricultural areas. But the Verreaux Eagle is an exception and has seen its numbers increase in agricultural land..
The annual ‘Living Landscapes’ procession is aimed at raising awareness of the Cedarberg’s KhoiSan cultural heritage.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
Human population groups worldwide are highly homogeneous genetically. They are in fact 99.5% similar and their anatomical features vary in an uncorrelated fashion over the landscape.
Police officers in South Africa are four times more likely to kill themselves than be murdered.
Reuters/Dylan Martinez
While the unacceptably high rate of police murders in South Africa attracts much media coverage, the bigger problem of suicide among police receives little focus.
The southern ground hornbill is endangered in South Africa.
Lucy Kemp
Reintroduction programs can really help stop the decline of the southern ground hornbills.
South Africa is taking a tough stance against the practice of abducting and forcing young girls into marriage that’s still rife in some parts of the country.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
The reasons for the phenomenon of child marriage are complex and include the fact that in customary law, marriageable age was never reckoned as an actual number but depended on puberty.
The Western Cape in South Africa has mapped out a plan to help farmers cope with expected climate change threats to agriculture.
Shutterstock
South Africa’s Western Cape is the first region in the country to put together a comprehensive plan to help farmers deal with changes in weather patterns brought on by climate change.
A typical community protest over the delivery of basic services in South Africa. A study shows protesters often resort to violence to attract attention.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
The advent of democracy in South Africa in 1994 is often hailed as peaceful and smooth. But, there are lingering problems. Dissent over unmet expectations has resulted in an increase in protests.
South African police duck bricks during a protest by students over tuition fees at the Union Buildings, the seat of government, in Pretoria.
Reuters/Sydney Seshibedi
Images of South African police on social media are part of a carefully scripted performance in which the police service is heavily invested.
A tree house used to observe the Tungurahua volcano in Ecuador which has made a point of developing ecotourism to boost economic growth.
Reuters/Gary Granja