Obituary
Dr Clive Levy: 16 October 1957 – 11 August 2013
Clive passed away suddenly on Sunday morning from an apparent fatal heart attack, following a very short illness.
This has come as a huge shock to us all at your Union as he was a highly respected, hard working and dedicated member of our team.
He remained a bachelor as he never married and is survived only by his 3 nephews, who live outside the country, to whom we send our most sincere condolences.
Clive was one of those people who put everything he had into his job which he carried out in a scientific manner and with absolute dedication, putting in many, many hours of his own time outside normal office hours. Any work that was done was performed meticulously and with absolute accuracy and he would not submit anything that could later be questioned. He was a pleasure to work with, thoroughly trustworthy and a good team player.
Clive was born and brought up in Salisbury (as it was then) and, apart from his time at university, lived in the same house in Belvedere all his life. He was educated at Belvedere Junior School and Prince Edward Boys’ High School. In 1980 he did his B.Sc in plant pathology and microbiology at the University of Natal where he qualified with an Honours degree.
In 1982 to 1986 he studied further and carried out more plant research work at the University of Zimbabwe before studying further at the University of Illinois in the United States of America through which he received his Doctorate after completing his D.Phil. on “Aspects of morphology, cultural and pathogenic characteristics of the fungus, Pyrenochaeta glycines, causal agent of red leaf blotch of soyabeans”. This work was completed at the University of Zimbabwe under the supervision of Dr D L Cole and Professor J B Sinclair of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Clive first came to your Union in 1987 as a consultant research officer to COPA on soyabean diseases and later as an Extension Executive (Plant Pathology) for both COPA and ZCPA. Part time he was also a lecturer to M.Sc. Crop Protection students at the University of Zimbabwe. He became full time Plant Pathologist at the CFU from 1993 onwards.
During this time he was a well respected member of staff at your Union and was very popular with farmers, right from Zambia down to South Africa and was often called to consult in America on Soyabean Rust in which he was recognised as a world authority. He was deeply interested, and well qualified in his field and delighted in either lecturing on the subject at field days or talking to farmers about combating crop diseases in the field.
He also received a number of scholarships, grants and awards in recognition for his outstanding and dedicated work. Below are a few of the awards, but his list of scholarships and grants would cover several pages:-
- COPA Oscar for soyabean disease research
- Bayer Coffee Award for “outstanding contributions in research and production for the improvement of coffee bean standards in Zimbabwe”.
The farming community was blessed to have such a highly qualified and interesting man to help them with their crop production and he will be sorely missed. Fortunately, he has only recently updated the ZCPA production handbook, which is now up to date with the latest information.
He was also regularly called to discuss and judge on applications for new seed varieties on the Government Crop Breeding Institute at R&SS.
As a scientist, Clive was passionate about Zimbabwean agriculture and what happened to the commercial farming sector over the past decade deeply affected him. He tried to do everything in his power to assist the remaining farmers where he could and to work towards a positive solution.
Clive was a perfectionist in everything he did and during his spare time he had a great interest in philately and medals and was a very active member of the Zimbabwe Philately Society. He has an incredible stamp collection and is a recognised authority on Rhodesian stamp history.
Clive – you will be greatly missed by many and may God be with you.
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