Assessing the role of social transfers in curbing household food insecurity in Harare rural district, Zimbabwe
- Authors: Nyabvudzi, Tatenda Gaudencia
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Poverty -- Zimbabwe Food security -- Zimbabwe Households -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10353/12205 , vital:39197
- Description: Purpose – Empirical work on the career development processes of vulnerable groups such as refugees is beginning to receive currency within the academic literature. However, little is known about the intersection of factors such as gender and structural constraints on such processes especially within developing countries such as South Africa. The purpose of this study was to explore the career development processes of women refugees in South Africa. Design/methodology/ approach – A qualitative research approach through narrative inquiry was used. Snowball sampling was employed to select the 20 women refugees who took part in this research. The study location was the city of Port Elizabeth located in the Eastern Cape Province. The three levels of meaning-making incorporated in previous narrative research was utilised to analyse the data. Findings Results show that women refugees are more concerned with a short-term desire to survive and acquire basic commodities than a long-term focus to advance and develop their careers. This is mainly compounded by constraints personal to the individual and those in the environment. Finally, the results illustrate that career development processes of women refugees are affected by the inextricably intertwined factors associated with their gender, immigration status as well as person-environmental factors. Practical implications – The research suggests strategies that policy makers in South Africa and other developing nations that are hosting refugees can use to assist women not just their career development but also their lived experiences. Originality/value – This study extends and advances literature on the career development issues of vulnerable groups such as women refugees especially in developing nations such as South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Assessing the role of social transfers in curbing household food insecurity in Harare rural district, Zimbabwe
- Authors: Nyabvudzi, Tatenda Gaudencia
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Poverty -- Zimbabwe Rural poor -- Zimbabwe Food security -- Zimbabwe Social security -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , M Admin
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10353/1939 , vital:27586
- Description: One of the major problems obstructing international development is the issue of food security. Solutions for this global concern have not yet been found. This research sought to explore the role of social transfers in curbing household food insecurity. Social transfers are regular services or donations which are offered by the government or/and other institutions such as non-governmental organisations to vulnerable households. This exploratory study administered structured interviews, incorporating the Household Hunger Scale, Months of Adequate Household Food Provisioning indicator and self designed questions soliciting general household information, to Harare rural residents. The population was divided into clusters and a simple random sampling was used to select three clusters, Mufakose, Glen Norah and Warren Park, thereafter, systematic random sampling was employed within selected clusters.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Environmental conflict resolution: a critical analysis of the role of interests and value
- Authors: Mweshi, John
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/55842 , vital:26740
- Description: This thesis intends to contribute to an enhanced understanding of environmental conflicts and their resolution. To accomplish this task the thesis will ascertain the role that value and interests play in environmental conflicts in order to establish an adequate basis upon which they can be resolved. In the process, the thesis will also examine three different approaches, namely, the Standard Approach; the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) framework; and the Structured Decision Making (SDM) approach. First, the standard approach is informed by the understanding that focusing on interests instead of human values makes the resolution of conflicts more tractable. In contrast, this thesis argues that an exclusive focus on interests, in the context of environmental conflict resolution, is inadequate in some important respects because there are other factors to be considered such as the environmental impacts at the root of the conflict. Second, the thesis examines the focus on impacts that characterises EIAs. It argues that this approach remedies the limitations of the standard approach insofar as impacts are understood in terms of object value. However, the EIA approach does not provide much guidance on how to deal with conflicting human values. Third, taking into account the fact that the standard approach does not address the question of object value, while the EIA addresses object value but does not deal directly with human values, the thesis examines the SDM approach to environmental risk decisions. The thesis argues that while the SDM approach claims to deal with conflicts involving human values head-on, it does not provide a viable alternative in terms of environmental conflict resolution. This is because it fails to recognise the key distinction between human values and object value despite acknowledging the presence of multiple value dimensions as a major obstacle to value trade-offs and therefore to the resolution of value conflicts. Finally, the thesis recommends an adequate basis upon which environmental conflicts can be resolved.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Spatio-temporal variation in the phytobenthos and phytoplankton community structure and composition of particulate matter along a river-estuary continuum assessed using microscopic and stable isotope analyses
