It’ time to get the goat market going
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May 19, 2016 THE WITNESS | 9 www.witness.co.za INSIGHT A second reason goats make good sense is that they are a good, perhaps the only, weapon against bush en- croachment, which is the result of in- creased carbon emissions and it soaks up precious water in catchment areas. “Think about it,” says Alcock. “There are maybe 10 to 20 million hectares of land affected by bush encroachment. Most probably more than we have as game reserves. At this rate it will cause rhino, buffalo and other grazers to dis- appear, and all you’ll have left are impala and goats.” Far from destroying the environ- ment, as public perception would have it, goats may well save it. “It’s just a boo- geyman” that goats are destructive, says Alcock impatiently. Moreover, “as organised agriculture collapses, goats will fill the gap”, says Alcock. Isn’t that a bit of a stretch? No, says Alcock. “Look around you. Where do you see a fence? It’s either high-secu- rity fences around game farms, or else the fences have collapsed. The advan- tage of goats is that they self-herd, so it doesn’t matter.” His vision does, he admits, entail a fundamental shift in agriculture in areas where goats make more sense than any other livestock. As for the impact of vast numbers of goats, Alcock says: “We cannot imagine high enough numbers to push back on bush encroachment. Even high-volume goat areas have bush encroachment.” The odd thing about goats, however, is that they are ubiquitous, on the one hand, and yet, on the other, they are not officially reflected anywhere. Alcock es- timates with confidence that there are about one million goats in KZN, but more likely about three million. But even so, “there is no South African goat policy”, which means that “there is no support for them and no research”. “Just think”, says Alcock, “goats were the first domesticated herd animals in human history, but there’s so little re- search on them anywhere”. Further- more, “officially, no goat meat is sold in South Africa”, he says. Meat statistics are gathered at abattoirs, but since goats do not go to abattoirs for slaugh- ter, they don’t figure. Stats SA, which has data on every imaginable agricul- tural activity, has no data whatsoever for goats since 1988. And goats were not earmarked for assistance during the drought, while cattle were supported with fodder or through being moved to where there was grazing. What is known is that the demand for goats is insatiable, and production simply cannot keep up with demand. South Africa imports 400 000 goats from Namibia a year. Other provinces sell almost their entire production to KZN, and it’s still not enough. The agri- business project hopes not only to pro- vide enough for the KZN market, but also to start exporting foot-and-mouth free goats. Alcock is encouraged that goats are starting to be taken seriously, and gov- ernment support is very welcome. But while he has a grand vision, he’s not giv- en to grand schemes. Start small. Do the research. Work out what works. And always recognise that “farmers farm where they are”, which means that any support needs to be local, specific and practical. Alcock already has a track record in this. Some years ago he came up with the idea of manufacturing pro- tein/energy licks for goats, except that farmers were shown how to mix the in- gredients at home and compact them into small bricks themselves. One spin- off has been that block-making ma- chines are now being built for this pur- pose, and with this comes the possibili- ty of block-making microbusinesses, which enables small entrepreneurs to enter agriculture, although not as farm- ers. The impact of this innovation is that it keeps kids and ewes healthy, and this reduces the mortality rates. “If you can stop just the die-off — the mortality rate among kids — then you should have an immediate boost in pro- duction of 20% to 40%. It’s probably an easy problem to fix,” he says. A boost in production creates its own problems, however. Managing herd siz- es, and getting the right balance be- tween ewes, kids and castrates (which fetch the highest price), is tricky. And then maintaining the right balance be- tween selling and producing is a science on its own. Optimum herd size is 60: more than that, and you run into troub- le. “We don’t know why yet, but it is”, says Alcock, and that means “you can’t just give a farmer 200 goats and a fence. It won’t work”. Anticipating the importance of goats finding their way into the commercial market, Mdukatshani and the Depart- ment of Agriculture and the Depart- ment of Rural Development and Land Reform have been holding goat auc- tions, for the first time, to ensure that farmers are not blocked once their herd numbers start rising. After a slow start, they are now developing momentum. While logic dictates that a goat in- dustry is long overdue, Alcock acknowl- edges that there are image issues to overcome. Goat meat, he notes, “is seen as eaten only in times of sadness or debt”. That perception needs to change. At the last goat auction earlier this year, two top Durban chefs served up cordon bleu goat dishes to dignitaries