The Conversation – Africa – Page 5

January 12, 2026

Stablecoins are gaining ground as digital currency in Africa: how to avoid risks

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Iwa Salami, Professor of Law, University of East London

A notification popped up on my LinkedIn the other day. Africans were doing a traditional celebratory dance at the Africa Stablecoin summit in Johannesburg.

The picture gave me a sinking feeling.

Why? While stablecoins can advance financial inclusion in Africa, could this celebration mark the potential transfer of monetary sovereignty from African economies to the economy issuing the most coveted currency-denominated stablecoin?

Stablecoins are crypto-assets or digital currencies designed to maintain a stable value, typically by being pegged to a reference asset such as a national currency (like US dollars), a commodity (like gold) or a basket of assets.

The use of stablecoins in Africa is on the rise, particularly in Nigeria, South Africa and Kenya. This rise is driven by currency volatility, inflation and limited access to stable foreign currency through traditional banking. Those problems prompt some people to adopt US dollar-denominated stablecoins for saving, hedging and remittances.

Part of their appeal is that they can be moved across borders more quickly, cheaply and efficiently than conventional assets. In South Africa, a well developed regulatory and financial infrastructure has increased institutional confidence, expanding stablecoin use beyond retail into business payments, remittances and other business-to-business transactions.

Their stability is usually achieved through reserves, collateral, or algorithmic mechanisms that prevent large price swings.

My book, Financial Technology Law and Regulation in Africa, looked at their operation as a crypto-asset in African states. I raised concerns about their potential impact on emerging economies, including African countries, in 2019 and 2020. A recent International Monetary Fund paper has echoed these concerns.

The journey so far

Stablecoins emerged in 2014 to reduce the volatility of crypto-assets for crypto-holders who wanted to cash out of a high-value crypto-asset before it crashed. Crypto-asset values crash easily because they are highly speculative, sentiment-driven, and can be sold instantly at scale, allowing fear to trigger rapid sell-offs.

The most popular ones are US dollar-denominated USDT and USDC issued by private companies Tether and Circle, respectively. However, stablecoins were unregulated for about 10 to 11 years before the EU Markets in Crypto-assets (MiCA) regulation in 2024 and the US Genius Act in 2025. During this period, there were no disclosure requirements governing these crypto-assets.

As not all are subject to regulation, criticisms abound regarding the quality and opaque nature of the assets backing them and their robustness to withstand redemption runs or large cash redemption by holders of stablecoins.

These criticisms arise as it is often unclear exactly how liquid, safe, and transparent the assets backing stablecoins are, raising doubts about whether unregulated issuers could meet large, sudden redemption demands without stress. This matters because the stablecoin market is worth approximately US$300 billion, so a loss of confidence could trigger mass redemptions and cause disruption well beyond the crypto-asset sector.

Potential problems

The rise in the use of stablecoins poses a risk of dollarisation, as US dollar-denominated stablecoins account for 99% of the stablecoin market. Dollarisation is the excessive use of the dollar in local African economies. It could be a threat to African states’ monetary sovereignty and drive capital flight from African economies.

To avert this problem, African authorities and central banks would first need to be prepared to impose restrictions or limits on the amounts of these US dollar or foreign-denominated stablecoins that can circulate within their economies at any given time. This is to prevent the threat to monetary sovereignty.

Secondly, African economies should also be prepared to put in place sound policy frameworks through which they can build credibility for their currencies and, therefore, avoid the risk of dollarisation.

Thirdly, they can consider launching their own stablecoins. This can be in the form of a local currency stablecoin or a regional stablecoin. To prevent capital flight from the economies, these stablecoins can be backed by a commodity or a basket of commodities, from Africa’s wealth of natural resources and minerals such as precious stones, gold, diamonds, crude oil and cobalt. To have a global edge, a dollar value can be derived from these commodities.

Since the proposed African backed stablecoin would be a local currency with a US dollar value, it could be used to settle domestic, regional and global transactions without the need for US dollars, whose backing assets are held outside the country and in the US.

Fourthly, they could also consider issuing their own retail central bank digital currency, as this would have exactly the same effect as fiat but in digital form. It would have the same credibility status as fiat, which would need to be built to avoid the risk of dollarisation.

The risks

As US dollar-denominated stablecoins account for 99% of the stablecoins market, the rise of their use in Africa indicates stablecoins have heightened dollarisation.

Dollarisation already exists and is widespread across Africa. It ranges from partial and informal to deep and systemic, depending on country conditions, but stablecoins accelerate and reinforce it. Traditional dollarisation (people and firms informally using US dollars for savings and trade) remains constrained by physical cash, bank access and foreign exchange controls.

Stablecoins make dollar-denominated liquidity instantly accessible on a mobile phone, bypassing banks, foreign exchange restrictions and domestic currency infrastructure. They become “digital dollars”, circulating outside the supervisory perimeter of central banks.

The US Genius Act brings issuers under US regulatory oversight. It guarantees that US dollar-denominated stablecoins will be safe, liquid and institutionally backed, making them more attractive than many African domestic currencies, especially in inflationary environments.

Consequently, what was once an informal hedge becomes a formal, globally credible digital alternative to local currency, accelerating capital flight, weakening deposit creation, and undermining domestic monetary policy.

This has direct monetary sovereignty implications for countries such as Nigeria and Kenya. In Nigeria, persistent foreign exchange shortages and naira volatility have pushed households and small enterprises into Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC) as working capital and savings instruments.

Post-Genius Act, these instruments will become more institutionally robust, increasing dependence on US-dollar-based payment and settlement systems located and governed outside the country’s financial system and reducing the Central Bank of Nigeria’s ability to influence liquidity, lending and inflation.

In Kenya, where digital finance is already deeply embedded through M-Pesa, US dollar-stablecoins offer a hedge against the shilling, bypassing local credit creation and weakening the Central Bank of Kenya’s monetary transmission mechanism.

In both cases, the US Genius Act effectively shifts monetary authority away from African central banks and towards US regulators and private issuers – not by design, but through market incentives. Stablecoins thus do not merely mirror existing dollarisation; they legalise it at scale, embedding it into Africa’s digital financial systems.

There is also the risk of capital flight from African economies to the jurisdictions where the denominated stablecoins are backed.

In summary, stablecoins can truly advance financial inclusion in Africa, but heavy reliance on foreign-denominated stablecoins risks deepening dollarisation and weakening monetary sovereignty.

Next steps

To deal with these risks, African economies need stronger policy frameworks to build currency credibility and reduce the risk of dollarisation. This means that the fiscal deficit must be contained – meaning that governments must not spend far more than they earn. Current account balances must be managed, and foreign exchange, bank and corporate sector balances must be closely monitored.

