Thesis (DTech. in Public Management)

The main objective of this study is to examine the potential contribution of households’ involvement in mopane worm activities (harvesting, commercialisation and consumption) to households’ food security in the Mopani District of the Limpopo Province. Data was collected using a structured questionnaire from a stratified sample of 120 households, 60 of which are mopane worm harvesters. The Binary Logit Model was used to determine households’ socio-economic factors affecting participation in mopane worm harvesting. The results revealed that gender of the household head, age of the respondent, households’ size and the level of income per month increases the probability of households participating in mopane worm harvesting whilst distance to the market and food expenditure as well as religion (belonging to the Zion Christian Church) decreased the probability of being mopane worm harvester. The Ordinary Least Square (OLS) model was used to identify households’ socio-economic factors that determine the rate of commercialisation of mopane worms within harvesting households. 53 percent of the households commercialized their harvest. The model identified that gender, harvesting experience and income from mopane worm sales are the main factors determining commercialisation within harvesting households. The Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) was used to determine household food security status. The result revealed that about 20 percent of the harvesters were food secure, while 80 percent where food insecure. In addition, about 12 percent of the non-harvesters were food secured. An OLS model was also used to examine the impact of mopane worms in the food security status of the households in the Limpopo Province. The results revealed that age, education level of a household head, level of income, income from mopane worm sales and frequency of consuming mopane worm/day improve the food security status of households whilst households’ size and the distance to the market worsens the food security status of the households. The study found that about 48 to 60 percent of the households to be adopting less pervasive strategies like asking neighbours/family relatives for help, borrowing money for food and selling mopane worms for cash to protect their food consumption and over 70 percent adopted strategies like reducing food intake, portion size and eating less preferred food were adopted to modify their food consumption. The findings indicated that policy priorities should be focused on the promotion of harvesters associations for collective marketing and creating an enabling environment for sustainable harvesting and commercialisation. / M. Sc. Agric. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg 2013.

This research dissertation investigates the level of Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) housing delivery in Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province. The post-apartheid South African Constitution indicates that the provision of basic services like formal housing is a basic right for all South Africans. In Limpopo Province and in particular, Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District, there is still massive shortage of Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) housing for the poor, despite funding being made to address this need. Millions of poor families are suffering and are still living in shacks in informal settlements. There is a backlog in the provisioning of RDP housing delivery. Low cost housing projects have been identified in Limpopo Province to address the RDP housing delivery backlog. It takes time to complete RDP houses and the communities become impatient and frustrated. The quality of completed houses is often perceived to be of unacceptable standards. This study investigates the level of RDP housing delivery in Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province. This study also identifies the challenges of RDP housing delivery experienced by Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province. Recommendations with the view of resolving problems pertaining to Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province are made. The findings from this research work identified significant challenges of RDP housing delivery experienced by Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province which needs to be addressed. In its contribution, this study made recommendations with the view of resolving problems pertaining to Disteneng (Polokwane Extension 44) Township, Capricorn District: Limpopo Province. This study in conclusion, emphasizes the need to address RDP housing backlogs and ensure that RDP houses are of good quality and that the government and all South Africans have to join hands and collectively address the problems of RDP housing delivery in South Africa.

