Masters in Public Administration - MPA / Hawston, a small fishing town situated in Greater Hermanus is famous for its lucrative abalone resource. Since the drastic reduction of the abalone quota, which was implemented from 1994-2001, black commercial abalone divers have been on the receiving end of the new fishing legislation. The decimation of abalone by illegal harvesters, and the annual allocation of one and a half ton of abalone to all black commercial divers at present, are serious factors that influence the future of the commercial abalone divers and their counterparts. An abalone quota plays a pivotal role regarding the existence of various groups of people namely the Southern boat assistants, Overberg commercial abalone divers, Hawston fishing community etc. This study attempts to examine the effects of the drastic reduction of the abalone quota on the commercial divers (from 22-ton to one and a half ton), the boat assistants and the Hawston fishing community. The mentioned groups are also engaged in harvesting their allocated crayfish quotas, the research project mainly focuses on the effect of the new quota system on the allocation of abalone and crayfish quotas in Hawston. In essence, this research project seeks to examine the validity or invalidity of the White Paper regarding policies of the new Living Resources Act on commercial abalone divers, the boat assistants and the Hawston fishing community. The researcher has noted the various shortcomings in the White Paper on Marine Resources and the associated indiscrepancies being practiced by the Department of Environmental Affairs. In the study, a qualitative method is used to assess the impact of the implementation of new fishing quotas on various social groups in Hawston (existing and new groups). This was done by means of in-depth interviews. Some of the policy makers at the Department of Environmental Affairs were also interviewed. An evaluation of data gathered through the use of interviews and review of primary and secondary literature, revealed that equitable fishing quota allocation systems are not addressing the needs of the small-scale fishers in Hawston. By means of reports, it was concluded that various factors are infringing on the rights of those excluded from receiving allocation systems and also has the effect of fuelling uncertainty for the future of commercial abalone divers and small scale fishers in Hawston. The primary objective of this study is to investigate if the White Paper Policy on Marine Resources is benefiting the disadvantaged small-scale fishers in Hawston. Most important for the commercial abalone diver in Hawston, is the effect of the decimation of abalone and how legislation in the new quota system will influence their lives.

In the modern days government organization are operating in a new climate environment of accountability. According to Rennekamp (2000:1), funders want more than accurate record keeping and the summary of what was done with their appropriation. They want information that communicates value of the programs. Therefore, more attention is being paid to customer satisfaction as funding decisions are made. Even when an organization meets its performance goals, few taxpayers want to finance an organization if it's programs are viewed as irrelevant or official are perceived as rude. The major objective of this study is measuring farming community perceptions and expectations of the quality of extension services rendered by the Department of Agriculture and Environmental Affairs (DAEA) within uMngungundlovu District. Research indicates that customers judges service quality based on multiple factors i.e. dimension of service quality : *Empathy - the provision of caring individual attention (statements 1-4), *Responsiveness - the willingness to help the customer (statements 5-9), *Assurance - the knowledge and courtesy of the employees (statements 10-14), *Reliability - the ability to perform the promised service reliably and accurately (statements 15-18), *Tangibles - the appearance of physical facilities, equipment, communication materials (19-22) ( Zeithaml and Bitner 2006 : 153). These five dimensions of customer satisfaction were used as framework for both the collection and presentation of data. The results of the study have shown that all five dimensions of service quality are significantly important as far as extension work is concerned in the DAEA. The average gap score between the extension service perception and expectation for each of service quality dimensions are empathy (-0.23), responsiveness (-0.25), assurance (-0.23), reliability (-0.36) and tangibles are (-0.31). There is a narrow gap between the extension services - perception and expectation for all five dimensions. However the negative differences implies that the expectation scores have exceeded the perception scores. This calls for some level of improvements. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2010.

