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Masters Degrees (Public Policy)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10413/14255

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Browsing Masters Degrees (Public Policy) by Author "Johnson, Belinda."

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    Evaluating the role of business incubators in South Africa.
    (2015) Khuzwayo, Sithabiso Siyabonga.; Johnson, Belinda.
    The aim of this study was to evaluate the role of business incubators and business incubation programmes in South Africa. Worldwide, business incubation programmes are aimed at promoting economic development by supporting emerging entrepreneurs or start-up companies by cushioning them in their nascent phase of business development. South Africa only adopted business incubation as a strategy for promoting entrepreneurship and supporting SMMEs about two decades ago. This route was taken in order to build an inclusive economy whilst addressing a number of the country’s multifaceted challenges; therefore business incubation as a strategy had to yield rapid results. The study’s conceptual framework centred around how business incubators, through organisation and providing certain contingencies, cushioned SMMEs; and on how, through agglomeration, SMMEs were able to exploit the economies of scale and networking effects, as well as how they benefited from the positive externalities. The research methodologies adopted in this study comprise a multi-pronged approach made up of both secondary and primary research methods. The primary research methods include surveys, questionnaires and interviews with business incubation programmes based in KwaZulu-Natal. The study used small- micro- and medium-sized enterprises (SMMEs) or entrepreneurs as the unit of analysis, six were randomly selected from each of the fifteen business incubators in the province to take part in the survey questionnaire. The main findings of the study were firstly that South African entrepreneurs were faced with quite a number of challenges and these challenges were acting as a deterrence for a lot of people that wanted to consider entrepreneurship as a career path. Secondly, business incubators in South Africa were failing to fill in the gaps by mitigating against the challenges entrepreneurs faced. At best a number of these business incubators served duplicate roles as office parks with little value-added services. This study discovered that South Africa still needs to do a lot of groundwork if wanted to promote entrepreneurship and stimulate economic growth, but in the main, it was seemingly in the right direction policy-wise.
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    Exploring the social impacts of the expansion of the port of Durban.
    (2021) Jele, Pretty Xolisile.; Johnson, Belinda.
    Current research demonstrates that spatial developments are mostly the cause of social, environmental, and economic problems. While businesses expand, the quality of life in most communities deteriorates due to the social impacts that are associated with the expansion of industries. Governments are increasingly prioritizing and commissioning infrastructure of megaprojects such as ports, which are often supported by economic impact studies. The port of Durban is currently experiencing capacity constraints as a result of the congestion problems facing the harbour. The port developers (Transnet) proposed to expand the port as a solution to the congestion impediments. The old Durban airport relocated to La Mercy, presenting an opportunity to Transnet to purchase the old airport site at South Durban Basin (SDB) to commence the expansion of the port of Durban. The expansion plans include building a new port, construction of a link road from the Bluff through Clairwood, Austerville, and Merebank to connect with the national roads network. This research aims to explore the social impacts of the expansion of the port of Durban for the communities in the South Durban Basin. Underpinned by the Social impact theory and the Psychological impact theory, this study seeks to explore the extent to which the expansion of the Port of Durban will impact on SDB communities as well as determining whether the port expansion is justified for port development. The study used both primary and secondary data. The results of the research indicate that the magnitude of the social impacts and enormity of it all are such that the change in the lives of people living in SDB will be for the worst, given the current problems existing in the area. The expansion plans have been viewed to cause more “havoc” in the area. Moreover, the expansion of the port is not justified for port development because expanding the port may not necessarily mean that they will be to the degree required to remain competitive.