This study sought to explore what is termed the 'entrepreneurial ecosystem' that exists for small businesses operating in the manufacturing sector in Namibia. The objectives were to establish whether there exists a conducive business environment – that is an environment conducive for small businesses in the manufacturing sector to develop networks and build new institutional capabilities. The study also sought to determine if there existed an environment conducive to foster cooperation between different stakeholders in the manufacturing sector in Namibia. Finally the research also sought to make practical recommendations on how stakeholders in the small business sector in Namibia can create an integrated holistic system that encourages a healthy entrepreneurship ecosystem. Through an analysis of literature information provides an overview of the business environment, and through analysis of the primary findings, the researcher shares perception on the ecosystem from the manufacturers themselves. The interviews revealed that the challenges faced by small businesses operating in Windhoek were similar to those documented by existing literature. Of key note however, was the increasing perception of a lack of cooperation between various stakeholders, the government, the private sector, tertiary institution and consumers to make concerted efforts to foster a conducive environment for these small businesses. It is recommended that government initiatives be supported by the private and civil sector – particularly and awareness of and access to funding opportunities, compulsory skills development and training, and capacity building through mentorship and incubation and facilitating market access. The research concludes by suggesting a systematic model that illustrates the relationships (as suggested by the theory and the interviews) between the elements of the ecosystem, as well as recommendations for future research.

The study primarily explores whether private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) firms in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) integrate sustainable and responsible investment (SRI) practices in their investment processes. Also examined were the influences, opportunities and challenges associated with Southern African PE and VC firms adopting and implementing SRI towards sustainable growth and development in the SADC region. A field study conducted with 41 PE & VC firms as well as 6 DFI's operating in the SADC region found that PE & VC firms integrated ESG factors in their investment management processes despite the majority having no formal SRI policies. ESG integration was integrated mainly for risk management and as part of the overall business strategy. Corporate governance was top of agenda followed by social and environmental aspects. Awareness for Codes for Responsible Investing in South Africa (CRISA) was very poor amongst the PE & VC firms. PE & VC firms also found little value in becoming signatories of the UNPRI. The PE & VC firms anticipated minimal or no impact to their respective businesses if ESG were to be integrated formally and consistently. PE & VC firms agreed that ESG risks should be actively managed and that the investment holding periods enable them to manage ESG effectively, however, a number of challenges hinder the integration of ESG in SADC such as difficultly in sourcing standard ESG information, translation of the information into quantitative measures, insufficient skills among professionals to assess or link ESG factors to investment performance and the lack of clear regulatory & legislative guidance in effective ESG integration. A recommendation is for PE & VC firms to formalise SRI policies as the first steps towards consistent integration of ESG in investment making processes. Further recommendations are for remuneration of PE & VC professionals to be aligned directly to ESG performance and for investors such as DFI's to be more proactive in monitoring their appointed PE & VC managers (particularly in auditing of ESG performance reports compiled by the PE & VC firms.

Political events can be described as events that affect a country's economic and regulatory environment. Such events may include changes in monetary and fiscal policy, changes in trade and foreign policy, cabinet reshuffles and changes in government. In emerging markets, political events can affect asset prices because of the impact they can have on foreign sentiment and investor confidence. Elections in particular can cause considerable uncertainty which can lead to herding behavior by investors, if outcomes do not reflect prior predictions. Unfavorable election results can lead to currency depreciation, stock market crashes and economic deterioration as investors change their expectations and demand higher premiums due to the perceived increase in sovereign as well as currency risk. This research focuses specifically on the effect of presidential elections on the exchange rate between U.S. Dollar and Zambian Kwacha. The study employs the event study methodology by dividing elections into two periods and these are; a month leading to the election and another month after the elections. The study will examine three distinct presidential elections that occurred in Zambia in 2011, 2015 and 2016 respectively. The research uses daily time series data for the periods September 2011, January 2015 and August 2016. The methodology makes use of the currency pair's daily mid-rate as inputs to the market model. The market model was used to calculate average abnormal returns and cumulative average abnormal returns. Test of significance was conducted using t-test with 5 percent level of significance using a two-tailed test. The results of the t-test show that political events represented by the presidential elections had a statistically significant effect on the Kwacha, with noteworthy observations concentrated around the days following the event. The study recommends that key policy makers and stakeholders should place more emphasis in ensuring a healthy and safe political environment in the country. Investors should also be cautioned against viewing emerging markets as one homogenous group. The results in this study are unique to Zambia, which has had a history of holding peaceful (and arguably), free and fair elections since becoming a multi-party democracy in 1991.