headed by King Goodwill Zwelithini. “That’s the eye candy part of the project”, to create a receptive environment, says Al- cock. It doesn’t take much to get Alcock enthusing about goats, and it’s clearly catching on now. As he says: “Mdukat- shani has put goats on the national agenda in a huge way.” cinations work, and the bigger problem is feeding them.” The success of this initiative was summarised by one woman, MaNde- bele Skhakhane, who said that her very robust flock was able to provide meat which, because of the drought’s impact on household budgets, has become too expensive and cannot be included in the grocery shop. But as Alcock points out, however successful their work with chickens is, “it’s not enough”. “Say you’re a widow,” he says. “You have two children. You’ll incur expens- es. Your social capital isn’t in chickens. You’ll pay with goats or cattle. If you don’t have either, it is very expensive. If you have four goats, that’s the equiva- lent of one cow. If you have that, you have collateral for transactions. With- out goats at least, you’ll always be stuck, and you’ll have to pay cash for any dam- ages, for example.” Ergo, goats, and not just because they’re a logical way to give women con- trol over their lives and to build wealth. Whichever way you look at it, says Al- cock, you have to ask: “Why not goats?” One very obvious reason they make good agricultural sense is offered by the drought. “Cattle numbers have collapsed. In some families, farmers have lost all their cattle because of the drought.” Goat numbers, on the other hand, have “stalled”. There have been losses, says Alcock, but “it’s the new production, the kids, that have mainly died. That means that while numbers haven’t in- creased, they haven’t dropped”. The implications are huge. Alcock reckons it’ll take maybe 10 years to re- generate cattle herds, and for some farmers their losses result in a “terminal exit” from farming because they cannot raise the capital to start over. Alcock suggests that while cattle farming makes sense in some areas, goats are more resilient and therefore offer great- er social and food security. YVES VANDERHAEGHEN D EEP in Msinga, goat things have been happening, largely on the quiet. While cattle herds have been devastated by the drought, goat numbers have held up, partly because they’re resilient creatures, but also be- cause the Mdukatshani Rural Develop- ment Project has been working at ways to keep them healthy and productive. Its successes have encouraged the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform to put R50 million into a project to boost goat production in five districts in KwaZulu-Natal: Mzinyathi, Thukela, Uthungulu, Zululand and uM- khanyakude. Together with funds from the Department of Agriculture and the EU, the total investment comes to over R70 million. The KZN Goat Agribusiness Project aims, within five years, to stitch togeth- er a value chain that will double indige- nous goat production, develop 7 000 women commercial farmers, create 620 youth jobs and 270 microbusinesses, and generate R100 million in extra value from the herds. Where did the goat project start? “Actually”, says Mdukatshani direct- or Rauri Alcock, “it all started with chickens”. Post land reform, agricultural support was mainly directed towards cattle. “If you asked farmers why they wanted land, they always said because they wanted cattle. Sometimes this was for sentimental reasons, but not al- ways.” But this affected only a small part of the community, says Gugu Mbatha, Mdukatshani’s projects manager. First- ly, cattle tend to be owned by men, and so support for cattle excluded women, and “did not redress the power ratio be- tween men and women”. In any case, notes Alcock, cattle would sometimes be owned by men who were working in Johannesburg. And so, because they were not on site, you always had to phone them before you could do any- thing, and this would always take time and the delays made any interventions impractical. “What is the use’’, asks Mbatha, “of supporting men. If they have five cattle, for example, that amounts to the equiv- alent of about R50 000. The question we had to answer was, do we help wealthy people, or do we help people trying to make a livelihood?” That’s why, she says, “women are our clients, and those are the farmers we help”. Besides, says Alcock, “access to cattle is more complicated, beyond just men and wealth. There are cultural issues. For example, makhotis are not allowed into the kraal. Menstruating women are not allowed into the kraal. And so the daily handling and management of the cattle becomes problematic. “So we asked: ‘How do we work with women at their homes in Msinga’, and the answer was chickens,” says Alcock. That was nine years ago, and Mdukat- shani launched a chicken vaccination and management programme to reduce mortality rates. “Now, the main prob- lem for chickens is not disease. The vac- SUE GRAFTON, AMERICAN AUTHOR (1940-). Ideas are easy. It’s the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats. Goats are more resilient than cattle and therefore offer greater social and food security. Goats are perhaps also the only weapon against bush encroachment. PHOTOS: