Titus
Dlamini
Mr Titus Dlamini was born on 19 September 1968 in Mbabane, Swaziland. He grew up in Msunduza Township and attended the South African General Mission Primary School, also known as Ka-Boyce. He went on to Mankayane High School and obtained his O Level Certificate in 1986. He was admitted to the University of Swaziland for a Science Pre-entry Course in April 1987; he enrolled for a B.Sc. degree in August 1987, which he completed in May 1992.
Titus majored in Biology and Chemistry and it was during his varsity days that his passion for environmental work began to show. He worked as a government intern—in 1989 and 1991 doing the work of Laboratory Assistant with Water Resources and the then Water and Sewage Board. This entailed collecting water samples in major rivers throughout Swaziland (1989) and in major municipal supplies (1991), and analysing their water quality. In his final year, he did two research projects entitled, “Water and nitrogen requirements for Sesbania punicea (Cav.) Benth. at early stages of growth” and “An analysis of phosphate levels in the Usushwana River along the Matsapha industrial centre”.
Titus was employed by the Teaching Service Commission in June 1992, and taught Biology and Integrated Science at the Mater Dolorosa High School in Mbabane until December 1993. In January 1994 he joined the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives and took the position of Assistant Herbarium Curator in the Swaziland National Herbarium, a position he still holds. The work at the National Herbarium has offered Titus valuable training opportunities through the many short courses and workshops he has attended in southern Africa and abroad. In 1994, he acquired a certificate in Plant Genetic Resources Management from the Nordic Gene Bank in Malmö, Sweden, and an International Diploma in Herbarium Techniques from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, UK, in 1995. He has attended the SABONET training courses on pteridophyte and grass identification, as well as a Red Data List workshop.
In 1996, he enrolled for his B.Sc. Honours degree at the University of Cape Town and did two research projects entitled, “Absence of fertile island effect in the succulent Karoo of northwestern Namaqualand” and “Pollen morphology and the taxonomy of Clutia L. (Euphorbiaceae)”. He enrolled for an M.Sc. degree at the same institution in 1997 and worked on Melianthus L. (Melianthaceae), focussing on the ecology, taxonomy, and phylogeny of the genus. Titus feels the time he spent in Cape Town doing his postgraduate work at UCT has equipped him with sound theoretical and practical approaches to solving environmental problems, and also improved his communication skills. He feels that organisations such as the South African Association of Botanists (SAAB) and Southern African Taxonomist’s Society offer the appropriate forum for scientists in southern Africa to interact.
Today, Titus is back in Swaziland and is currently involved in many environmental initiatives and national action plans. He is fully involved in Swaziland’s Forest Policy and Legislation Review project, which started in December 1998 under the sponsorship of Danish Co-operation for Environment and Development (DANCED). He was part of the team that has just finished revising the Flora Protection Act of 1952; the revised act is now ready to be tabled as a bill in Parliament for debate. He is also involved in the Environmental Impact Assessment of the Komati Downstream Development Project in the northeastern part of Swaziland.
Titus is the Swaziland Government’s representative to the Subsidiary Body on Scientific Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA), which makes recommendations to the Conference of Parties (CoP) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). He sits on the Biodiversity Programme Implementation Steering Committee, and is Swaziland’s representative on the SABONET Steering Committee. He is also the chairman of the SABONET-Swaziland National Working Group. Titus also coordinated the Red Data List compilation process in the country.
Titus’s close association with SABONET goes back to 1997 when he first attended a SABONET course on the identification of ferns and their allies, held in Zomba, Malawi. Since then, he has been attending all the SABONET Steering Committee meetings on behalf of Swaziland, and has made many contacts within the SABONET family. He appreciates the networking opportunities the Project offers.
Titus embraced the Christian faith at a tender age and in his free time attends church, enjoys watching soccer and reading. He likes History and Geography, which are subjects he has informally pursued after his high school days. He is concerned about the threat of alien invasive species in Swaziland and the acute shortage of professionals in the field of botany in the country. He hopes that in the near future there will be an updated version of Compton’s Flora of Swaziland, and believes he is morally and academically bound to be part of the updating process.
