M. Tech. Agriculture / Shortly after World War two (WWII), the South African government responded to the mounting food production crisis in the homelands by introducing public tractor services. Establishment of irrigation schemes and provision of public tractor services for use by smallholders were two important government-initiated modernisation projects in the homelands. It was in line with the idea of modernisation that smallholder irrigation schemes were the prime target for public tractor services, and this lead to the rapid abandonment of the use of animal draught for cultivation on these schemes. By the time public tractor services were completely dismantled, cultivation on smallholder irrigation schemes had become almost entirely dependent on tractor draught. Thereafter, hiring the services of privately owned tractor enterprises became the principal way in which farmers on smallholder irrigation schemes in Limpopo Province cultivated their plots. The rising cost of hiring private tractors placed financial stress on the cropping enterprises of smallholder irrigators, generating interest in alternatives that were more affordable. Animal draught represents an attractive alternative to tractor draught. Whereas prevailing economic circumstances on smallholder irrigation schemes favour the adoption of cultivation systems that are cheaper than those offered by private tractor enterprises, it is not known whether animal draught land preparation enterprises are an appropriate alternative to the existing tractor enterprises from an economic and social perspective. In order to resolve this knowledge problem, the current study was done with the following two main objectives: to determine the profitability of the different types of land preparation enterprises operating on smallholder canal irrigation schemes in Vhembe District Municipality; and to determine the social acceptability of these different types of land preparation enterprises by measuring the perceptions of the quality of the cultivation services provided by these enterprises among plot holders on these schemes.

This study is set out to investigate municipal service delivery in the Vhembe district with specific reference to the following areas:- The nature and level of community participation, councillors’ understanding of their functions, roles and responsibilities and capacity required of local municipalities to deliver quality services based on their constitutional and legislative competencies. For the past eight years, municipal service delivery protests have become prevalent in South Africa. Even after the 2008 National and Provincial elections, more cases of service delivery protests were reported. All indications are that service delivery is a phenomenon that needs to be explored to provide understanding of the deep rooted problem areas affecting municipalities. A qualitative study was undertaken to enable the researcher to provide answers to questions related to whether communities are participating in the activities of the municipalities, whether or not councillors have the necessary understanding, of their roles and responsibilities for example, communicating information to their constituency regarding service delivery progress, and whether municipalities have the required capacity to deliver quality services. The key findings of this study are that there is a need to come up with a model which ensures that municipal councils are no longer situated in towns but in the villages, that there is a need to rethink political deployment as it is believed to impact 10 negatively to the capacity of municipalities to deliver services, and that the lack of monitoring and evaluation of councilors’ performance is increasingly causing challenges, and undermining the purposes and intentions of developmental local government.

M. Tech. Education / Learners in the Limpopo province are reported to be performing very poorly in their examination results. This is clearly seen in Grade 12 results which are published for the entire country, South Africa. This problem is caused by, among other things, the lack of effective communication between educators and learners. This study investigated the problem of communication between learners and educators by using a quantitative approach, through implementing sampling, data collection and data analysis. A total of 47 educators from four secondary schools falling under Soutpansberg East Circuit of the Vhembe District answered a questionnaire. The collected information was grouped into categories and revealed that aspects of effective communication, for example, feedback, asking questions and proximity should be considered in the teaching-learning activity to improve learner performance. The results of the study were translated in a number of recommendations for improved communication practice and further research.