My take on this issue is that central banks should be at the forefront of these developments, and this could also involve issuing their own central bank-issued tokenised money or digital currencies. This can co-exist alongside stablecoins rather than allowing privately issued, foreign-denominated stablecoins to become the dominant digital currency in circulation in a state.

So, while the dance at the stablecoin summit was commendable, I am concerned that only one dimension, looking at the benefits of stablecoins to facilitate payments and financial inclusion, is being put forward.

Policymakers must clearly articulate the implications of foreign-denominated stablecoins and prepare appropriate responses.

Iwa Salami does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Stablecoins are gaining ground as digital currency in Africa: how to avoid risks – https://theconversation.com/stablecoins-are-gaining-ground-as-digital-currency-in-africa-how-to-avoid-risks-271359

January 11, 2026

Ghanaian celebrities are dealing with mental illness stigma behind closed doors – why speaking up matters

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Lyzbeth King, PhD Student, School of Communication Studies, Ohio University

Imagine living in a country where talking openly about depression or anxiety can cost you your job, your reputation, or even your freedom. That is still the reality in Ghana, where mental illness is often explained in spiritual terms, and seeking help can mean being taken to a prayer camp instead of seeing a therapist. Even with global mental health awareness campaigns flooding social media and calendar days dedicated to ending stigma, many Ghanaians continue to struggle in silence.

We study communication and wanted to understand how Ghanaian celebrities, in particular, communicatively manage the stigma that is associated with their mental illness. Celebrities are often treated as near-superhuman figures; they are admired for their talent, resilience and public influence. But they suffer too.

For our research, we reached out to some celebrities who helped us reach out to others who were experiencing or had experienced a mental illness. Altogether, 20 celebrities were interviewed.

Most of them told us they hide their struggles and turn to private prayer rather than professional care. Fear of being labelled “weak”, judged as “spiritually afflicted” or losing work opportunities keeps them quiet. Instead of speaking out, they pray behind closed doors, hoping their symptoms will disappear before anyone notices.

Their status makes it even harder for them to speak openly about their mental illnesses. Their careers depend on credibility and the impression of strength. As a result, they cope privately, turning to prayer rather than professional help.

Celebrities influence public perceptions. Therefore, understanding how they manage mental illness stigma can offer valuable insights into broader societal attitudes and behaviours towards mental health communication.

Insights from our conversations

Our candid conversations with 20 Ghanaian celebrities in the entertainment and sports industries revealed the unique ways they manage stigma associated with mental illness. For example:

I would wake up at dawn and walk to a church and pray. I could stand outside for the dawn dew to fall on me just so that I could pray and ask God to use the dew to change the happenings in my life. (male, actor)

Some reported that prayer served not only as a way of managing stigma, but also as a source of healing from the mental illness itself. One said that “prayers and fasting” helped.

Others use a combination of acceptance and praying to cope. Acceptance is a stigma management strategy identified by health and stigma researcher Rebecca Meisenbach. It refers to acknowledging the existence of stigma around a certain condition and its application to the individual.

Acceptance as a stigma management strategy manifests through behaviours such as displaying symptoms associated with the mental illness and forming bonds with other individuals who are similarly stigmatised.

Our study participants said they managed stigma by connecting with others going through similar experiences:

When I was dealing with depression and all of that, the person I spoke to about it was my cousin. He was also depressed at the time. So it was like, we are sharing notes. You know, and we end up encouraging each other. (male, actor and comedian)

Another male actor and comedian shared:
“Among celebrities who go through mental health issues, we talk. We have discussions among ourselves. It will not be possible to go out and say it publicly but among ourselves, I can call a colleague and say, guy, I have been experiencing this breakdown.”

What needs to be done

Our research shows an important truth for Ghanaians. The people we admire most are also actively navigating mental health challenges behind closed doors. Their silence and ways of handling their mental struggles reflect the same fears many ordinary Ghanaians carry. If people in the spotlight are quietly battling mental illnesses, it shows that mental illness is far more common than some people are willing to admit.

This is why real mental illness conversations must begin now. To reduce mental illness stigma, it must be openly spoken about, and every shift starts somewhere: in our homes, religious spaces and workplaces. When people speak honestly about their struggles, and if others listen and respond with compassion, it creates a culture where seeking mental help is not seen as shameful.

Celebrity stories show that prayer plays a central role in how celebrities largely cope with mental illness. Prayer is meaningful, culturally rooted and, for many, spiritually essential. But prayer should not replace medical help. In short, prayer and seeking medical help should not be seen as mutually exclusive; rather, they should be seen as complementary.

Mental health professionals and religious leaders can help reframe mental illness healing as a process that can be accomplished through both medical care and spiritual prayers and not as a choice between them, especially in a religious culture like Ghana. Doing this can offer a more holistic pathway to recovery and a more accepting community for people who fear stigmatisation.

Healing does not have to be hidden, and help does not have to be feared. A new culture of openness can begin with each person who chooses to speak, listen and support. We hope that this shift starts now and that Ghana becomes a place where spiritual care and medical support work in tandem to make mental health care accessible and stigma-free.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Ghanaian celebrities are dealing with mental illness stigma behind closed doors – why speaking up matters – https://theconversation.com/ghanaian-celebrities-are-dealing-with-mental-illness-stigma-behind-closed-doors-why-speaking-up-matters-270710

January 11, 2026

Africa’s climate finance rules are growing, but they’re weakly enforced – new research

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Paola D’Orazio, Associate Professor, IÉSEG School of Management

Climate change is no longer just about melting ice or hotter summers. It is also a financial problem. Droughts, floods, storms and heatwaves damage crops, factories and infrastructure. At the same time, the global push to cut greenhouse gas emissions creates risks for countries that depend on oil, gas or coal.

These pressures can destabilise entire financial systems, especially in regions already facing economic fragility. Africa is a prime example.

Although the continent contributes less than 5% of global carbon emissions, it is among the most vulnerable. In Mozambique, repeated cyclones have destroyed homes, roads and farms, forcing banks and insurers to absorb heavy losses. Kenya has experienced severe droughts that hurt agriculture, reducing farmers’ ability to repay loans. In north Africa, heatwaves strain electricity grids and increase water scarcity.

These physical risks are compounded by “transition risks”, like declining revenues from fossil fuel exports or higher borrowing costs as investors worry about climate instability. Together, they make climate governance through financial policies both urgent and complex. Without these policies, financial systems risk being caught off guard by climate shocks and the transition away from fossil fuels.

This is where climate-related financial policies come in. They provide the tools for banks, insurers and regulators to manage risks, support investment in greener sectors and strengthen financial stability.

Regulators and banks across Africa have started to adopt climate-related financial policies. These range from rules that require banks to consider climate risks, to disclosure standards, green lending guidelines, and green bond frameworks. These tools are being tested in several countries. But their scope and enforcement vary widely across the continent.