- Authors: Dalu, Tatenda
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/54416 , vital:26563
- Description: Phytoplankton and phytobenthos communities play an important role in lotic systems as primary producers providing essential biomolecules to higher trophic oganisms and are important indicators for environmental or ecological change. In this thesis, field studies (observational and experimental) along a river–estuary continuum were conducted to assess the spatio-temporal variation and development of phytobenthos and phytoplankton communities using a combination of stable isotope and community analyses in a temperate southern African system across four study periods: September (early spring) and November/December (late spring) 2012, and February (summer) and May/June (winter) 2013. Additionally, the sources and composition of the particulate organic matter were also analysed using stable isotope (δ15N and δ13C) analysis. The effects of substrate type and flood occurrence were assessed through experimental studies at an up- and downstream site of the river after a major flood event that occurred between October and November 2012. Common household tiles were used as artificial substrates to study the development/succession of phytobenthos communities after the flood disturbance. Distinct diatom communities were observed between upstream and downstream sites and at each site, community structure changed with time indicating succession. In addition to recording diatom characteristics on three natural substrates, namely; macrophytes, rocks and sediment, artificial substrates observations were also made on three different types of artificial substrates, namely; brick, brown clay and grey clay tiles. The natural (species richness 78) and artificial substrates (sp. richness 93) had different communities with the latter having greater species richness. Common phytobenthos taxa were not restricted to a single substrate but preference was generally high for the artificial substrates, especially brown tiles (mean sp. richness 47). Results of the redundancy analysis (RDA) analysis indicated that ammonium, conductivity, total dissolved solids, salinity, pH, oxygen reduction potential, phosphate and water depth were the major determinants of the phytobenthos composition at the two sites. The spatio–temporal variation of phytoplankton and phytobenthos communities and allochthonous organic matter along the river–estuary continuum was assessed at 8 sites using a combination of community and stable isotope analyses. A total of 178 species belonging to 78 genera were recorded with diatoms being predominant, accounting for 81.9 % of the total abundance. The total chl-a concentration along the river-estuary continuum increased from spring to a high in summer before decreasing to a low in winter. Periphyton communities were observed to be significantly different across sites (p < 0.05) in terms of species richness, abundances and isotopically The high periphytic δ15N values (range 7.9–15.2 ‰) recorded at the downstream sites compared to the pristine upstream sites (δ15N values range 4–7 ‰) suggest nutrient enrichment most likely derived from anthropogenic sources. Overall, our results reveal general patterns of periphyton communities and stable isotopes and provide improved information in the use of periphyton δ15N as an excellent indicator of anthropogenic nitrogen pollution. Ecologists are interested in the factors that control, and the variability in, the contributions of different sources to mixed organic materials traveling through lotic systems. We hypothesized that the source matter fuelling mixed organic pools in a river-estuary continuum varies over space and time, with the upper reaches of a system characterized by allochthonous-dominated material and autochthonous contributions becoming more important in the lower reaches. Samples of the mixed organic pools and allochthonous and autochthonous source materials were collected during the four study periods. The C:N ratios of suspended particulate matter (SPM) collected during summer and winter indicated that the lower reaches of the system had similar organic matter contributions from the freshwater and terrestrial sources. Stable isotope analysis in R revealed that the contributions of autochthonous organic matter were high in SPM along the entire continuum, and aquatic macrophytes were significant contributors to SPM specifically in the upper reaches. The terrestrial leaves made major contributions to the SPM in the middle regions of the system (i.e. downstream sites of the river, particularly in early and late spring). Bulk