The case study research sought to investigate and establish the attitude of the Africa diaspora community, mainly associated with the University of Cape Town, towards the modeling of a diaspora pension fund as a likely instrument for the financing of the continent's development infrastructure. The case study further sought to test, using chi-square and logistic regression, whether the independent variables of age, gender and education have an effect on the willingness/support of the members of the diaspora in the establishment of the diaspora pension fund for the financing of the continent's infrastructure. The results show that members of the sampled diaspora community support the modeling and also showed their willingness to be part of the diaspora pension fund and to have part of their pension contributions invested for the financing of the development infrastructure. The resulting model shows that males, who are middle-aged and well-educated, are more likely to be in support of the modeling of the diaspora pension fund as a likely instrument for financing the continent's development infrastructure. The results show that when modeling the diaspora pension fund factors such as age, education, gender, remaining years towards retirement, governance, corruption, regulatory issues, and the rule of law and the infrastructure of investment portfolio diversification have to be taken into account as they affect the likelihood of support amongst the diaspora community. The research will help policy makers, global pension funds, governments in Africa, and the bigger community of the Africa diaspora in assessing the feasibility of commercialising the diaspora pension fund as an innovative financing instrument.

This dissertation aims to provide insight into the relationship between Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE) compliance and the financial performance of top empowered companies listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) in South Africa. This study is similar to two previous studies; the first is on the impact of corporate governance on JSE listed companies for the period 2003 until 2006 and on a sample of 97 JSE listed companies (Abdo & Fisher, 2007). The second is on the contribution of BBBEE on the financial performance on a sample of 49 JSE listed companies from 2005 until 2008 and 2008 until 2010 (van Heerden, 2011). This empirical study was initially on a sample of 100 JSE listed companies from 2009 until 2012 that was derived from JSE listed companies which featured in the annual Financial Mails Top Empowerment Survey Publication from 2009 until 2012. The sample was reduced to 64 units due to delisting, corporate name changes and data unavailability for the period. Corresponding company financial data (share price, price to earnings ratio, price to book value) were obtained for the period 2008 until 2012 from McGgregor BFA database and correlated to BBBEE compliance ratings as published by Financial Mail. JSE indices were obtained from I-Net Bridge. Based on the types of companies, they were grouped into 10 JSE economic sectors such that the performance of each sector could be correlated to the total average BBBEE compliance ratings, financial metrics and JSE indices. For each sample unit, the average BBBEE rating was calculated for the period 2009 until 2012. This was then correlated to the annualised share price return for the same period and to price to earnings ratio and price to book value for 2012. The findings suggest there was a negative and weak relationship between share price and BBBEE compliance rating. There is a positive and weak relationship between price to earnings and price to book value. The cluster of companies with high BBBEE compliance ratings achieved higher and lower annualised share price returns than the respective JSE sector indices. The cluster of companies with low BBBEE compliance ratings also achieved higher and lower annualised share price returns than the respective JSE sector indices. It was also observed that high BBBEE rated companies achieved higher and lower share price returns than low BBBEE rated companies. Companies with high BBBEE compliance ratings achieved both higher and lower price to earnings than the respective JSE indices. Companies with low BBBEE compliance ratings also achieved higher and lower price to earnings than the respective JSE indices. Companies with low and high BBBEE compliance ratings achieved profit to book values below the respective JSE sectors. Of the seven BBBEE compliance indicators five positively correlated to the annualised share price return i.e. employment equity, skills development, preferential procurement, enterprise development and socio- economic development. Ownership, skills development, preferential procurement, enterprise development, socio- economic development positively correlated to the price to earnings ratio. Skills development, preferential procurement, enterprise development, socio- economic development positively correlated to the price to book value ratio.