My research compiles the first continent-wide database of climate-related financial policies in Africa and examines how differences in these policies – and in how binding they are – affect financial stability and the ability to mobilise private investment for green projects.

A new study I conducted reviewed more than two decades of policies (2000–2025) across African countries. It found stark differences.

South Africa has developed the most comprehensive framework, with policies across all categories. Kenya and Morocco are also active, particularly in disclosure and risk-management rules. In contrast, many countries in central and west Africa have introduced only a few voluntary measures.

Why does this matter? Voluntary rules can help raise awareness and encourage change, but on their own they often do not go far enough. Binding measures, on the other hand, tend to create stronger incentives and steadier progress. So far, however, most African climate-related financial policies remain voluntary. This leaves climate risk as something to consider rather than a firm requirement.

Uneven landscape

In Africa, the 2015 Paris Agreement marked a clear turning point. Around that time, policy activity increased noticeably, suggesting that international agreements and standards could help create momentum and visibility for climate action. The expansion of climate-related financial policies was also shaped by domestic priorities and by pressure from international investors and development partners.

But since the late 2010s, progress has slowed. Limited resources, overlapping institutional responsibilities and fragmented coordination have made it difficult to sustain the earlier pace of reform.

Looking across the continent, four broad patterns have emerged.

A few countries, such as South Africa, have developed comprehensive frameworks. These include:

disclosure rules (requirements for banks and companies to report how climate risks affect them)
stress tests (simulations of extreme climate or transition scenarios to see whether banks would remain resilient).

Others, including Kenya and Morocco, are steadily expanding their policy mix, even if institutional capacity is still developing.

Some, such as Nigeria and Egypt, are moderately active, with a focus on disclosure rules and green bonds. (Those are bonds whose proceeds are earmarked to finance environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, clean transport or climate-resilient infrastructure.)

Finally, many countries in central and west Africa have introduced only a limited number of measures, often voluntary in nature.

This uneven landscape has important consequences.

The net effect

In fossil fuel-dependent economies such as South Africa, Egypt and Algeria, the shift away from coal, oil and gas could generate significant transition risks. These include:

financial instability, for example when asset values in carbon-intensive sectors fall sharply or credit exposures deteriorate
stranded assets, where fossil fuel infrastructure and reserves lose their economic value before the end of their expected life because they can no longer be used or are no longer profitable under stricter climate policies.

Addressing these challenges may require policies that combine investment in new, low-carbon sectors with targeted support for affected workers, communities and households.

Climate finance affects people directly. When droughts lead to loan defaults, local banks are strained. Insurance companies facing repeated payouts after floods may raise premiums. Pension funds invested in fossil fuels risk devaluations as these assets lose value. Climate-related financial policies therefore matter not only for regulators and markets, but also for jobs, savings, and everyday livelihoods.

At the same time, there are opportunities.

Firstly, expanding access to green bonds and sustainability-linked loans can channel private finance into renewable energy, clean transport, or resilient infrastructure.

Secondly, stronger disclosure rules can improve transparency and investor confidence.

Thirdly, regional harmonisation through common reporting standards, for example, would reduce fragmentation. This would make it easier for Africa to attract global climate finance.

Looking ahead

International forums such as the UN climate conferences (COP) and the G20 have helped to push this agenda forward, mainly by setting expectations rather than hard rules. These initiatives create pressure and guidance. But they remain soft law. Turning them into binding, enforceable rules still depends on decisions taken by national regulators and governments.

International partners such as the African Development Bank and the African Union could support coordination by promoting continental standards that define what counts as a green investment. Donors and multilateral lenders may also provide technical expertise and financial support to countries with weaker systems, helping them move from voluntary guidelines toward more enforceable rules.

South Africa, already a regional leader, could share its experience with stress testing and green finance frameworks.

Africa also has the potential to position itself as a hub for renewable energy and sustainable finance. With vast solar and wind resources, expanding urban centres, and an increasingly digital financial sector, the continent could leapfrog towards a greener future if investment and regulation advance together.

Success stories in Kenya’s sustainable banking practices and Morocco’s renewable energy expansion show that progress is possible when financial systems adapt.

What happens next will matter greatly. By expanding and enforcing climate-related financial rules, Africa can reduce its vulnerability to climate shocks while unlocking opportunities in green finance and renewable energy.

Paola D’Orazio does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Africa’s climate finance rules are growing, but they’re weakly enforced – new research – https://theconversation.com/africas-climate-finance-rules-are-growing-but-theyre-weakly-enforced-new-research-270990

January 8, 2026

South Africa’s addressing system is still not in place: a clear vision is needed

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Sharthi Laldaparsad, PhD Student, University of Pretoria

Informal settlement in South Africa. By Matt-80 – Own work, CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

“Turn right after the first big tree; my house is the one with the yellow door.” In parts of South Africa, where settlements have grown without formal urban planning due to rapid urbanisation, that could well be a person’s “address”.

Having an address has many purposes. Not only does it allow you to find a place or person you want to visit, it’s compulsory in South Africa to provide an address when opening a bank account and registering as a voter in elections. Address locations are used to plan the delivery of services such as electricity or refuse removal and health services at clinics or education at schools. Police and health workers need addresses in emergencies.

Nowadays, address data is integrated and maintained in databases at municipalities, banks and utility providers, and used to analyse targeted interventions and developmental outcomes. Examples would be tracking the spread of communicable diseases, voter registration or service delivery trends.

South Africa has had national address standards since 2009 to make it easier to assign addresses that work in multiple systems, and to share the data. But the standards are not enforced, so the struggle with addressing persists. There is still no authoritative register of addresses in South Africa, and it’s not clear who is responsible for the governance of address data.

We work in geography and geoinformatics, an interdisciplinary field to do with collecting, managing and analysing geographical information. We recently turned to a neglected source to explore the issue of addresses: the people in government and business who actually use the information. We wanted to explore what they said about whose job it is to give everyone an address, how the data is maintained and what’s standing in the way of doing this.

Our research took a qualitative approach. We interviewed stakeholders to get their unique insights and daily experiences about what addresses are used for, how they are used, challenges that are experienced and how these are overcome. We spoke to 21 respondents across different levels of government with in-depth experience of projects, in both urban and rural settlements, as well as private companies that collect,
integrate and provide address data and related services.

Our main finding was that there’s no clear vision of future address systems, or leadership on the issue. Without agreement on whether there is a problem, or whose problem it is, a resolution isn’t possible.

Categories of addresses

First we collected all the different purposes of addresses and systematically categorised them. The main categories were:

finding an object (for example, for postal deliveries)
service delivery (such as electricity)
identity (for example, for citizenship)
common reference (for example, use in a voter register or in a pandemic).

The broad spectrum of address purposes suggests that addresses are essential to society, governance and the economy in a modern world.

So what’s standing in the way of better address coverage?