This research is undertaken in Vhembe region in Limpopo Province. Many researchers, on the subject of ‘parent involvement’, have conducted in-depth research; this means parental involvement is not a new term. According to St John and Griffith (1997:48-52), there are important benefits that teachers, learners and parents derive from parents’ participation in school programmes and activities such as healthy communication, generation of interest and building positive self-esteem and confidence, to mention but a few while their children attending school during pre-primary, primary and secondary level. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether parents in Vhembe District involved themselves in the education of their children. The population of a study included three schools in Vhembe, six parents from each sampled schools, six teachers from sampled schools and each principal from sampled schools. The purposeful sampling technique was used to select the participants. The findings are briefly that: -Few parents indicated their appreciation of parental involvement by suggesting ways in which they could become involved, it was clear that a developmental programme should be introduced to motivate parental involvement; -It also came to the attention of the researcher that most of the parents did not attend school meetings because of lack of proper communication; -Parents were silent about the monitoring and supervision of their children’s work while they are at home, which can result in better academic performance. Parents should have high expectations for their children’s future and academic achievement. -It emerged from the interviews that many factors present barriers to parental involvement; like parents’ limited education, economic status, lack of a school policy, poor communication and teachers’ attitude towards parents. Recommendations -From the conclusions drawn above, it is recommended that parental involvement workshops be organised for school managers, school teachers and parents. -To improve parents’ attendance of school meetings, teachers should provide them with an opportunity to communicate their expectations and concerns. -In relation to parents’ role in their children’s education, parents should be motivated to ensure that their children accomplish their goals. -Parents should be empowered with skills of self-confidence, so that they will realise that their children have potential. -Schools should encourage parents to play an important role as partners in their children’s education. / Educational Management and Leadership / M. Ed. (Educational Management)

This research is undertaken in Vhembe region in Limpopo Province. Many researchers, on the subject of ‘parent involvement’, have conducted in-depth research; this means parental involvement is not a new term. According to St John and Griffith (1997:48-52), there are important benefits that teachers, learners and parents derive from parents’ participation in school programmes and activities such as healthy communication, generation of interest and building positive self-esteem and confidence, to mention but a few while their children attending school during pre-primary, primary and secondary level. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether parents in Vhembe District involved themselves in the education of their children. The population of a study included three schools in Vhembe, six parents from each sampled schools, six teachers from sampled schools and each principal from sampled schools. The purposeful sampling technique was used to select the participants. The findings are briefly that: -Few parents indicated their appreciation of parental involvement by suggesting ways in which they could become involved, it was clear that a developmental programme should be introduced to motivate parental involvement; -It also came to the attention of the researcher that most of the parents did not attend school meetings because of lack of proper communication; -Parents were silent about the monitoring and supervision of their children’s work while they are at home, which can result in better academic performance. Parents should have high expectations for their children’s future and academic achievement. -It emerged from the interviews that many factors present barriers to parental involvement; like parents’ limited education, economic status, lack of a school policy, poor communication and teachers’ attitude towards parents. Recommendations -From the conclusions drawn above, it is recommended that parental involvement workshops be organised for school managers, school teachers and parents. -To improve parents’ attendance of school meetings, teachers should provide them with an opportunity to communicate their expectations and concerns. -In relation to parents’ role in their children’s education, parents should be motivated to ensure that their children accomplish their goals. -Parents should be empowered with skills of self-confidence, so that they will realise that their children have potential. -Schools should encourage parents to play an important role as partners in their children’s education. / Educational Leadership and Management / M. Ed. (Educational Management)

This study explored the attitudes of community members toward the Human Rabies in the Vhembe district of the Limpopo Province, South Africa. This study was underpinned by interpretative phenomenological analysis design. Data were collected using individual interviews of 20 participants and 6 focus groups consisting of six community members each. Both sets of interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. Data were analysed using interpretive phenomenological analysis framework for data analysis. Three super-ordinate themes emerged from data analysis: attitudes toward the Human Rabies, factors influencing attitudes toward the Human Rabies and tackling the Human Rabies. Results indicate that attitudes toward the Human Rabies has a direct influence on adherence to prevention and care approaches. Attitudes can be influenced by addressing training and educational needs and perceptions of prevention and care approaches. Recommendations are made to enhance adherence to prevention and care approaches for management of the Human Rabies. / Health Studies / M.A. (Health Studies)

