Abstract
This research is intended to provide an outlook on soil conservation discourse in South Africa. The 1950s was an era where a considerable number of conservationists expressed growing concern about the erosion of soil, especially in black reserves. With the South African Nationalist government’s previous attempts in the 1920s and 1930s to implement laws that would help combat soil erosion, the 1950s represented a time when a growing number of initiatives in the form of environmental groups, tried to combat soil erosion on a practical level. Out of the government’s initiative to implement laws, various conservation groups were formed and attempted to address the issue of soil conservation in various parts of South Africa. The National Veld Trust, a white-dominated conservation organization, paved the way for a black soil conservation organization called the African National Soil Conservation Association (ANSCA). ANSCA envisioned itself as an independent black organization that would penetrate black communities in anticipation to educate them about soil conservation. This was done to eradicate soil erosion in those areas. Popular scholarly work on ANSCA highlights the central role Africans played in consolidating agricultural farming and conservation management to fight soil erosion. The study looks at the extent to which ANCSA tried to achieve this by also expanding on Farieda Khan’s work on the organization. The ultimate goal of the research is to show that a type of black conservation consciousness resulted from the creation of ANSCA. Although in the end the organization failed to sustain itself because of segregation in South Africa, the story of ANSCA provides an important, hitherto unacknowledged, perspective to the ways in which conservation is discoursed in contemporary South Africa.
M.A. (Historical Studies)