M.A. (Information Science) / As organisations exist in the constantly overwhelming information age, more emphasis is put on information as resource and the economic value it has in the organisation. The South African life insurance industry is no different from other organisations and deals with a vast number ofinformation that flows through these organisations daily. In this study, the role of information, the management of information and the existence and implementation of an information policy are examined. The appointment of an information manager to manage information is also examined. The study was done to determine the level of importance and value of information in this type of industry and whether the South African insurance industry has identified information as a valuable resource in the organisation. Information as resource and the management thereof as competitive advantage is studied. The research methods applied were to carry out a literature study on information and its role as resource in an organisation, the roles and responsibilities of an information manager and the advantage and implementation of an information policy in the organisation. A questionnaire was compiled and sent to all the major South African life insurance companies to determine the above aspects and the current status in this industry.

M.Phil. (Information Management) / An efficient document management system is one that considers the user’s needs for information and the ability of the system to provide valuable information that matches certain characteristics. When users utilise a document management system (DMS) they require a system that they perceive will make their work easier. The efficient and effective use of a DMS depends on how receptive the users are to technology and their intention in using the system. The documents in the document management system are corporate knowledge and should therefore be stored in a central repository such as the DMS, where the company’s corporate memory cannot be lost. The DMS has all the capabilities to keep documents safe where the documents can be accessed again. To measure the technology acceptance of end users, research has identified the technology acceptance model (TAM) as the ideal method. TAM is tailored to elaborate on computer usage, perceived ease of use, attitudes toward using and usage behaviour. The research stream on technology acceptance and use has become one of the most prolific and is claimed to be the most mature research in the modern information system field. The problem identified was to analyse the user’s behavioural intent towards effectively utilising the Eskom in-house document management system. The purpose was to investigate the use of the document system that is currently in place at Eskom and determine user perspectives. Employees working in Eskom cannot afford to neglect using the document management system on a regular basis. Important documents relevant for everyday work are stored in the system, and all employees are granted access to these documents. Given these considerations, users’ perceptions of the in-house document system cannot be taken for granted, and these issues were researched. The findings from the TAM variables showed that perceptions of users towards the DMS were divided, while half of the users were satisfied with the information, system, usefulness and ease of using the system the other half was not satisfied. A division in opinion emerged whether the system should be replaced or rather improved. Benefits of both options were weighed and the study suggested that the system be replaced.

In rural districts of Sub-Saharan Africa, livelihoods typically centre around peasant agriculture and herding. While historically effective, changing resource constraints associated with rapid population growth and resource degradation have put these livelihoods under strain. Dramatic shifts over recent years in agricultural policy and the prices of agricultural inputs and outputs have not helped. Together, such changes arguably amount to a set of destabilising influences and a relative paucity of advantageous opportunities. The question is whether local people successfully adapt their land-use strategies to these changing circumstances. 'Sustainable agriculture' technologies such as agroforestry practices represent an obvious means of adaptation to change in low-potential areas, which largely lack access to purchased agricultural inputs. Yet despite the promise these technologies have shown in farm trials, their adoption by farmers has generally been hesitant and limited. This has been widely interpreted as evidence that these technologies do not respond effectively to the needs of target beneficiaries. Based on a household survey from Shinyanga District, Tanzania, the study revisits the issues of adaptation to changing circumstances and technology adoption. It highlights the possibility that some households adapt to change more effectively than others, with some adopting advantageous available technologies while others do not. Its focus is on the differing knowledge and perceptions informing decisions vis-à-vis tree management, with a view to identifying distinct knowledge types within the wider body of local knowledge. The study posits then tests a theoretical model problematising local knowledge. It finds that integrating local knowledge variables into regressions of tree management practice greatly increases their explanatory power, suggesting that these variables do not simply reflect incentives, as suggested by contemporary theory. The implication is that problematic local knowledge may critically constrain rural livelihoods in areas facing unprecedented challenges and opportunities. Finally, diverse associations with observed knowledge patterns are considered, suggesting promising ways to build on this work.