M.Sc. (Zoology) / The Limpopo Province covers an area of 12.46 million hectares and these accounts for 10.2 per cent of the total land area of the Republic of South Africa. The province is endowed with abundant agricultural resources and it is one of the country’s prime agricultural regions noted for the production of fruits and vegetables, cereals, tea, and sugar. A key feature of the agricultural industry of Limpopo Province is its dualism. There are two distinct types of agricultural production systems. The large scale commercial farming system occupies approximately 70% of the total land area. The smallholder farms are located mostly in the former homeland areas and they cover approximately 30% of the provincial land surface area. The town of Thohoyandou, with its surrounding villages, is the area of greatest human concentration in the Luvuvhu Catchment and subsistence farming is about a third of the total agricultural component. It is important to study the effects of agricultural inputs (e.g. fertilizers and sediment loads) on aquatic ecosystems in order to fully understand the processes involved of these stresses on aquatic ecosystems. Knowledge of these impacts toward the environment and human health is often limited due to lack of capacity building, especially among small scale farmers. Ten bio-monitoring sites were studied on five systems in the Vhembe district. The sites were sampled during the low flow period of November 2011 and the high flow period of April 2012. Sampling sites were selected to present conditions in the Mutale, Mutshindudi and Tshinane Rivers upstream and downstream of the potential influence of small scale agricultural activities...

This research study explored and described a partogram as a clinical practice guideline for monitoring and managing women during labour at Vhembe District of Limpopo province. A qualitative, explorative, descriptive and contextual design was used in order to achieve the study objectives. Purposive sampling was carried out to select three hospitals in order to obtain comprehensive data from the district. The research study was conducted in three phases. Face-to-face semi-structured interviews were conducted with 17 midwives who were selected conveniently from the three hospitals. Document study was also conducted on 24 partograms that were conveniently selected from the three hospitals on the days that interviews were conducted, using a self-designed checklist. Tesch’s eight steps of qualitative data analysis were used to analyse the data, and simple, descriptive statistics using frequencies were used to analyse the data obtained from the document study. Four themes that emerged from the data are: benefits of implementing the partogram, challenges experienced, attitudes of staff and evaluation on how the guideline is being implemented in the wards, including giving feedback. These aspects were indicated as pivotal in the implementation of the guideline in monitoring a woman during labour. The findings on document study revealed gaps in recording, mostly on aspects that needed frequent observations and on aspects in which resources that needed to be used in monitoring were lacking. The strategies to improve the implementation of a guideline were developed based on the research findings, sent to one of the hospitals for review and comments were included in the discussions. It is recommended that in-service training on the implementation of the partogram be conducted regularly for midwives. Hospital management and supervisors need to provide support, enough staff and equipment in order to enable midwives to use the partogram / Health Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

This research study explored and described a partogram as a clinical practice guideline for monitoring and managing women during labour at Vhembe District of Limpopo province. A qualitative, explorative, descriptive and contextual design was used in order to achieve the study objectives. Purposive sampling was carried out to select three hospitals in order to obtain comprehensive data from the district. The research study was conducted in three phases. Face-to-face semi-structured interviews were conducted with 17 midwives who were selected conveniently from the three hospitals. Document study was also conducted on 24 partograms that were conveniently selected from the three hospitals on the days that interviews were conducted, using a self-designed checklist. Tesch’s eight steps of qualitative data analysis were used to analyse the data, and simple, descriptive statistics using frequencies were used to analyse the data obtained from the document study. Four themes that emerged from the data are: benefits of implementing the partogram, challenges experienced, attitudes of staff and evaluation on how the guideline is being implemented in the wards, including giving feedback. These aspects were indicated as pivotal in the implementation of the guideline in monitoring a woman during labour. The findings on document study revealed gaps in recording, mostly on aspects that needed frequent observations and on aspects in which resources that needed to be used in monitoring were lacking. The strategies to improve the implementation of a guideline were developed based on the research findings, sent to one of the hospitals for review and comments were included in the discussions. It is recommended that in-service training on the implementation of the partogram be conducted regularly for midwives. Hospital management and supervisors need to provide support, enough staff and equipment in order to enable midwives to use the partogram / Health Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

Thesis (M.A.(Practical Theology))--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 103-107).