Roadworks Blitz To Address Rain Damage In The City

25 APRIL

Mbabane – The Municipal Council of Mbabane has embarked on a massive exercise to address the damage that has been caused by the ongoing rains and roadwork blitz which will involve pothole patching, graveling and vegetation control. Most of the streets that will be attended to by the City Council are mostly in the central business district and those that are found near busy places like schools, hospitals, clinics and shopping complexes.

The schedule will also include drain cleaning which is being done to make sure that the road network in the city quickly drains rain water from the surface to reduce damage on the surface. Also, Council continues to control vegetation in all the streets to make walkways safe for pedestrians. A total of 23 streets will be attended by the council.

CLEARING INVASIVE ALIEN PLANTS

By far the most powerful tool for dealing with invasive alien plants revolves around educational and awareness initiatives. However, being able to identify invasive alien vegetation is not enough. We must move to clearing community parks and gardens of invasive plants, clearing our vacant plots as well as riverine areas; and there are a number of ways to do this;

1. Mechanical or physical control methods involve the direct removal of species by hand or with appropriate tools, instruments and machines.
2. Chemical control involves using herbicides to control target species.
3. Biological control involves the intentional use of populations of natural enemies that target invasive alien plant species or other methods that negatively affect the population of the target species.
4. Habitat management involves measures such as burning and grazing.
5. Integrated pest management (IPM) involves a combination of the methods above based on ecological research, regular monitoring and careful co-ordination.

MECHANICAL OR PHYSICAL CONTROL

Force is used to control the target invasive plants, e.g. uprooting (including hand pulling), slashing, mowing or felling, ring- barking, (removing every trace of bark and cambium in a 30cm wide band around the stem at a height of about 50cm) or strip barking (stripping of all the bark from about waist height to below the surface of the soil.)

A highly effective tool is the tree popper which pulls the tree out by the roots, without much effort. This is particularly effective when removing acacia mearnsii.

Advantages include:

• Little training and supervision needed.
• Simple tools required and only target species treated.

Disadvantages include:

• Physically Demanding
• Slow and costly for large areas or dense infestations where it is seldom completely successful and requires repeated follow up operations