detritus had large allochthonous matter components in the lower reaches (estuary), and the contributions of aquatic macrophytes and benthic algae to bulk detritus were high (> 50 %) in the upper to middle reaches (river), but low (< 20 %) in the lower reaches (estuary). The current investigation represents the first attempt to assess the validity of the River Continuum Concept (RCC) in a southern African temperate river. The phytoplankton and phytobenthos communities, and chl-a concentration followed a trend similar to that proposed for the river continuum concept (RCC). The middle reaches based on the phytobenthos or phytoplankton communities and chl-a concentrations which were employed as proxies for primary production, were the most productive, while the upper reaches were the least primary productive. The evaluation of organic matter contributions to the SPM and detritus along the river–estuary continuum provided a baseline assessment of the nature and sources of potential food for consumers inhabiting different locations during different times of the year. Incorporating such spatio-temporal variations in SPM and detritus into food web studies will improve our understanding of the flow of carbon through aquatic systems.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Structural studies on yeast eIF5A using biomolecular NMR and molecular dynamics
- Authors: Sigauke, Lester Takunda
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Molecular dynamics , Reverse transcriptase , HIV (Viruses) , HIV infections , Eukaryotic cells , Yeast
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSc
- Identifier: vital:4547 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1017927
- Description: Eukaryotic initiation factor 5A, eIF5A, is a ubiquitous eukaryotic protein that has been shown to influence the translation initiation of a specific subset of mRNAs. It is the only protein known to undergo hypusination in a two-step post translational modification process involving deoxyhypusine synthase (DHS) and deoxyhypusine hydroxylase (DOHH) enzymes. Hypusination has been shown to influence translation of HIV-1 and HTLV-1 nuclear export signals, while the involvement of active hypusinated eIF5A in induction of IRES mediated processes that initiate pro-apoptotic process have inspired studies into the manipulation of eIF5A in anti-cancer and anti-diabetic therapies. eIF5A oligomerisation in eukaryotic systems has been shown to be influenced by hypusination and the mechanism of dimerisation is RNA dependent. Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy approaches were proposed to solve the structure of the hypusinated eIF5A in solution in order to understand the influence of hypusination on the monomeric arrangement which enhances dimerisation and activates the protein. Cleavage of the 18 kDa protein monomer by introduction of thrombin cleavage site within the flexible domain was thought to give rise to 10 kDa fragments accessible to a 600 MHz NMR spectrometer. Heteronuclear single quantum correlation experiments of the mutated isotopically labelled protein expressed in E. coli showed that the eIF5A protein with a thrombin cleavage insert, eIF5AThr (eIF5A subscript Thr), was unfolded. In silico investigations of the behaviour of eIF5A and eIF5AThr (eIF5A subscript Thr) models in solution using molecular dynamics showed that the mutated model had different solution dynamics to the native model. Chemical shift predictors were used to extract atomic resolution data of solution dynamics and the introduction of rigidity in the flexible loop region of eIF5A affected solution behaviour consistent with lack of in vivo function of eIF5AThr (eIF5A subscript Thr) in yeast. Residual dipolar coupling and T₁ relaxation times were calculated in anticipation of the extraction of experimental data from RDC and relaxation dispersion experiments based on HSQC measurable restraints.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
The interrelationships between foreign direct investment and economic growth in Africa
- Authors: Bolani, Lindelwa Mandisa
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Investments, Foreign -- Africa , Economic development -- Africa , Africa -- Economic conditions -- 1960- , Africa -- Foreign economic relations , Gross domestic product -- Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MCom
- Identifier: vital:1123 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1019885
- Description: There has been a long search for the keys to development and economic growth in Africa. This study investigates the relationship between FDI and economic growth over the period 2000-2012 using data from 48 African countries. On the aggregate regional level FDI and economic growth were found to be positively correlated during this period. Using panel data econometric techniques and the Panel Granger Causality test, results revealed that a bi-directional causality relationship existed between FDI and GDP. Thus, the results suggest that GDP is a requirement for increased investment, and at the same time is the result of increased foreign investment. Thus, the conclusion is that African policy makers are justified in increasing their attempts to create an attractive business environment for foreign investors, as it is beneficial for economic growth.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015