RAURI ALCOCK Rauri Alcock, director of Mdukatshani Rural Development Project and general go-to guy on the subject of indigenous goats in South Africa. A goat auction in Msinga: Mdukatshani’s projects manager Gugu Mbatha is in the foreground. RON NICOLSON I HAVE my own private prejudices. I think men who wear socks with sandals are naffs. I think people at concerts who clap in the middle of a piece are Philistines (unless, of course, it is opera or ballet, in which case you can interrupt, cheer and boo whenever you like). I rejoice when Australia are beaten at cricket. One of my favourite jokes manages to put down the Irish and Australians at the same time. I enjoy reading prejudiced com- ments or looking at prejudiced car- toons. I like Noseweek. I like com- ments that go against political cor- rectness. None of us is politically correct at heart. I have my own preju- dices about global warming, BEE and transformation in sport. Of course, if you press me, my prej- udices are unfair. Men who wear socks are probably nice men who live in Germany where socks with sandals is equivalent, it appears, to be on a par with wearing Dolce and Gabbana. People who clap after every movement in a symphony are just enjoying the music. I don’t know any Irishmen, but half of my children are Australian. My wife has prejudices, too. She thinks I am genetically predisposed to losing my car keys. She thinks I am hopeless at looking for them when to her eyes they are plainly in sight. Of course that is unfair too — she can only find them so quickly, I think, be- cause she put them there in the first place. Prejudices are what you say at a dinner party after several glasses of wine. But you won’t be able to defend them in the cold light of day. And you should never make them public. So the moral of the story is that you should never, ever, put your prejudices on social media. Note to wife: no mention of car keys on Facebook lest everyone should think I am an idiot. I’m not a great believer in social media. I never post on Facebook, al- though in an idle moment I may read other people’s posts and laugh at their jokes. I have never tweeted on Twitter and nor would I know how. I do go on to WhatsApp but only to my family group and never to express any opinion other than “Happy birth- day”, “Sorry you are ill”, and “So the Sharks lost again” (thankfully I didn’t need to send that last weekend). I can never understand why people commenting on social media seem to believe that they are just having a co- sy chat with a few close friends and say things they would never have said in public. People, social media is pub- lic. And someone will resend your stu- pid views. We see it constantly. Diane Kohler Barnard, Penny Sparrow, and now Judge Mabel Jansen — not to mention Steve Hofmeyer and many others. Kohler Barnard, Sparrow and Jansen would probably never have said what they posted on social media if they had known it would go public — I can’t say the same about Hofmeyer. So can’t I have prejudices? Must I carefully police my thoughts? Can’t I tell jokes about Australians? Prejudices can be fun, even funny. I can make jokes about Australians be- cause Barry Humphries did it better with his skit on Dame Edna. Austra- lians can laugh at themselves. I can tell Van der Merwe jokes because Piet- er Dirk Uys led South Africans in laughing at ourselves. But nobody in Humphries’ reviews suggested that Australians are monkeys. Nobody in Pieter Dirk Uys shows suggested that nationalist politicians were all rapists. Sometimes harsh things need to be said. But that’s not prejudice, that’s legitimate political comment and we can expect to be challenged on it. Le- gitimate comment may elicit hostility, even anger, in those whom we criti- cise. If Jansen really believes, without reserve, that rape is socially acceptable in the black community let her say so in serious scientific conferences and journals, provide the evidence and be ready to face the flak. It’s not a thing to say on social media. Prejudices are funny (at least I think mine are) provided they don’t hurt anyone. But it is a fine line. Prej- udices against the vulnerable, against people who are already hurting, against people who are socially disad- vantaged, prejudices that hurt, should be kept to yourself. So, yes, we should police our thoughts. Of course I am prejudiced. I am male, I am white, I grew up in South Africa. I have secret prejudices that I won’t share with you, but I am ashamed of them. I certainly won’t put them on social media. But if you want to know the joke about the man who wanted to be Irish and became an Australian, I am happy to tell you in private. • Ron Nicolson is a retired Anglican priest and academic. Prejudices should remain private It’ time to get the goat market going A Msinga project’s promotion of goat farming is taking off as it makes good sense for multiple reasons
Transcript of It’ time to get the goat market going
May 19, 2016 THE WITNESS | 9
www.witness.co.za INSIGHT
A second reason goats make goodsense is that they are a good, perhapsthe only, weapon against bush encroachment, which is the result of increased carbon emissions and it soaksup precious water in catchment areas.