Need for governance: The interviews confirmed that stakeholders need clear rules, regulations, processes and structures to guide decisions, allocate resources and ensure accountability about addresses and address data. Most of the respondents considered addresses to be necessary for socio-economic development.

Leadership: These responses suggest that the societal problem of addressing is not (yet) clearly identified and defined. That makes it difficult to determine who should legitimately resolve the problem, for whom and how.

Interviewees raised concerns about leadership and vision at different levels of government affecting the country’s ability to solve the address issue. They agreed that the task had not been assigned to municipalities, which have many other pressing priorities and limited resources. The South African Post Office could play a role. But it has been placed in business rescue.

Adapting to gaps: In this constrained environment, stakeholders resort to short-term “fixes” that don’t have systemic impact. For example, some municipalities assign numbers to dwellings based on aerial photography, or barcodes on dwellings, or only locate the main assembly points in their jurisdiction, to fulfil their own responsibilities. So nothing changes: addresses and address data are incomplete and of poor quality.

Respondents also made suggestions.

Some questioned whether addresses were needed at all. They said there were other ways of finding a house or a business, such as navigating to a coordinate shared via Google Maps, or using verbal directions.

Some suggested that the uncertainty about responsibilities could be an opportunity for the private sector. It is already collecting address information from various sources like municipalities, then standardising, integrating and making available address data and related services, at a cost.

However, as is the case with many other services in the country, rural areas may be left behind where there is no economic incentive. Access to private data becomes unaffordable for government and society at large.

Ending the aimlessness

The deficiencies and adaptations in South Africa suggest that addressing is in a state of aimlessness.

How to fix the problem will require a number of interventions.

Firstly, there need to be decisions, actions and institutional commitments towards long-term strategies that will stop the drift. For example, cities and municipalities should strive for full coverage of addresses. They should also improve the quality and standardisation of the data, so that they are more useful.

Secondly, there’s a need for innovation and investment to transform and strengthen the governance of the country’s addressing infrastructure. For example, the European Commission recommends e-government based on a set of interlinked registers for property, addresses, people, business and vehicles.

Thirdly, data collection platforms and databases should be designed with the understanding that different types of addresses are in use – it could be a street name and number, or an informal description. Different types of addresses should have equal validity or credibility.

At a more technical level, address metadata (information about the data) should make it possible for different systems to use it.

Addresses connect us to society – locally to our community and globally to the rest of the world. Addresses are essential for socio-economic growth and good governance in cities and municipalities.

– ref. South Africa’s addressing system is still not in place: a clear vision is needed – https://theconversation.com/south-africas-addressing-system-is-still-not-in-place-a-clear-vision-is-needed-268135

January 8, 2026

Arrow tips found in South Africa are the oldest evidence of poison use in hunting

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Marlize Lombard, Professor with Research Focus in Stone Age Archaeology, Palaeo-Research Institute, University of Johannesburg

Boophone disticha. Ton Rulkens from Mozambique, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

The oldest evidence for the use of arrow poison globally was long thought to come from Egypt, dating to 4,000 years ago. It was a black, toxic residue on bone arrowheads from a tomb at the Naga ed Der archaeological site.

New evidence from southern Africa is challenging this.

New research has found poison on stone arrow tips from South Africa dating to 60,000 years ago. It is the oldest direct evidence for hunting with poisoned arrows.

This adds to what is already known about the know-how of ancient African bowhunters. These abilities may have contributed to our species’ long and flourishing evolution in the region, and ultimately the successful spread of Homo sapiens out of Africa.

Hunter-gatherers in southern Africa

The evidence comes from Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter, in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province. The site was partly excavated in the 1980s to preserve archaeological material that could be damaged during the construction of the N3 highway between the cities of Durban and Pietermaritzburg.

Umhlatuzana is recognised as an important Stone Age site where hunter-gatherers lived at least 70,000 years ago. It is one of only a few sites in southern Africa where people continued to live until just a few thousand years ago.

In southern Africa, people have a long history of hunting with poisoned arrows. For example, a team of South African and Swedish archaeologists found residues on arrow tips dating to between a few centuries and 1,000 years ago, that revealed how different arrow poison recipes were used.

Recently, three bone arrowheads stored in a poison-filled bone container were reported from Kruger Cave in South Africa dating to almost 7,000 years ago. This pushed back direct molecular evidence of arrow poison use to about 3,000 years before the Egyptian poisoned arrows.

Traces of poison have previously been found on a stick and in a lump of beeswax dating to between 35,000 and 25,000 years ago at Border Cave in KwaZulu-Natal. These were seen as indirect suggestions of early hunting poisons.

As a researcher in cognitive and Stone Age archaeology, I studied some of the artefacts from Umhlatuzana almost 20 years ago, finding use traces and adhesive residues on some of the quartz backed microliths (small, shaped stone tools) from 60,000 years ago. This showed that they were probably used as arrow tips.

Now, Sven Isaksson in the archaeology laboratory at Stockholm University has been able to identify molecular traces of toxic plant alkaloids (chemical substances), known to be an arrow poison, on a handful of these artefacts.

Poison from indigenous plants

This latest research revealed the presence of buphandrine and epibuphanisine toxic alkaloids on five out of ten analysed arrow tips from Umhlatuzana. The same alkaloids were also found on bone arrowheads collected by Swedish travellers in the region 250 years ago. This tells us that the same arrow poison was used for many millennia in southern Africa.

Both alkaloids can be found in several southern African species of Amaryllidaceae, a family of flowering plants growing from bulbs. But only what is colloquially known as gifbol (poison bulb, Boophone disticha) is well-recorded as the source of an arrow poison. The plant’s bulb contains a toxic juice (exudate).

Finding these specific alkaloids on five out of the ten quartz arrow tips studied cannot be coincidental. Ancient hunter-gatherers would have been familiar with the toxic properties of the gifbol exudates. For example, by about 77,000 years ago, people of the same region also understood the insecticidal and larvicidal properties of some aromatic leaves that were used for bedding. So they probably would not have kept the gifbol substance in their living space.

Substances with buphandrine and epibuphanisine molecules are not used commercially or in archaeological conservation, ruling out accidental modern contamination of the arrow tips.

Gifbol bulbs can survive for a century or more, despite drought cycles and fire regimes. The plant is indigenous to South Africa, thriving in grassland, savanna and Karoo vegetation. It is widespread throughout the southern, eastern and northern regions of South Africa, growing within a day’s walk from Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter today. For various reasons, it’s likely that it was also available to the inhabitants of the site thousands of years ago.

The toxic chemicals in the bulb last a long time. They don’t decompose easily, even in wet environments, and they interact well with mineral surfaces like stone arrow tips. That’s probably why they survived for 60,000 years at Umhlatuzana.