<p> Los objetivos de esta investigaci&oacute;n fueron: establecer las dimensiones culturales para Puerto Rico, determinar la existencia o no de diferencias culturales entre Puerto Rico y la Rep&uacute;blica Dominicana. Adem&aacute;s, se midi&oacute; el impacto de los factores demogr&aacute;ficos y las dimensiones culturales en la felicidad colectiva de una sociedad. Una muestra de 596 adultos en Puerto Rico y 404 en Rep&uacute;blica Dominicana fue recopilada para calcular las dimensiones culturales de Hofstede para Puerto Rico seg&uacute;n el <i> Values Survey Module</i> 2013 y el desarrollo de un modelo de regresi&oacute;n m&uacute;ltiple. La investigaci&oacute;n concluy&oacute; que Puerto Rico es una sociedad principalmente jer&aacute;rquica (PDI = 68), colectivista (IDV = 27), masculina con rasgos femeninos (MAS = 56), pragm&aacute;tica con planes para todo pero improvisa cuando hay incertidumbre (UAI=38), enfocada a corto plazo (LTO = 19) y de las m&aacute;s indulgentes del mundo (IVR = 99). Los resultados indicaron que la dimensi&oacute;n cultural de Indulgencia versus Restricci&oacute;n (IVR) tuvo un efecto significativo en la felicidad colectiva en Puerto Rico y la Rep&uacute;blica Dominicana. En otro hallazgo, la salud como variable demogr&aacute;fica tuvo un efecto significativo en la felicidad colectiva en Puerto Rico.</p><p>

<p> Unconventional oil and gas extraction has been deployed significantly in the United States in recent years. The current study focuses on the impact of hydraulic fracturing (also known as fracking) on the sustainability of water resources in Louisiana. This impact is measured by quantifying the stress for current and future scenarios of fracking water use in the two main shale plays in Louisiana. The assessment is conducted at the HUC-12 fine catchment spatial scale. Initially, sectored stress metrics were calculated for surface and groundwater, respectively, without including fracking water use. Once both stress metrics were estimated with the reported water sources and uses in Louisiana corresponding to the 2010 year, several scenarios for both sources were evaluated. In the <i>first scenario</i>, a peak year (2011) of fracking water use was added as a water demand new category into the stress calculation matrices. The results indicate that a significant variability in the calculated stress metric with and without fracking is reflected only for the groundwater sector. The second <i>Existing wells</i> scenario calculates the stress including the water use of the total number of wells that currently exist in both shale plays over a brief time period. The other additional tested scenario consists of an increase of 100% of the required number of wells to extract the expected total shale play capacity. Results of the <i>additional scenarios</i> follow the same pattern as the <i> first scenario</i>. This analysis can be useful for water management authorities to consider several factors, such as cost analysis of recycled flow-back, as alternative resources for fracking water use. In addition to this fracking water use impact on resources analysis, an educational web-module comprising the Energy-Water Nexus is developed in the current study. The core of the educational module available online is contained in the learning activities development.</p><p>

<p> Dissolved organic matter (DOM) plays an important role in the cycling of nutrients within aquatic ecosystems; however, excess amounts can have detrimental effects on aquatic organisms. Stormwater runoff events in urban areas can contribute high concentrations of DOM to receiving waters, posing potential impairment to the aquatic ecosystems of urban streams and downstream water bodies. Characterizing compositional changes in DOM due to storm events is important for understanding potential downstream water quality effects and has been well studied in forested, agricultural, and urban landscapes. However, <i>in situ</i> sensors have not been widely applied to monitor stormwater contributions in urbanized areas, leaving the spatial and temporal characteristics within these systems poorly understood. Using laboratory measurements of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentration and excitation emission matrix spectroscopy (EEMS), fluorescent DOM (FDOM) sensors, and a mobile water quality sensing platform, this study investigated changes in DOM quantity and sources within the Northwest Field Canal (NWFC), an urban water conveyance located in Logan, Utah, USA that receives runoff during storm events. Under baseflow conditions, FDOM decreased and exhibited dampened diurnal variability as the summer irrigation season progressed, while FDOM values at the upstream and downstream monitoring sites were relatively similar. During storm events, FDOM concentrations were rapidly elevated to values orders of magnitude greater than in baseflow measurements, and DOC concentrations were more than 3 times greater at the downstream site than those at the upstream site due to high contributions of DOC being discharged from outfalls. Compositional changes in DOM indicated a shift during storm events from a more autochthonous, less degraded DOM in baseflow to more decomposed and terrestrially derived DOM in stormwater flows. These observations were consistent with results from custom, <i>in situ</i> fluorometers, which also revealed a seasonal transition to a more microbially derived composition in baseflow conditions as the summer season progressed. Deployment of a mobile sensing platform during stormflow conditions confirmed that contributions of DOM were associated with the locations of outfalls discharging runoff into the canal and revealed spatial changes in DOM composition and concentration along canal transects.</p><p>