“Think about it,” says Alcock. “There
are maybe 10 to 20 million hectares ofland affected by bush encroachment.Most probably more than we have asgame reserves. At this rate it will causerhino, buffalo and other grazers to disappear, and all you’ll have left are impalaand goats.”
Far from destroying the environment, as public perception would haveit, goats may well save it. “It’s just a boogeyman” that goats are destructive, saysAlcock impatiently.
Moreover, “as organised agriculturecollapses, goats will fill the gap”, saysAlcock. Isn’t that a bit of a stretch? No,says Alcock. “Look around you. Wheredo you see a fence? It’s either highsecurity fences around game farms, or elsethe fences have collapsed. The advantage of goats is that they selfherd, soit doesn’t matter.”
His vision does, he admits, entail afundamental shift in agriculture in areaswhere goats make more sense than anyother livestock. As for the impact of vastnumbers of goats, Alcock says: “Wecannot imagine high enough numbersto push back on bush encroachment.Even highvolume goat areas have bushencroachment.”
The odd thing about goats, however,is that they are ubiquitous, on the onehand, and yet, on the other, they are notofficially reflected anywhere. Alcock estimates with confidence that there areabout one million goats in KZN, butmore likely about three million. Buteven so, “there is no South African goatpolicy”, which means that “there is nosupport for them and no research”.
“Just think”, says Alcock, “goats werethe first domesticated herd animals inhuman history, but there’s so little research on them anywhere”. Furthermore, “officially, no goat meat is soldin South Africa”, he says. Meat statisticsare gathered at abattoirs, but sincegoats do not go to abattoirs for slaughter, they don’t figure. Stats SA, whichhas data on every imaginable agricultural activity, has no data whatsoeverfor goats since 1988. And goats were notearmarked for assistance during thedrought, while cattle were supportedwith fodder or through being moved towhere there was grazing.
What is known is that the demandfor goats is insatiable, and production
simply cannot keep up with demand.South Africa imports 400 000 goatsfrom Namibia a year. Other provincessell almost their entire production toKZN, and it’s still not enough. The agribusiness project hopes not only to provide enough for the KZN market, butalso to start exporting footandmouthfree goats.
Alcock is encouraged that goats arestarting to be taken seriously, and government support is very welcome. Butwhile he has a grand vision, he’s not given to grand schemes. Start small. Dothe research. Work out what works. Andalways recognise that “farmers farmwhere they are”, which means that anysupport needs to be local, specific andpractical. Alcock already has a trackrecord in this. Some years ago he cameup with the idea of manufacturing protein/energy licks for goats, except thatfarmers were shown how to mix the ingredients at home and compact theminto small bricks themselves. One spinoff has been that blockmaking machines are now being built for this purpose, and with this comes the possibility of blockmaking microbusinesses,which enables small entrepreneurs toenter agriculture, although not as farmers. The impact of this innovation isthat it keeps kids and ewes healthy, andthis reduces the mortality rates.
“If you can stop just the dieoff — themortality rate among kids — then youshould have an immediate boost in production of 20% to 40%. It’s probablyan easy problem to fix,” he says.
A boost in production creates its ownproblems, however. Managing herd sizes, and getting the right balance between ewes, kids and castrates (whichfetch the highest price), is tricky. Andthen maintaining the right balance between selling and producing is a scienceon its own. Optimum herd size is 60:more than that, and you run into trouble. “We don’t know why yet, but it is”,says Alcock, and that means “you can’tjust give a farmer 200 goats and a fence.It won’t work”.
Anticipating the importance of goatsfinding their way into the commercialmarket, Mdukatshani and the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Rural Development and LandReform have been holding goat auctions, for the first time, to ensure thatfarmers are not blocked once their herdnumbers start rising. After a slow start,they are now developing momentum.
While logic dictates that a goat industry is long overdue, Alcock acknowledges that there are image issues toovercome. Goat meat, he notes, “is seenas eaten only in times of sadness ordebt”. That perception needs to change.At the last goat auction earlier this year,two top Durban chefs served up cordonbleu goat dishes to dignitaries headedby King Goodwill Zwelithini. “That’sthe eye candy part of the project”, tocreate a receptive environment, says Alcock.