Implications of the world’s oldest known poisoned arrow tips

The quartz arrow tips with gifbol poison now represent the first direct evidence for hunting with poisoned arrows in southern Africa, and globally – at 60,000 years ago.

It demonstrates that these ancient bowhunters possessed a knowledge system enabling them to identify, extract and apply toxic plant exudates effectively. They must have also understood prey ecology and behaviour to know that the delayed effect of poison shot into an animal would weaken it after some time. That would make it easier to run down, a technique known as persistence hunting.

Such out-of-sight, long-distance action is a convincing indicator of complex cognition that requires response inhibition (being able to delay an action for a reason). Because poison is not a physical force, but functions chemically, the hunters must also have relied on advanced planning, abstraction and causal reasoning.

Thus, apart from providing the first direct evidence of hunting with poisoned arrows, the findings contribute to the understanding of human adaptation, techno-behavioural complexity and modern human behaviour in southern Africa.

Marlize Lombard works for the University of Johannesburg

– ref. Arrow tips found in South Africa are the oldest evidence of poison use in hunting – https://theconversation.com/arrow-tips-found-in-south-africa-are-the-oldest-evidence-of-poison-use-in-hunting-271444

January 7, 2026

Land reform in South Africa: how new landholders could prosper from wildlife and not just farming

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Hayley Clements, Senior Researcher, African Wildlife Economy Institute and Centre for Sustainability Transitions, Stellenbosch University

South Africa has a thriving wildlife economy – enterprises like trophy and meat hunting, ecotourism, live wildlife sales and game meat production.

Over the past few decades private (predominantly white) farmers have converted millions of hectares once reserved for livestock into game ranches. These enterprises generate profits and jobs while maintaining natural vegetation and conserving indigenous large mammals.

Government policy considers the sector key to integrating conservation with rural development. The national 2024 strategy is to grow “sustainable and inclusive eco-tourism-based businesses by 10%” every year.

It is also projected that the GDP contribution of game meat will increase from US$4.6 billion (2020) to US$27.6 billion by 2036. The overarching aim is to:

grow the wildlife economy to include more black landholders and communities
expand the amount of land that is conserved “from 20 million ha (hectares) to 34 million ha by 2040”.

In South Africa, land uses based on wildlife could address the twin land reform objectives of economic development and empowerment, while also conserving biodiversity.

Land reform is central to the country’s strategy to rectify historical inequities in land access. Beneficiaries of reform include black individuals, families and communities.

Yet little is known about how land reform beneficiaries – who often begin with fewer resources – might realistically participate in the wildlife economy.

We are conservation and wildlife economy researchers with a focus on South Africa’s inclusive conservation agenda. In a recent paper, we explored whether land reform beneficiaries were engaging in the wildlife economy, and what might hold them back or help them.

Knowing more about this would be useful for policymakers.

We found that new landholders were not yet participating meaningfully in the wildlife economy. With focused government help and investment they could benefit from the land through mixed livestock–wildlife enterprises that align with their experience and resources. In this way, South Africa could promote inclusive economic development while safeguarding its wildlife.

The study

Since 1994, the Department of Land Reform and Rural Development has pursued a constitutional mandate of land restitution, land tenure reform and land redistribution. The intention is to redress the historical injustices of apartheid and promote equitable access to land and livelihoods. Many redistributed farms fall within areas of high biodiversity value that are well-suited to wildlife-based enterprises.

In South Africa’s Eastern Cape province, for instance, herds of kudu and springbok are a common sight on hillsides. The land that they roam is no longer managed by white farmers only, but also by black farmers, enabled in part by the country’s land reform programme.

During our study in Addo-Amathole Biodiversity Economy Node we interviewed 19 land reform beneficiaries. It is one of the government’s focal areas in the Eastern Cape for promoting the wildlife economy. It also overlaps with one of the “mega living landscapes” in South African National Parks’ new Vision 2040. The farms in our study cover nearly 50,000ha. They represent two-thirds of the land reform beneficiaries in the province who aspire to be part of the wildlife economy.

To date, land reform programmes in rural South Africa have focused strongly on agriculture. In the Addo-Amathole region, this means livestock farming.

Interviews were conducted in English and isiXhosa and covered wildlife and livestock numbers, revenue streams, infrastructure, business planning, employment, skills and barriers to market access.

We set out to understand how the characteristics of land reform farms align with existing wildlife ranches, what types of infrastructure and investment they would need to grow, and where their strengths already lie. These 19 properties were compared with 74 established wildlife ranches in the region.

The findings

One of the most striking findings is that land reform farms in this region hold a lot of ecological value. Most of the land overlaps with critical biodiversity areas.

Yet only 42% of the farms earned any income from wildlife. On average it contributed less than 5% of total income. Almost all income still came from livestock, despite all of the beneficiaries’ business plans being focused on wildlife enterprises.

The greatest barrier was the lack of basic infrastructure needed to participate legally and commercially in wildlife markets.

Only six farms out of 19 had any perimeter game fencing. Water systems, vehicles and access to game meat processing facilities were very limited. Accommodation for visitors was scarce, with about two-thirds of farms lacking suitable facilities.

Another important finding was that almost all of the land reform beneficiaries’ business plans (submitted to government in their application for land) emphasised specialised trophy hunting or high-end ecotourism enterprises.

These enterprises require hundreds of millions of rands in infrastructure, charismatic wildlife such as rhinos and lions, skilled staff and access to specialised markets.

However, the size and current wildlife densities on land reform farms closely resemble mixed livestock–wildlife ranches. These focus on a mix of trophy and meat hunting, game meat sales and domestic tourism, alongside more traditional livestock farming.

Mixed ranches require far less initial investment and align more closely with the skills many emerging farmers already have. As seen in the COVID-19 pandemic, diversified wildlife ranches can also be more resilient.

What should happen

South Africa’s wildlife economy could become more inclusive if land reform farms were supported to adopt realistic business models in stages. It’s not realistic to copy the high-capital enterprises of some established ranches.

This starts with growing mixed livestock-wildlife enterprises that match existing knowledge and allow farmers to build experience and capital.

The first investment should not be animals, but infrastructure – notably perimeter fencing, water systems and modest visitor accommodation. Then wildlife numbers should be boosted, using existing programmes such as South African National Parks’ innovative game loan and donation programme.

Landscape partnerships like conservancies – where landowners cooperate to manage their land for environmental and economic sustainability – are an option.

National and regional government entities responsible for agriculture, land reform or the environment need to work together.

Joint initiatives could also allow for private investment via the government’s Biodiversity Sector Investment Platform. The platform aims to connect investors with investment opportunities in the sector.

Meanwhile, established ranchers and private operators can mentor emerging wildlife ranchers and help them access markets. Beneficiaries could build on their existing livestock experience while gradually expanding into wildlife activities that match their capacities and resources.