The hydrology of the Kudumela Wetland, Limpopo Province of South Africa was studied from November 2005 to April 2007, involving both fieldwork and laboratory analyses. This study presents the results of an investigation of the hydrology of the Kudumela Wetland in South Africa, and its contribution to dry season flow in the Mohlapitsi and Olifants Rivers. Initially, 40 Piezometers were installed along seven transects and water levels monitored in order to understand water table level characteristics (fluctuations) with time. Water levels in transects one, three, the right bank portion of transect four and transect six showed fluctuations. Transect two, the left bank portion of transect four and transect five did not show significant temporal changes. The relationships between piezometer water levels, rainfall in the study area and stream flow observed at a river gauging station are not clear. The river within the wetland is a gaining stream because the water table level elevation is above that of the river. This indicates that the wetland is feeding the river. The northern part of the wetland (T1 and T2) is affected by artificial drains and most of the piezometers closest to the river channel showed the lowest variations. The relationships between rainfall, groundwater, and surface water at this site shows that stream flow did not respond quickly to precipitation as expected, even in months when rainfall increased (for example, 74 and 103mm during 08/02/06 and 18/02/06 respectively), and the groundwater levels did not show fluctuations, indicating that groundwater responds gradually to precipitation, and that the relationship between rainfall, groundwater and surface water is complex. The environmental stable isotopes (deuterium and oxygen-18) and the radioactive isotope (tritium) were analyzed, along with field observations of electrical conductivity (EC), pH, total alkalinity (Talka) and some major and minor dissolved ion analyses for tracing water dynamics in the study area. A total of 39 water samples was taken and analyzed from boreholes, auger holes, right bank and left bank drains, various points along the river and springs in four sampling visits to the wetland. The results did not clearly provide a temporal record of isotope and chemical variations in the various sources. Results from the most extensive sampling survey in April 2007 provide the most comprehensive overview of hydrological relationships. Clustering of the stable isotope data suggests that the water samples of upstream and downstream river, auger holes further south and most drains clustered together suggesting a common water source and almost all samples fall above the global (GMWL) and local (Pretoria MWL) meteoric water lines, while some fall between the global and Pretoria meteoric water lines. Six representative water samples were analyzed for major ion concentration. Both cation (Ca, Mg, K, and Na) and anion (HCO3, SO4, Cl, and NO3) analyses in November 2007 confirmed conclusions reached from field observations. The analysis shows that a single type of water (Ca, Mg-HCO3) is involved in the study area. In almost all major ion plots, the right bank drains, upstream river and downstream river samples grouped together in a single cluster. As the means for reliable river flow measurements were not available, except for the gauging station at the outlet of the valley, rough, semi-quantitative estimates were made during several field visits. These, suggest considerable losses of river flow into the gravel/boulder beds at and below a gabion dam at the head of the valley. Three major and several other left bank springs and right bank drains at transects T1 and T2 contributed to the river flow at all times. Along with the isotopic and chemical evidence, these observations have lead to a hypothesis that river water enters the wetland and flows back to the Mohlapitsi River through boulder beds underlying the wetland and through drains on the surface of the argillaceous aquitard covering the more conductive boulder beds. Deeper dolomitic groundwater does not appear to contribute to the water balance at least in the northern half of the wetland. Although environmental isotope and hydrochemistry results may not unequivocally prove this hypothesis they do not contradict it.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the way in which OBE teacher training in the Northern Province is being managed, particularly in Region 4. The study also aimed to contribute in providing information about how the Provincial office of the Northern Province is managing OBE teacher training. The literature review covered both materials in the Provincial, National and other countries. The study's research methodology was qualitative, which includes interviews, observation and case study based. Interviews were scheduled with Provincial, Regional, District Dept officials, Educators and Principals. The study has revealed that Region 4 cannot manage the implementation of OBE teacher training properly and effectively due to constrains such as lack of transport, insufficient training for trainer facilitators and educators, et cetera. / Educational Studies / M.Ed. (Education Management)

M.Sc. / Please refer to full text to view abstract

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document / Dissertation (MA (Anthropology))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Anthropology and Archaeology / unrestricted

The UG3 at Modikwa Platinum Mine occurs as a platiniferous, planar chromitite seam. It is stratigraphically located in the Upper Critical Zone of the Eastern Bushveld Complex. Field work study comprise of underground mapping, sampling, surface mapping, borehole core logging, microprobing and microscopic investigations carried out at the Rhodes University. The UG3 at the Modikwa Platinum Mine is about 22cm thick chromitite seam underlain by a white fine grained anorthosite and overlain by a brown medium grained feldspathic pyroxenite. It is an incomplete cyclic unit consisting of chromite and feldspathic pyroxenite. The UG3 reef at the Modikwa Platinum Mine lease area represents a Platinum Group Metal resource of 300 million tons of ore at an in situ grade of 2.5g/t. Under the current market conditions the UG3 reef remains unprofitable to mine in an underground operation due to the operational cost involved. However, it has been illustrated that the UG3 chromitite seam can increase profit margins in an open pit operation provided it is mined together with the economic UG2 chromitite seam. The extraction of the UG3 as ore in the four Modikwa UG2 open pits would result in a combined operating cash profit of R330 million. The UG3 chromitite seam is platiniferous. The platinum-group minerals (PGM) range in size from less than 10μm to about 70μm. The PGMs are associated with sulphides and are both located in the interstitial silicates and are concentrated in the chromitite seam. The PGMs show a strong preference to contact boundaries of the silicate grains, the chromite grains and the sulphide phases. In some instances, they are enclosed within the chromite grains in association with sulphides. The general sulphide assemblage comprises pentlandite and chalcopyrite whereas, the PGMs assemblage comprises cooperite, ferroplatinum, laurite, FeRhS and PtRhS.