This dissertation critically reviews the quality of South African environmental authorisations through the application of a methodology adopted from the Lee and Colley (1999) environmental impact assessment (EIA) report review package. The literature review shows that to date limited research has been conducted on the quality of environmental authorisations nationally. Anecdotal evidence suggests that environmental authorisations are of weak quality; hence the development of guidelines on the compilation of environmental authorisations by the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA). In this dissertation, the quality of the environmental authorisations is critically reviewed against the requirements of the National Environmental Management Act (Act No. 107 of 1998) and departmental guidelines. The research concludes that only 64% of reviewed authorisations are deemed satisfactory, while 36% were unsatisfactory. When the basic assessment report (BAR) and scoping and environmental impact assessment (S&EIA) process authorisations are compared it is concluded that the there is a minimal difference in quality. The BAR achieved a 69% satisfactory rating while the S&EIA process achieved a 61% satisfactory rating. The dissertation concludes by making recommendations to improve the quality of authorisations. / M (Environmental Management), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

This dissertation critically reviews the quality of South African environmental authorisations through the application of a methodology adopted from the Lee and Colley (1999) environmental impact assessment (EIA) report review package. The literature review shows that to date limited research has been conducted on the quality of environmental authorisations nationally. Anecdotal evidence suggests that environmental authorisations are of weak quality; hence the development of guidelines on the compilation of environmental authorisations by the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA). In this dissertation, the quality of the environmental authorisations is critically reviewed against the requirements of the National Environmental Management Act (Act No. 107 of 1998) and departmental guidelines. The research concludes that only 64% of reviewed authorisations are deemed satisfactory, while 36% were unsatisfactory. When the basic assessment report (BAR) and scoping and environmental impact assessment (S&EIA) process authorisations are compared it is concluded that the there is a minimal difference in quality. The BAR achieved a 69% satisfactory rating while the S&EIA process achieved a 61% satisfactory rating. The dissertation concludes by making recommendations to improve the quality of authorisations. / M (Environmental Management), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

This research project examines a case of environmental training for workers in the Expanded Public Works Programme, a poverty relief programme operating in South Africa (EPWP). It is constituted as an interpretive case study, and explores what workers learn and how they learn in an environmental skills programme. The study also examines the context of learning. In accordance with education and training policy, what learners are meant to learn is articulated in unit standards registered on the South African Qualifications Authority website. The unit standards are used to design curricula and learning programmes which are registered as environmental skills programmes by Sector Education and Training Authorities (SETAs). For the conservation sector the SETA is the Tourism and Hospitality Education and Training Authority (THETA). To develop an understanding of what learners learn, I considered the content, concepts, skills, values and attitudes contained in the unit standards, and then considered the actual learning taking place during the training programme focusing on three unit standards. Data was generated from semi-structured interviews with facilitators, focus group interviews with learners, observations of teaching and learning interventions and document analysis of EPWP, training and skills development policy documents, registered unit standards for the skills programme, and learning support materials produced by the provider implementing the training. The study notes that there is learning taking place within the training implemented through environmental skills programmes. The training is influenced by a number of diverse contextual factors namely policy factors, historical contextual factors, the economic context and diverse literacy levels. Learning interactions involve a variety of social interactions, activities and practices between learners and learners, and learners and facilitators. The main finding of the study is that the training programme’s major emphasis is on concepts and content, and social and learning skills, and values and attitudes. The prominence of social skills masks a neglect of practical workplace related skills which make up a strong focus of the unit standards. This, the study shows, is related to a lack of engagement with workplace learning, which in turn is linked to a disjuncture between policy and practice, where workers working in the EPWP programme are meant to benefit from training, but in this case it was found that community members, who were not working in the programme were being offered training. It was therefore not possible for them to develop the applied workplace skills, which were also meant to facilitate increased employability, as this is one of the key objectives of the EPWP programme. Based on the insights raised by the research findings the study made recommendations that the programme consider the following to recover the situation: to develop strategies that allow for longer term training frameworks so that learners can be trained on full qualifications so that they may qualify and benefit more substantively from the training in terms of employability skills. Facilitators in the programme need to be trained so that they can develop materials that address practical skills, values, attitudes, critical reflections and actions. Monitoring of training needs to be given preference both at materials development level and implementation level.