Inclusive wildlife economies could connect economic opportunity, land justice and biodiversity conservation in ways that advance South Africa’s transformation and development goals.

But this will only happen if support is grounded on evidence from research.

Naledi Mneno co-authored the research on which this article is based.

Hayley Clements receives funding from Agence Française de Développement, Oppenheimer Generations Research and Conservation, the Benjamin Raymond Oppenheimer Trust, Jamma Communities and Conservation, and Kone Foundation

Alta De Vos has received funding from gence Française de Développement, the National Research Foundation, Google, the National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, the Global Resilience Partnership, and the Australian Research Council.

Matthew Child and Siviwe Shwababa do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Land reform in South Africa: how new landholders could prosper from wildlife and not just farming – https://theconversation.com/land-reform-in-south-africa-how-new-landholders-could-prosper-from-wildlife-and-not-just-farming-270986

January 7, 2026

A Namib desert beetle runs to stay cool: how scientists solved the puzzle of this unique and speedy species

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Duncan Mitchell, Honorary Professorial Research Fellow, University of the Witwatersrand

The Namib desert of south-western Africa can be extremely hot – the surface temperature can be over 50°C. But a surprising number of around 200 beetle species live on its bare, inhospitable-looking sand dunes.

Scientists studying them were perplexed by the astonishing behaviour of one of the beetle species – a darkling beetle, Onymacris plana.

Like most desert darkling beetles, it is black – a colour that absorbs heat. And it has a flattened body, a big surface area exposed to heat. Scientists didn’t expect to find it active on the sand surface in the dangerous heat of the day. But it sprints in the sun, sometimes pausing in the shade of a desert shrub.

In fact, it’s the fastest of all the invertebrates of the Namib desert sands. This tiny beetle can run as fast as a human can walk.

When humans and other animals run, the fuel burning in our muscles produces heat. The faster we run, the more oxygen we use and the hotter we get.

But not so these beetles.

In an astonishing discovery, we established that the beetle in fact gets cooler when it exercises. This is the first land animal to have been found with this capability (and the first research of its type on a pedestrian animal).

Their cooling system enables them to move around to find their wind-blown food before it’s covered by sand. And they can be active when other animals (predators and competitors) are not. Finally, males can spend more time looking for mates. So we believe they are adapted to move in the sun because it’s good for survival.

The hunt

In the early 1980s, entomologist Sue Nicolson and her co-workers from various universities and research institutes went out on the dunes in the hot sun to measure the temperature of the beetles. They used a thermometer in a fine hypodermic needle to measure each beetle’s temperature without harming it. The needle went into the beetle’s thorax, from underneath. They looked for beetles that had just finished a sprint and others that had rested for the same time in the shade of a shrub. The beetles that had finished a sprint were no hotter than those that stayed in the shade.

In the 1980s, comparative physiologist George Bartholomew and his co-workers from various universities measured how much oxygen the beetles used while running on a treadmill. Running fast took hardly any more oxygen than running slowly. So, running faster would not make the beetles much hotter.

So, we knew how hot the beetles were after a sprint (not very hot), and how much oxygen they used while running (not much). But what no-one had done was to measure the temperature of the beetles while they were running.

We’re a team of scientists who work on how animals’ bodies cope with heat. Much of our desert research is done in the Namib Desert. We wanted to know how the beetles achieved something that looked impossible physiologically: run in the Namib sun.

We attached a fine thermocouple thermometer fed through the end of a fishing pole.

One of our team followed the beetle while it was running in the sun, keeping the weight and drag of the thermometer off it. But the beetles did not get hotter when they ran – they got cooler.

Run like the wind

We calculated what should have happened to the temperature of the beetle. Because it was black, we could estimate how much of the sun’s radiation it would have absorbed. The Namib’s sun is so intense that the radiation falling on a tabletop would boil a kettle.

We measured how far the beetles had run and in what time, so we knew their speed. We could calculate how much heat they were generating in their muscles. Adding the sun’s heating to the heat coming from the muscles, we calculated that, in the hottest Namib sun, the beetles’ temperature should have risen by 5°C per minute. That should have killed them.

The Namib desert’s sand can be burningly hot but its air, blowing in off the Atlantic Ocean, is cool. Running generates a wind over the body. We concluded that the heat from the sun and from the muscles must be carried away by that cool wind.

The males have an especially flattened body shaped like the wing of an aircraft so that they almost float, clear of the hot sand.

We needed to confirm that what we had observed on the sand dune did not conflict with what engineers know about heat transfer (moving thermal heat from one object to another). So, we took beetles into the laboratory. We put them under a lamp which heated them as much as the sun would have done.

Then we blew cool air over them from the front at the speed at which they would have run. So, we mimicked the cool wind they would have felt when they were running on the dune. Switching on the fan dropped the temperature of the beetles by as much as 13°C.

Our laboratory experiments confirmed that the wind generated by running could carry away all the heat that the beetles absorbed from the desert sun. But to survive on the dunes, they had to run. Standing still in the sun in windless conditions would have meant death by overheating.

So evolution has delivered an animal that is cooled by running. This is unique for a pedestrian animal so far, though we think that some desert ants may also be able to do it. Many aquatic animals do cool by swimming and some insects cool by flying.

Carole S. Roberts, Mary Seely, Liz McClain and Victoria Goodall of the Gobabeb Namib Research Institute, Walvis Bay, Namibia, contributed to this research and article.

Duncan Mitchell has received funding from South African National Research Foundation, South African Medical Research Council, Oppenheimer Memorial Trust, Australian Research Council.

– ref. A Namib desert beetle runs to stay cool: how scientists solved the puzzle of this unique and speedy species – https://theconversation.com/a-namib-desert-beetle-runs-to-stay-cool-how-scientists-solved-the-puzzle-of-this-unique-and-speedy-species-269433

January 7, 2026

Measures of academic value overlook African scholars who make a local impact – study

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Eutychus Ngotho Gichuru, PhD Candidate in Educational Management, Makerere University

Academics today, around the world, are confined by the way their research output is measured. Indicators that count the number of times their work is cited by other academics, and the relative prestige of journals that publish their papers, determine everything: from career development to research funding.

What does this international system mean for African scholars like ourselves? Our work has found that metrics for measuring excellence are instead acting as a disadvantage for academics who seek to generate knowledge relevant for their communities.

The higher the traditional indicators like citation counts and impact factors are for African scholars, the lower their score for local relevance and community impact. The globally accepted metrics punish what matters most, while blocking African scholars’ career progress.

Our findings show that there’s a need for a philosophical and practical alternative to the existing system. Ngotho’s work towards a PhD in educational management offers one: an assessment framework built on the African ethical principle of ubuntu – “a person is a person through others”. The PhD work suggests a practical, quantifiable assessment tool to create an ubuntu score for academic output.