It doesn’t take much to get Alcockenthusing about goats, and it’s clearlycatching on now. As he says: “Mdukatshani has put goats on the nationalagenda in a huge way.”
cinations work, and the bigger problemis feeding them.”
The success of this initiative wassummarised by one woman, MaNdebele Skhakhane, who said that her veryrobust flock was able to provide meatwhich, because of the drought’s impacton household budgets, has become tooexpensive and cannot be included in thegrocery shop.
But as Alcock points out, howeversuccessful their work with chickens is,“it’s not enough”.
“Say you’re a widow,” he says. “Youhave two children. You’ll incur expenses. Your social capital isn’t in chickens.You’ll pay with goats or cattle. If youdon’t have either, it is very expensive.If you have four goats, that’s the equivalent of one cow. If you have that, youhave collateral for transactions. Without goats at least, you’ll always be stuck,and you’ll have to pay cash for any damages, for example.”
Ergo, goats, and not just becausethey’re a logical way to give women control over their lives and to build wealth.Whichever way you look at it, says Alcock, you have to ask: “Why not goats?”
One very obvious reason they makegood agricultural sense is offered by thedrought.
“Cattle numbers have collapsed. Insome families, farmers have lost all theircattle because of the drought.” Goatnumbers, on the other hand, have“stalled”. There have been losses, saysAlcock, but “it’s the new production,the kids, that have mainly died. Thatmeans that while numbers haven’t increased, they haven’t dropped”.
The implications are huge. Alcockreckons it’ll take maybe 10 years to regenerate cattle herds, and for somefarmers their losses result in a “terminalexit” from farming because they cannotraise the capital to start over. Alcocksuggests that while cattle farmingmakes sense in some areas, goats aremore resilient and therefore offer greater social and food security.
YVES VANDERHAEGHEN
DEEP in Msinga, goat things havebeen happening, largely on thequiet. While cattle herds have
been devastated by the drought, goatnumbers have held up, partly becausethey’re resilient creatures, but also because the Mdukatshani Rural Development Project has been working at waysto keep them healthy and productive.
Its successes have encouraged theDepartment of Rural Development andLand Reform to put R50 million into aproject to boost goat production in fivedistricts in KwaZuluNatal: Mzinyathi,Thukela, Uthungulu, Zululand and uMkhanyakude. Together with funds fromthe Department of Agriculture and theEU, the total investment comes to overR70 million.
The KZN Goat Agribusiness Projectaims, within five years, to stitch together a value chain that will double indigenous goat production, develop 7 000women commercial farmers, create 620youth jobs and 270 microbusinesses,and generate R100 million in extra valuefrom the herds.
Where did the goat project start?“Actually”, says Mdukatshani direct
or Rauri Alcock, “it all started withchickens”. Post land reform, agriculturalsupport was mainly directed towardscattle. “If you asked farmers why theywanted land, they always said becausethey wanted cattle. Sometimes this wasfor sentimental reasons, but not always.”
But this affected only a small part ofthe community, says Gugu Mbatha,Mdukatshani’s projects manager. Firstly, cattle tend to be owned by men, andso support for cattle excluded women,and “did not redress the power ratio between men and women”. In any case,notes Alcock, cattle would sometimesbe owned by men who were working inJohannesburg. And so, because theywere not on site, you always had tophone them before you could do anything, and this would always take timeand the delays made any interventionsimpractical.
“What is the use’’, asks Mbatha, “ofsupporting men. If they have five cattle,for example, that amounts to the equivalent of about R50 000. The questionwe had to answer was, do we helpwealthy people, or do we help peopletrying to make a livelihood?”
That’s why, she says, “women are ourclients, and those are the farmers wehelp”.
Besides, says Alcock, “access to cattleis more complicated, beyond just menand wealth. There are cultural issues.For example, makhotis are not allowedinto the kraal. Menstruating women arenot allowed into the kraal. And so thedaily handling and management of thecattle becomes problematic.
“So we asked: ‘How do we work withwomen at their homes in Msinga’, andthe answer was chickens,” says Alcock.That was nine years ago, and Mdukatshani launched a chicken vaccinationand management programme to reducemortality rates. “Now, the main problem for chickens is not disease. The vac
SUE GRAFTON, AMERICAN AUTHOR (1940).
