The purpose of the study was to investigate the perceptions of emerging black entrepreneurs on their ability to access government contract work with special reference to that outsourced by the Department of Economic Development and Tourism in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal. The study was based on the assumption that black emerging entrepreneurs are side lined by the procurement systems and processes of government, despite the fact when the new government took over after the democratic elections of 1994, it formulated legislation and policies and provided institutional framework to ensure that enterprises belonging to entrepreneurs of African descent in particular were brought into the economic mainstream activities of the country. The study utilized an exploratory description research design owing to publicity of literature on the effectiveness of government's procurement intervention strategies in addressing the needs of emerging black entrepreneurs. The study used two samples drawn from two research populations. In the first sample the population consisted of thirty-two tender submissions that emerging black entrepreneurs forwarded to the Department of Economic Development and Tourism in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal, in response to contract work or tenders advertised and evaluated by the Tender Evaluation Committee and the Tender Award Committee of the Department during the financial year 2001/2. An instrument was developed to elicit data from the tender documents for the purpose of orders. In the second sample the research population consisted of sixteen emerging black entrepreneurs whose tender documents submitted in response to the tenders outsourced by the Department during the financial year 2001/2 were evaluated by the Department's Tender Evaluation Committee and tender Award Committee during the period in question. The questionnaire was used to elicit information on the perceptions of emerging black entrepreneurs with regard to their level of participation in the procurement process of the Department. The findings of the study are supportive of the guiding questions and assumptions advanced for the purpose of focusing the study. The finding was that black emerging entrepreneurs perceived themselves to be non-participants in the procurement activities of the Department. The study also found the existence of structural problem, which acted as barriers to active participation, of black emerging entrepreneurs, in the outsourcing activities of the Department of Economic Development and Tourism in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal.

Thesis (MBA)-University of Natal, Durban, 2003.