Taking an academic’s measure

The doctoral study first looked at the evaluation mechanisms being used across all African Research Universities Alliance member universities.

It found that the indicators used as the basis for academic assessment across the globe appear objective in design, but they are not. They foster a deep bias against African scholarship.

The h-index measures both publication productivity and citation impact. This inherently disadvantages collaborative scholarship, particularly community-based work, which is essential for social transformation. Our research indicates that 73% of faculty who are engaged in participatory research have h-indices that fail to reflect their true impact. The index has other flaws: it can be artificially inflated through self-citations, and its value changes depending on which database calculates it.
Journal impact factors favour journals from the global north. Western Europe and North America dominate academic publishing, contributing 74% of indexed public health journals. Africa represents just 2%. This forces scholars to bypass excellent regional journals that their peers and policymakers actually read. In effect, it silences locally important conversations.
Citation counts reinforce negative tendencies against African scholarship in fields like public health and agricultural development. The constant pressure for high publication counts values quantity over quality. According to the PhD research, 61% of African faculty report excessive pressure to publish, leaving insufficient time for the deep contextual analysis that our communities need.
Even altmetrics, designed to track broader societal impact, are calibrated for global north social media ecosystems. They typically ignore how knowledge is transmitted in African contexts, for example through community radio programmes, speaking and local workshops. This means promotion committees, focused on social media mentions and blog citations, overlook how African academics actually engage with their communities.

Many African scholars suffer from geographical bias before their work is even read. As the study contends, abstracts have even been rejected if reviewers have low regard for the authors’ institution or country of origin.

Ubuntu: an African alternative

The PhD thesis research provides a philosophical and practical alternative to this dysfunctional system. It’s an assessment framework founded on the African ethical principle of ubuntu, “I am because we are”, which means that any individual’s identity is fundamentally connected to collective wellbeing.

An “ubuntu score” allows for traditional measurement, complemented or surpassed by a collaborative impact quotient. It measures co-creation of knowledge with communities, interdisciplinary teamwork, custodian partnerships, and similar cooperative efforts in forming indigenous knowledge. Ubuntu metrics invert assessment from individual prestige to collective wellbeing, placing value on:

analytics addressing African developmental challenges
scholarship published in African languages
research disseminated in regionally relevant venues like the African press.

From theory to practice: early successes

Preliminary trials carried out in Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia and the University of Nairobi in Kenya revealed that 68% of faculty disadvantaged by the traditional journal impact factor rated highly on the ubuntu-based evaluation, which measured their contribution to society.

Pilot stakeholder panels were conducted at the University of Pretoria (South Africa) and echoed this finding. High-impact scholars who were overlooked by promotion committees wedded to citation counts were identified by community residents. Their excellence, embedded and serving their communities, was erased by conventional metrics.

This is in line with the growing realisation that African universities must shift from being research institutions to innovation engines.

The issue is far bigger than just creating new measures; it involves an entire transformation of academia’s culture.

Ranking systems should come from the African universities themselves. Encouraging citations of relevant articles from one’s region could build up the presence and influence of African publications.

Beyond alternative metrics, a total recomposition of academic values is what ubuntu-style assessment buys into. It does not ask “How visible is this scholar to the world?” but “How has this scholar’s work strengthened their community?” It measures not citations in far-away journals but solutions in local contexts.

– ref. Measures of academic value overlook African scholars who make a local impact – study – https://theconversation.com/measures-of-academic-value-overlook-african-scholars-who-make-a-local-impact-study-269201

January 6, 2026

Nigeria has a high poverty rate – what this has to do with ethnic conflicts

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Tolu Olarewaju, Economist and Lecturer in Management, Keele University; University of Lancashire

Nigeria has endured decades of violent insurgencies and ranks 6th on the 2025 Global Terrorism Index. Numerous people have been killed and millions displaced. The number of casualties from terrorist attacks in 2025 can be seen in both the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data and the Council on Foreign Relations’ Nigeria Security Tracker. Most of the casualties are in places with high poverty levels, as the Nigerian Poverty Map shows.

Tolu Olarewaju, who has researched ethnic poverty, unpacks why regions of violence and poverty overlap in Nigeria.

What is the state of poverty in Nigeria?

Poverty in Nigeria comes in various forms: a lack of income and productive resources to sustain livelihoods; hunger and malnutrition; illness and death; and limited access to education and other basic services. It includes inadequate housing and unsafe environments. It is also seen in a lack of participation in decision-making and civil, social and cultural life.

Nigeria currently has a population of 237 million people and over 133 million Nigerians are living in this kind of poverty. It is higher in rural areas, where 72% of people are poor, compared to 42% of people in urban areas. The current poverty in Nigeria is the result of two key factors:

history – particularly the slave trade and British colonial rule, which put the economic gain of the British Empire ahead of the development of the local population
corruption and poor governance practices.

My work shows that when initiatives are introduced to reduce poverty in Nigeria, they are often hijacked by corrupt individuals.

There have been numerous government efforts to combat poverty in Nigeria. The current administration launched the “Renewed Hope Conditional Cash Transfer” programme in October 2023 to cushion the effects of its fuel subsidy removal, which had raised the cost of living and caused inflation. The programme hasn’t made much impact on the level of poverty in the country.

The failures of successive Nigerian governments to reduce poverty stem from multiple factors. They include corruption, poor targeting of programmes, limited funding, weak legislative oversight, political interference, and the absence of a flexible, people-centred approach.

Meanwhile, poverty is the common thread across the places experiencing terrorism in Nigeria. Poor people are more likely to be recruited into terrorist groups, and their targets are likely to be poor people like themselves.

What is ethnic poverty?

Ethnic poverty occurs when there is systemic poverty for an ethnic group. An ethnic group is a social group that shares a common and distinctive history, culture, religion, language, or the like.

My work on ethnic poverty also shows that it can lead to conflicts that are easily labelled as ethnic, religious or tribal.

Ethnic poverty disparities, uneven development and radical ideologies will make any country susceptible to violent insurgencies. This has occurred, for example, in Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Ethiopia.

Ethnic poverty can increase hatred and violence, but economic growth could create a “win-win solution” if wealth can be shared equitably.

Nigeria is a multinational state where more than 250 ethnic groups live, speaking over 500 distinct languages. The three largest ethnic groups are the Hausa in the north, the Yoruba in the west, and the Igbo in the east. The country is prone to violent insurgencies where armed groups who suffer from ethnic poverty try to overthrow the government.

How does ethnic poverty play out in Nigeria?

Poverty in Nigeria is intertwined with ethnicity. Inequalities in wealth and education persist between ethnic groups and regions. For example, 65% of the poor and less educated live in the north, where the Hausa and Fulani ethnic groups are predominant. Poverty levels across states also vary. The incidence of multidimensional poverty ranges from a low of 27% in Ondo (in the south) to a high of 91% in Sokoto (in the north).

