Message from the Editor:

We are living in strange, unsettling times. For the last few years, there has been nothing but bad news. As a colleague of mine exclaimed last week: "Are we never going to get a break?"

If it is not the pandemic, the lockdown, the alcohol ban, the looting and destruction, the corruption, business closures, environmental collapse, governmental mismanagement, rising unemployment, loadshedding, implosion of police and army, scapegoating, disruption to education, the drought, general lawlessness and crime. Not to mention, on a global level, climate change. Just when we think it cannot get worse, it gets worse. On top of everything else we are now facing price increases and food shortages. A poll conducted by the Brenthurst Foundation confirms that the national mood is one of despair.

Our country is now divided between the people who can afford to emigrate and those who cannot - and of course those in the political class who are feeding off the mayhem.

However, knowing that we are about as low as we can go is strangely liberating. The apocalypse has arrived. Now we need to decide how we will meet it. Our national character is one of resilience, although - as this columnist declared - sometimes it would be nice not always to have to be resilient.

One can go into detail about how bad things are, and how they are going to get even more hopeless, but that is stating the obvious. Instead, we can grasp the few small highlights, most notably on the sporting front. And the fact that we are now so resilient as a nation that we are teflon-coated.

So the Safrea Chronicle is being re-designed to become a professional development portal for freelance media professionals, in order to give some hope to the hard-hit freelance community. In the next few weeks we will re-design our website and social media to reflect our new purpose. Our new Chronicle will offer better value to both Safreans and their clients.

We can also look forward to a whole new crop of contributors, with even more of the interesting, diverse and thought-provoking items you can come to expect. Enjoy.

Feature:

New solutions to curb dire plastics pollution

Author: Blake Wilkins

Breakthrough for recycling of ALL waste plastic

New solutions to curb dire plastics pollution

Feature:

Caring for marine life and people

Author: Andrea Abbott

Biodiversity conservation is often considered only in regard to terrestrial areas of our planet. But ocean ecosystems also urgently need protection. This is the goal of Marine Protected Areas.

What is Your Story?

A powerful story of a mother's courage- 1934

Author: Bronwyn Marcus

Betty had to find within herself a mother's courage. Answering God’s call, Betty went to China in 1931, then John went a year later but to a different region. They went as a part of the CIM (China Inland Missionaries). Then in 1933, they were married. They had a daughter Helen and settled as a family in Tsingteh. It was …

Feature:

You probably don’t have to create a value proposition

Author: Delilah Nosworthy

By Michael Wood (edited by Delilah Nosworthy)
Do you believe that it is necessary to create a value proposition? If so, what are the five questions of a useful value proposition?

Feature:

Three top emigration destinations for Saffers

Author: Denise Mhlanga

Although emigration figures are currently low, wealthy South Africans have their eyes set on three destinations – Australia, the UK and Portugal, say experts.