Ideas are easy. It’s the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.
Goats are more resilient than cattle and therefore offer greater social and food security. Goats are perhaps also the only weapon against bush encroachment.PHOTOS: RAURI ALCOCK
Rauri Alcock, director of Mdukatshani Rural Development Project and general goto guy on the subject of indigenous goats in South Africa.
A goat auction in Msinga: Mdukatshani’s projects manager Gugu Mbatha is in the foreground.
RON NICOLSON
IHAVE my own private prejudices. Ithink men who wear socks with sandals are naffs. I think people at
concerts who clap in the middle of a piece are Philistines (unless, of course, it is opera or ballet, in which case you can interrupt, cheer and boo whenever you like).
I rejoice when Australia are beatenat cricket. One of my favourite jokes manages to put down the Irish and Australians at the same time.
I enjoy reading prejudiced comments or looking at prejudiced cartoons. I like Noseweek. I like comments that go against political correctness. None of us is politically correct at heart. I have my own prejudices about global warming, BEE and transformation in sport.
Of course, if you press me, my prejudices are unfair. Men who wear socks are probably nice men who live in Germany where socks with sandals is equivalent, it appears, to be on a par with wearing Dolce and Gabbana. People who clap after every movement in a symphony are just enjoying the music. I don’t know any Irishmen, but half of my children are Australian.
My wife has prejudices, too. She thinks I am genetically predisposed to losing my car keys. She thinks I am hopeless at looking for them when to her eyes they are plainly in sight. Of course that is unfair too — she can only find them so quickly, I think, because she put them there in the first place.
Prejudices are what you say at a dinner party after several glasses of wine. But you won’t be able to defend them in the cold light of day. And you should never make them public. So the moral of the story is that you should never, ever, put your prejudices on social media. Note to wife: no mention of car keys on Facebook lest everyone should think I am an idiot.
I’m not a great believer in social media. I never post on Facebook, although in an idle moment I may read other people’s posts and laugh at their jokes. I have never tweeted on Twitter and nor would I know how. I do go on to WhatsApp but only to my family group and never to express any opinion other than “Happy birthday”, “Sorry you are ill”, and “So the Sharks lost again” (thankfully I didn’t need to send that last weekend).
I can never understand why peoplecommenting on social media seem to believe that they are just having a cosy chat with a few close friends and say things they would never have said in public. People, social media is public. And someone will resend your stupid views.
We see it constantly. Diane KohlerBarnard, Penny Sparrow, and now Judge Mabel Jansen — not to mention Steve Hofmeyer and many others. Kohler Barnard, Sparrow and Jansen would probably never have said what they posted on social media if they had known it would go public — I can’t say the same about Hofmeyer.
So can’t I have prejudices? Must Icarefully police my thoughts? Can’t I tell jokes about Australians?
Prejudices can be fun, even funny. Ican make jokes about Australians because Barry Humphries did it better with his skit on Dame Edna. Australians can laugh at themselves. I can tell Van der Merwe jokes because Pieter Dirk Uys led South Africans in laughing at ourselves. But nobody in Humphries’ reviews suggested that Australians are monkeys. Nobody in Pieter Dirk Uys shows suggested that nationalist politicians were all rapists.
Sometimes harsh things need to besaid. But that’s not prejudice, that’s legitimate political comment and we can expect to be challenged on it. Legitimate comment may elicit hostility, even anger, in those whom we criticise. If Jansen really believes, without reserve, that rape is socially acceptable in the black community let her say so in serious scientific conferences and journals, provide the evidence and be ready to face the flak. It’s not a thing to say on social media.
Prejudices are funny (at least I think mine are) provided they don’t hurt anyone. But it is a fine line. Prejudices against the vulnerable, against people who are already hurting, against people who are socially disadvantaged, prejudices that hurt, should be kept to yourself. So, yes, we should police our thoughts. Of course I am prejudiced. I am male, I am white, I grew up in South Africa. I have secret prejudices that I won’t share with you, but I am ashamed of them. I certainly won’t put them on social media.
But if you want to know the joke about the man who wanted to be Irish and became an Australian, I am happy to tell you in private.• Ron Nicolson is a retired Anglican priest and academic.
Prejudices should remain private
It’ time to get thegoat market going
A Msinga project’s promotion of goat farming is taking off as it makes good sense for multiple reasons