Education has been identified as a priority area by the South African government, in particular by the African National Congress as the ruling party. To this end, huge amounts of money are being spent on education as a service that has been approved by the legislators. Rules and regulations have been promulgated, and among others, the South African Schools Act, Act No. 84 of 1996, has been enacted. Rich research has also been funded with the sole intention of providing quality education to the people. Education of unacceptably poor quality has, however, been the result, as postulated by Peterson and Hassel (1998:55). The above are attested to by the findings that the political tensions emanating from the conduct of the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union and the Professional Educators’ Union, leading to class disruptions and general instability, erode the ethos of accountability on the part of educators and therefore impact negatively on service delivery. Furthermore, the Limpopo Department of Education is not immune to the challenges ranging from the elements of corrupt activities that often surface, teacher attrition which in the main is caused by lack of discipline. Winkler, Modise and Dawber (1998) indicate that teaching has never been easy, and many teachers are leaving their jobs because of the many problems with children in classrooms. Some of the problems cited are children who do not want to learn and learning that is becoming too difficult for the students because they do not want to listen. This study adopted sequential mixed methods namely, quantitative and qualitative research methods which are viewed as complementary rather than opposing approaches. Information was amassed from the subjects through interviews, observation, documentary survey and observation and the information has since been triangulated to validate the facts. All the methodologies employed proved to be useful in this study. The study sought to test the hypothesis “Good governance is informed by strong accountability and future-oriented organisation, continuously steering it towards its mission and vision, and thereby ensuring that the day-to-day management and administration are always linked with the organisation’s values and goals and thus eventually bringing about effectual and accelerated service delivery” to the South African populace without compromise. After empirically testing the hypothesis, showing mixed reaction informed by the findings of the study, five recommendations were made, based on the conclusions arrived at.

Community food gardens are regarded as a means through which rural households can improve their livelihoods. This study explores the contribution of community food gardens (CFG) to livelihoods in the Lepelle-Nkumpi local municipality in the Limpopo province. The objectives of this study are, firstly to explore the reason behind CFG participation and the reasons behind the participating possibility. Secondly, the study seeks to identify the socio-economic factors influencing the participation of households in CFG and lastly to determine the influence of CFG and other socio-economic variables on household food security status (HFSS). Descriptive statistical analysis was used to describe the socio-economic characteristics and the reasons behind CFG participation and the reasons behind the participating possibility. The binary logistic regression model was used to analyse the determinants of household participation in community food gardens as well as the contribution of CFG to HFSS on Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software version 21. Through a structured questionnaire, data was collected from a sample of 180 households which was obtained using multistage sampling. Descriptive results on the characteristics of sampled households revealed that there are high levels of food security in the area with 70% being food secure of which around 42.2% are CFG participants and 30% are food insecure. Furthermore the descriptive statistical analysis indicated that participation of households in CFG is mainly to obtain a source of food among the CFG participants and to generate income amongst the non-participants. On the basis of descriptive analysis, this study concludes that source of food and income generation respectively are the main reasons behind CFG participation and the possibilities of becoming a participant. Therefore the study accepts the research hypothesis stating that “There are social and economic reasons behind household participation and the possibilities of participating in CFG”. Binary results for the determinants of CFG participation revealed that socio-economic variables such as household size, farm income, household monthly income, land size, household perception, marital status, agricultural training and homestead gardening significantly influence household decisions to participate in CFG. This is an implication that socio-economic variables tested in this study are significantly influential to the household decision to participate in CFG, leading to the acceptance of the first hypothesis which states that “Socioeconomic factors determine the community food garden ownership or participation”. The results of the contribution made by CFG to HFSS showed that socioeconomic variables such as gender, age, household size, farm income, educational level, household monthly income, marital status, information access, formal employment status and CFG involvement significantly affect household food security status in the study area. The result indicates a positive contribution to HFSS and implies that socio-economic variables tested in this study have a significant influence on HFSS, leading to the acceptance of the second hypothesis which states that “Community food gardens have a positive effect on food security status of household in Lepelle-Nkumpi Local Municipality Limpopo province.” Therefore it is relevant to concluded that in the area of Lepelle-Nkumpi local municipality, social economic factors plays a vital role in the participation of households in CFG as well as improving the state household food security status.