<p> The purpose of this grant proposal was to develop and seek funding for the implementation of &ldquo;Project Motherhood&rdquo;, a parenting program for transitional aged youth (TAY) mothers in Los Angeles County. The clients, former clients of Heritage Group home for Teens Inc., as well as referrals from local agencies located in Los Angeles County will have an opportunity to participate in the proposed parenting program. </p><p> Through a review of the literature on the needs and challenges as well as current services and interventions in place for TAY, the grant writer proposed and designed a parenting program. This grant writer explored numerous potential public and private funding sources. The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation was selected as the potential funding source because it best fit with the goals and objectives of this project. </p><p> The actual submission and/or funding of this grant were not required for the successful completion of this academic project.</p><p>

Ph.D. / Definitions of sustainable development can be grouped according to their ideological orientation and economic paradigm in which they are placed: neoclassical; social and ecological modernisation of neoclassical; and radical. The view of sustainable development predominant in the mining sector aligns with the dominant neoclassical economic paradigm. It is revealed specifically through the system of metrics used, the most obvious of which is profit, shareholder value, and growth. The idea of sustainability is understood in mining as the need to respond to increasing regulation by adding two extra dimensions to the economic one – social and environmental. This is abbreviated as the triple bottom line, or weak sustainability. In the exercise of process stewardship, mines tend to follow global responsibility guidelines formulated for the sector, but product stewardship is of secondary importance. Narrow definitions of sustainability fail to take into account the biosphere as a complex adaptive system. In this study there is a discussion about an innovative collaborative sustainability model to be developed in a new industrial sector. That sector would operate beyond mining, while at the same time using mining waste residues feedstock as its inputs. The landscape in which the new sector would be located would be the current neoclassical one, but the model has been formulated as a tool to move towards a broader conception of sustainability. As a means of clarifying the fuzzy boundaries between the various entities and components of the complex adaptive system of the biosphere, for the purposes of discussion, the biosphere has been divided into seven separate schematic dimensions (after Gell-Mann, 1994: 345-366). These are ideological, institutional, economic, social, demographic, informational and technological. Six research and development projects, carried out over seven years (2002 to 2009) in a research and development group of a trans-national mining corporation, were directed by the author. These projects, in the fields of improved air quality and of minimisation of mining waste residues, formed the basis for conceptualising a new collaborative sustainability model. The projects, when placed in the context of seven dimensions of the biosphere and as examples of sustainable development, reveal themselves as falling far short of attaining sustainability goals. What a reductionist definition of sustainability used in the mining industry means is that the industry is slow at anticipating needs of communities after a mine closes, or after organisational restructuring and downsizing in the trans-national corporation has happened, or in dealing with the influx of people into the area who come to improve their economic/political opportunities. The implementation of sustainability principles in mines is directed by global protocols, directives and regulatory obligations, and is driven by the market economy.

Magister Philosophiae - MPhil / Following South Africa's independence from apartheid rule, there has been progressive developments in policies that promote equity in all spheres including the water sector. Equality in the water sector is not only limited to water access, but also management of the water. This study investigated the factors that empower women in the water sector as an example of gender equity. / South Africa

Magister Administrationis - MAdmin / This exploratory study seeks to critically explore human resources development with regard to the career needs and stages of the Namibian Police (NAMPOL). Documents were perused on the issue of the current human resources development and its relevancy to the training and development within the Namibian Police. Questionnaires were completed by a representative sample of NAMPOL officials from different departments of the police. Interviews were also conducted with selected officials on training and development of personnel. Recommendations are given as a model for improving the Namibian Police human resources development system as an effective training and capacity building system for members of the police force to perform their tasks effectively. / South Africa