What are the solutions to ethnic poverty?

There is no single solution, but several that will mature over time. The Nigerian government should:

Hold transparent discussions and elections to decide if a regional system of government that focuses on local problems will be better than the current centrally planned government.
Devise a strategy that combats corruption and focuses on ethnic groups with higher poverty rates.
Expand education and vocational training to promote peace and tolerance, and employable skills linked to local markets.
Deliver entrepreneurship training and financial literacy programmes to foster self-reliance and community-based economic growth.
Offer incentives for responsible industrial development and local enterprise investment in areas of high ethnic poverty.
Implement policies that promote balanced urban–rural economic growth and integrate ethnic populations economically into the national story.
Invest in transport, digital and communication infrastructure in remote areas to improve access to education, security and markets.
Promote inclusive national narratives that celebrate ethnic diversity.

Together, these measures can create a more equitable social contract that gives every ethnic group a stake in national progress. By being transparent and accountable, the government can rebuild trust.

Sustained investment in people, infrastructure and local economies will help break the cycle of inter-generational ethnic poverty. Over time, these efforts can strengthen unity and share prosperity across Nigeria.

Tolu Olarewaju does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Nigeria has a high poverty rate – what this has to do with ethnic conflicts – https://theconversation.com/nigeria-has-a-high-poverty-rate-what-this-has-to-do-with-ethnic-conflicts-270649

January 5, 2026

Johannesburg has failed its informal traders: policies are in place, but action is needed

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Mamokete Modiba, Senior Researcher, Gauteng City-Region Observatory

Johannesburg’s inner city is a bustling hub of economic life – a dense, dynamic web of informal traders, adjacent businesses and other users. Informal trading remains an essential survival strategy for many households. It is also a key source of affordable goods and services.

Managing this activity, however, is not straightforward. The city authorities face legitimate pressures to maintain order, safety, hygiene and accessibility in highly contested urban spaces. At the same time, they have a mandate to support livelihoods and encourage inclusive economic participation.

Balancing these objectives is complex. But, as urban planners and researchers, we believe it’s possible and necessary. It needs to be done in a way that recognises the realities of both municipal constraints. These include budgets, conflicting political pressures and traders’ contributions. Traders generate local economic activity and provide convenient, affordable goods and services.

Johannesburg’s informal trading sector should not be viewed as a problem to eliminate. Rather, it should be managed effectively. The focus for the city should be on improving how this is done.

The city has a chequered history of managing informal traders. In October 2025, Johannesburg authorities removed informal traders from De Villiers Street in the heart of the city’s central business district. The city went on to expand the operation to other inner-city areas and townships to promote “order” and “cleanliness”.

This approach was reminiscent of the 2013 Operation Clean Sweep, which disrupted livelihoods and increased urban inequality and violence. After the events in 2025, the Gauteng High Court ruled in favour of traders who took the city to court. But the court’s ruling has not been implemented.

The city’s 2022 informal trading policy provides a roadmap for a different approach. It provides a structured framework that includes:

recognising informal traders as essential contributors to the urban economy
setting out clear procedures for registration, spatial planning, permit processes and trader support.

Its strength lies in offering a coherent, rights-based approach that can bring transparency and fairness to how trading spaces are allocated and managed. But its success hinges on implementation that is transparent, inclusive and responsive.

A durable solution

In our view, Johannesburg can turn contested spaces into engines of shared prosperity by:

investing in adequate infrastructure
promoting collaboration among traders, property owners, municipal authorities and other affected stakeholders
enforcing regulations that protect livelihoods instead of punishing them.

A durable solution requires systematic reforms grounded in provisions of the city’s 2022 informal trading policy. This emphasises co-management by various stakeholders. Among them are officials from various relevant departments, municipal-owned entities and the informal traders.

But laws and regulations have to be updated.

By-laws passed in 2012 are still being used to regulate the sector. This is even though a new policy was adopted in 2022.

Updated by-laws would enable the city to reflect the policy’s developmental orientation. This includes its focus on supporting livelihoods and expanding access to jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities. It also includes creating a conducive regulatory and management environment for informal traders.

The policy adopted in 2022 contains several important provisions that support more effective management of informal trading. Key elements include:

1) Informal trading plans.

A comprehensive, independently conducted census of all traders – registered and unregistered – will form the evidence base for this plan. This will enable the city to understand the full scale and distribution of informal trading.

The city must make enough suitable trading sites available. This expanded access would help accommodate more traders legally and reduce pressure on overcrowded locations. Throughout the process, the city must balance the need to demarcate trading sites with:

the principle of minimal relocation to protect livelihoods
ensuring that pavements, transport routes and other public amenities remain accessible to all.

2) Appropriate infrastructure and services.

Ensuring that informal traders have adequate services supports their livelihoods and also contributes to cleaner, safer, and more attractive streets for all users. All informal trading environments in the inner city would benefit from access to better infrastructure. This includes water, electricity, street lighting, storage, improved sidewalks, trading shelters and ablution facilities.

3) Clear articulation of traders’ rights and responsibilities.

The greatest responsibility rests with the city to transform informal trading management. But the policy also makes clear that informal traders themselves have important responsibilities to ensure the system works effectively.

Once allocated trading sites, traders are expected to:

operate only within designated areas
avoid restricted or prohibited spaces
help to maintain order
conduct their business in line with applicable regulations, policies and by-laws
play an active role in maintaining the cleanliness and upkeep of their trading spaces
work collaboratively with the City, neighbouring businesses and other local stakeholders.

The plan also envisages the establishment of an independent informal trade forum, an informal trading task team and a dedicated informal trade unit. Urgent action is needed to constitute these structures.

Next steps

The City has an opportunity to shift from reactive, enforcement-driven approaches to a proactive, developmental model that values informal trading as a central part of Johannesburg’s economy and identity.

There are key next steps that need to be taken.

Firstly, fully operationalising the commitments of the 2022 policy by updating by-laws.

Secondly, by completing a transparent and comprehensive census of all traders. This needs to include involving them meaningfully in decisions about management processes.

Alongside this, the city should prioritise investment in adequate infrastructure and strengthen communication and collaboration platforms. It also needs to establish the dedicated structures envisioned in the policy.

Together, these actions can build an enabling system that protects livelihoods, reduces conflict, and supports a vibrant, inclusive and economically resilient inner city.

Mamokete Modiba previously received funding from the National Research Foundation and Tiso Foundation.

Sarah Charlton previously received funding from the National Research Foundation and various UK & European research grant funders. .

Claire Benit-Gbaffou and Tanya Zack do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Johannesburg has failed its informal traders: policies are in place, but action is needed – https://theconversation.com/johannesburg-has-failed-its-informal-traders-policies-are-in-place-but-action-is-needed-270911