Saasveld Forestry College
Encyclopedia
Garden Route
The Garden Route is a popular stretch of the south-eastern coast of South Africa. It stretches from Heidelberg in the Western Cape to the Storms River which is crossed along the N2 coastal highway over the Paul Sauer Bridge in the extreme western reach of the neighbouring Eastern Cape...
in South Africa between George
and Knysna
Knysna
Knysna is a town with 76,431 inhabitants in the Western Cape Province of South Africa and is part of the Garden Route. It lies 34 degrees south of the equator, and is 72 kilometres east from the town of George on the N2 highway, and 25 kilometres west of Plettenberg Bay on the same road.-History:A...
. Before moving to its present location in 1932, it was located at Tokai in Cape Town.
Built on a rise between the Outeniqua Mountains and the Indian Ocean, the college commands sweeping views of fynbos-covered mountains and indigenous high forest. Between 1932 and 1985, it trained about 1300 foresters who were subsequently employed by the State and private companies such as Mondi and Sappi
Sappi
Sappi Limited is a global pulp and paper company group.Sappi is a producer of coated fine paper and chemical cellulose. The company conducts its business through three business units: Sappi Fine Paper, Sappi Forest Products and Sappi Trading....
.
History
Cape Colony
The Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
led to an increased demand for structural and furniture timber. This led to an
unhealthy strain on the indigenous forests of the Southern Cape, which had been exploited since the days of Jan van Riebeeck
Jan van Riebeeck
Johan Anthoniszoon "Jan" van Riebeeck was a Dutch colonial administrator and founder of Cape Town.-Biography:...
.
Farsighted planning obviously called for the establishment of plantations of fast-growing exotic trees and the necessary trained foresters to manage them. To meet this need, SACS
SACS
SACS may refer to:* St Andrew's Cathedral School, an Anglican school in Sydney, Australia* The South African College Schools, a school in Cape Town, South Africa...
started a course for forest rangers in 1902, but was superseded by the Tokai School for Forest Apprentices in 1912. At that stage forestry fell under the Department of Agriculture and was more conservation-oriented than concerned with afforestation; consequently the output of foresters was very small at that time. With the rapid growth of the timber industry, it was decided to relocate Saasveld to its present position on the farm Pampoenkraal, due to its proximity to indigenous forest, open areas suitable for plantations of exotics, sawmills in the vicinity and drying kilns in George. Many explorers, naturalists and botanists such as Thunberg, Sparrman, Le Vaillant
François Le Vaillant
François Levaillant or Le Vaillant was a French author, explorer, naturalist, zoological collector, and noted ornithologist.-Biography:...
, Drège
Johann Franz Drège
Johann Franz Drège or or , commonly referred to by his standard botanical author abbreviation Drège, was a German horticulturalist, botanical collector and explorer of Huguenot descent.Drège received his first training in horticulture at...
, Ecklon
Christian Friedrich Ecklon
Christian Friedrich Ecklon was a Danish botanical collector and apothecary.Ecklon collected extensively in South Africa. His first visit was in 1823, as first an apothecary's apprentice and then pharmacist, looking for plants with medicinal value...
and Zeyher
Karl Ludwig Philipp Zeyher
Karl Ludwig Philipp Zeyher , was a botanical and insect collector who collected extensively in South Africa...
had visited the farm in the preceding two centuries. In 1854 the farm was subdivided and the portion on which the college would eventually be built, was bought by the baroness Gesina van Rede van Oudtshoorn, and named Saasveld after her ancestral castle in Overyssel in Holland. In 1867 Thomas Bain
Thomas Bain
Thomas Bain was a Canadian parliamentarian.Bain was born in Scotland, the son of Walter Bain, and migrated to Canada with his family when he was three years old. They settled on a bush farm in Wentworth County near Hamilton, Ontario.He was elected to the County Council in the 1860s and became...
, the famous road-maker, had surveyed the main road heading east to Knysna
Knysna
Knysna is a town with 76,431 inhabitants in the Western Cape Province of South Africa and is part of the Garden Route. It lies 34 degrees south of the equator, and is 72 kilometres east from the town of George on the N2 highway, and 25 kilometres west of Plettenberg Bay on the same road.-History:A...
and passing through Pampoenkraal. In those days a toll gate was sited near the present entrance to Saasveld. In 1917 Saasveld was bought by the George Forest Timber Co., and later acquired by Searles Limited. In 1928 ownership of the land finally passed to the State and work started on construction of the College.
Recent history
Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU), situated in Nelson Mandela Bay, opened on 1 January 2005, the result of a merger of the PE Technikon, the University of Port Elizabeth and the Port Elizabeth campus of Vista University. Saasveld is now a satellite campus of NMMU.