The world has seen unparalleled pressure put on the public sector to improve the speed and quality of service delivery, whilst simultaneously employing measures to cut the costs. South Africa and the Eastern Cape have not been immune to this as there have been complaints and demonstrations from various national and provincial stakeholders demanding more and improved services. The Department of Economic Development, Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEDEAT) in particular has employed the services of public entities in its quest to realise government’s socio-economic developmental objectives and ease some of the service delivery pressures. These agencies are unfortunately struggling to deliver and the Department is unable to play the oversight role it is legislatively mandated to carry out. The main reason for this seem to be the lack of the capacity to objectively track and measure the performance of these agencies. As they say “you cannot manage what you cannot measure”. This is despite the fact that there is a shareholders’ compact and many other measures in place to enable performance monitoring. Also, the public sector is known to have inherent and unique performance management challenges like broad and vague objectives which lead to too many measurements, a propensity to focus on the “easy to measure” but often irrelevant indicators at the expense of critical outcomes and a short-term orientation that is usually fuelled by political expediency. Against this background, this study sought to make use of a comprehensive and dynamic performance monitoring framework, namely the Balanced Scorecard (BSC), to explore its potential use in assisting government to monitor the performance of public agencies, in particular the Development Finance Institutions (DFI) in South Africa. The proposed framework helps government to focus on the performance drivers of future value, and what decisions and actions are necessary to achieve critical outcomes. The aim of the study therefore is to develop an adjusted BSC framework to monitor the activities of a public sector agency and thus demonstrate how a BSC framework could be used to monitor a public agency by the government department. The study is evaluative in nature and is divided into three sections. Section one is presented as an Evaluation Report. It sets the scene, discusses briefly the key theoretical concepts, outlines the research methods used and presents the findings followed by a discussion and recommendations. Section two delves into the literature in more detail, providing a more extensive review of the literature that informed the investigation, whilst section three provides a more extensive description of the research methodology employed in the study. To achieve the aims of the study, the research drew from the work of various authors in the field including that of Bigliardi, Dormio and Galati, 2011; Bititci, Garengo, Dörfler, and Nudurupati, 2012; Julyan, 2011; Kaplan and Norton, 1992, 1993, 1996, 2001, 2004 and 2006; Niven, 2003 and 2008 and Northcott and Taulapapa, 2012. Also, five BSC perspectives - including the programme specific “equity” perspective - were used to develop an interview schedule. These were used to formulate the key performance objectives and indicators, based on the stakeholder’s responses. These respondents have experience within the programme as administrators, beneficiaries and funders. The research employed purposive sampling with semi-structured in-depth interviews and document analysis as primary and secondary instruments for data collection. In essence, five officials from the agency, one from DEDEAT and two co-operatives participated in the research. The results indicate a general appreciation of and gravitation towards outcome based measures, even though the government culture of focusing on outputs is still prevalent. The results of the study indicated that, generally, a government - public agency BSC based performance monitoring framework would have the following features:  Customer objectives and programme mission as the main goal and this will provides clarity at all levels on who the customers are and what are their primary requirements.  Clear, visible and stringent financial controls as the agency is administering public resources.  Few carefully selected processes and systems that have a direct and positive impact on the customer objectives. Deliberate and consistent efforts to promote the participation of designated groups in the economy of the country.  Comprehensive indicators on capacity building as “mission based-organisations rely heavily on skills, dedication and alignment of staff”. Overall, the study concludes that the make-up of the BSC is beneficial to the public sector and in monitoring the public sector agencies for the following reasons:  It helps the agency to focus on customers and their needs.  It forces the agency to engage and communicate strategic intention with both internal and external stakeholders and thus synchronize competing stakeholder needs.  It forces the agency to limit the number of indicators and therefore select the few value adding measures that are aligned to customer outcomes.  Through its cause and effect relationship, the agency is compelled to align all the resources, activities and processes to the main goal of the entity. All these help to minimize the principal agent problem, as the use of the BSC can bring clarity on strategy and expectations, provided it is supported with regular communication.

The study employed a quantitative research method, which is descriptive in nature, to determine the role of Human Resource Management in supporting the strategic objectives of the Department of Environmental Affairs. This interest was explored with particular reference to the Environmental Programmes branch of the Department of Environmental Affairs. Data was gathered from senior, middle and junior managers through self-administered questionnaires and it was then analysed using statistical methods and graphs. The findings reveal that the role of Human Resource Management in supporting the strategic objectives of the Department of Environmental Affairs is not efficiently elevated or viewed to have any influence on the desired goals of the Department of Environmental Affairs. As a result, the Human Resource Management component is not considered a strategic partner. Furthermore, the senior, middle and junior managers know very little about the Human Resource Management strategy and there exists a lack of emphasis on the development and implementation of joint strategic human resource management plans between the managers and the Human Resource Management component. / Public Administration / M.P.A.