Corporate sustainability reporting is an important part of corporate reporting, and also an important part of creating a visibility about the sustainable agenda of corporates. Motivated by a lack of in-depth information about how this practise has evolved in South Africa; the objectives of this study are to shed more light into this evolution, as well as the quality of the content that is part of that evolution in the research period of 2002 – 2012. Segmenting the decade into through anchor points for the research, the methodology of content analysis was employed in order to read and interpret sample reports and conduct scoring across own developed evaluation criteria of six reporting categories, which was made up of a total of 62 assessment items. Reporting performance was determined, coded, summarized and aggregated where required, in order for the different levels of analysis to be carried out. The findings revealed a rising growth trend in the evolution of sustainability reporting in South Africa, with the highest growth taking place in the middle section of the research period, and significantly lower growth in the last section. This is both in terms of overall reporting as well as content coverage of the different reporting categories included in the research. The Social Performance category is the most reported on category through the decade. The highest percentage increase is found to be in the Context & Commitment and Quality of Management reporting categories through the decade. The industrial sector is the top performer and Telecoms the bottom performer in terms of overall reporting performance for the decade. Sustainability reporting in South Africa seems to have experienced an overall growth trend similar to the global trend. However the evolution of that growth has highlighted certain country specific nuances through the reporting period.

The study examines the relationship between the level of access to debt finance and viability among 41 randomly selected SMEs operating in the agricultural sector in Zimbabwe for the period 2011 and 2014 using descriptive statistical analysis and panel data regression analysis. The study found that viability is positively associated with short-term debt and negatively associated with long-term debt, while it has no significant relationship with total debt. The study concludes that the level of debt accessed does not matter to viability; what matters is the type of debt accessed. It also concludes that access to debt is not the main factor associated with viability, but there are other factors such as size of business, growth opportunities, number of employees and the ratio of female to male shareholders. It is therefore recommended that SMEs managers and policy makers should be mindful of the type of debt availed to SMEs since shortterm debt is positively related to viability and long-term debt is negatively associated with viability. It is also recommended that SME managers should monitor the sizes of their enterprises and growth opportunities since these are negatively associated with viability. Female ownership of SMEs should be encouraged and supported as the results demonstrate that those enterprises dominated by female shareholders are associated with high viability. SME managers should ensure that they have adequate employees, since the results show that viability is associated increasing the number of employees.

The global financial crisis of 2008 revealed the substantial over-indebtedness of households across many countries. Over-indebtedness of households is the outcome of the policy of financial liberalisation and deregulation since the 1970s. The consumers who are most likely to become over-indebted are employees who earn regular salaries and wages. This paper studies the over-indebtedness of public servants in South Africa. The concept of over-indebtedness is described, as a structural condition of a consumer that experiences financial is unable to repay credit commitments. This paper briefly describes the evolution of consumer credit and discusses the causes and consequences of overindebtedness. The study evaluates the level of over-indebtedness of public servants in South Africa applying three quantitative measures: the ratio of credit repayments to income, the number of credit commitments held by the consumer and the indebtedness index. The analysis uses a very large sample of credit records for public servants that were obtained from a credit bureau shows interesting findings. The overall findings show that majority of public servants in South Africa are over-indebted. The indebtedness index estimates that at least fifty-four (54%) of public servants in South Africa are over-indebted. Although the study did not include any statistical test of significance, the findings of the study are significant given the large sample size. The result should be treated as valid and exploratory.

Employment is one of the most significant determinants of the welfare of any nation. Any significant changes in employment (i.e. increase/decrease) will subsequently affect the wellbeing of the household. The unemployment rates in South Africa are among the highest in the world, currently standing at 25.2 per cent (i.e. by the narrow definition of unemployment) based on figures released by Statistics South Africa. Limpopo tends to have the highest proportion of rural dwellers in the South Africa, hence it is expected that socioeconomic conditions in the province are inferior to the national average; with the consequence of a high youth unemployment rate. This study seeks to find the determinants of youth unemployment in the Aganang municipality of the Limpopo province using census 2011, complemented by QLFs 2007-2010. This study used the same approach that Kyei and Gyekye followed by employing Regression, Principal, Component and Cluster analyses. Three variables, gender, training and education were categorised into twelve as independent variables. The study concluded that in the Aganang municipality, no education (that is no schooling or primary schooling) particularly for females, caused the level of Youth unemployment to rise, while a bachelor's degree and / or training, brought about a reduction in Youth unemployment.

The study investigated challenges facing Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in the informal settlements of Namibia