Browsing by Author "Barnes, Justin Raymond."

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7

Combating AIDS/HIV spread in the workplace : a case study of the Durban clothing industry.
(2002) Chetty, Elzhaan.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
No abstract available.
Constraints and enabling factors affecting the implementation of affirmative action in an industry that is globalising : a study of the Durban automotive cluster.
(2005) Jubisa, Zingisa.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
This study investigates prevailing factors that impede the implementation of affirmative action in the Durban Automotive Cluster. This study will enable DAC affiliates to determine their obstacles and challenges with respect to the implementation of affirmative action. The service provider of the DAC CB and M Analysts) will also be able to advise companies through their development programmes and recommend what has to be done in order to bring blacks on board. This study relied on primary data. In-depth interviews were conducted with the senior managers ofDAC affiliates using unstructured questionnaires. Secondary data from the DAC database was analysed to strengthen the qualitative data. The data focused on the distribution of different population groups across the levels of occupations. The aim of the study is not to generalise about affirmative action but to obtain more in-depth clarity on the research problem. The findings have established that the pool of technically qualified and experienced blacks is very small and hence they are in short supply in the market. A number of factors such as direct ownership and low turnover of staff were raised as one of the aspects that hinder affirmative action. Constraints such as attitudes of white middle management appeared to have been addressed by these companies. The findings also clarified the role of human resources department in driving affirmative action. In most companies, the human resources department is part and parcel of management and actively involved in affirmative action. The study discovered that poaching also arises as a result of the shortage of skilled blacks. Retention of black employees is a problem for the majority of the companies. Despite these shortcomings, this study revealed that proper channels such as training, development and mentoring were followed for both internal and external recruits. This is being done to avoid window dressing. The other constraint of the affirmative action programme is government capacity. The key constraints to delivery are limited staff capacity, scarcity of human resources at governmental level; lack of coordination and integration with other spheres of national and provincial government labour departments and the lack of effective organizational, technical and managerial support for affirmative action. With respect to globalisation, the automotive sector is a dynamic and global sector which is changing fast due to technology and globalisation. As a result, the requirements of the Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM's) who are competing globally were seen as a hindering factor to the realisation of affirmative action. In conclusion, the achievements of affirmative action programmes amongst DAC affiliates were very modest in relation to both national expectations and their own stated goals due to shortage of skills, family and direct ownership and poaching. Implementation has proved far more complex and resource demanding than originally anticipated.
A critical analysis of South African industrial policy and its impact on the domestic clothing and textile industry from 1993-2010.
(2012) Ganyile, Jongi.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
As a developing country South Africa is faced with mammoth tasks of both creating employment/jobs that require less skill to be able to absorb millions of job-seekers who are less skilled, as well as putting its economy in proper footing, through investment in continuous labor skills and technological upgrading, so as to compete in the global market characterized by trade liberalization. Unfortunately the 20th century trade liberalization drive caught domestic industry off-guard. Domestic industry was found wanting and job losses tide was triggered. The labor-intensive clothing and textile industry was severely affected. The most vulnerable sections of the society (unskilled/semi-skilled and women laborers) were dealt a terrible blow. The government developed an industrial policy that contained sector-specific intervention measures to rescue the sector. Initially, the clothing and textile sector benefited from export promotion drive expedited through General Export Incentive Scheme and Duty Credit Certificate Scheme. Later on, the government introduced the Clothing and Textile Competitiveness Improvement Program which intended to build domestic production capacity of the sector and make the sector globally competitive. This research intended to conduct a critical analysis of the South African government industrial policy and its impact on the domestic clothing and textile sector from the period 1993 to 2010. On the one hand evidence on the ground indicates that General Export Incentive Scheme and Duty Credit Certificate Scheme failed to salvage the sector through building its competitiveness and strengthen its employment creation potential. On the other hand, while the Clothing and Textile Competitiveness Improvement Program’s positive contribution towards addressing crucial challenges facing the clothing and textile sector is acknowledged, the evidence on the ground also demonstrated that some crucial pitfalls need to be addressed to enable the sector to become globally competitive and to realize its employment potential.
A global value chain perspective to understanding and unpacking the development trajectory of the horticultural industry in Zambia : the case of small-scale farmers based in Lusaka.
(2014) Kazekula, Harold Katete.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
The Global Value Chains (GVCs) have become an important constellation around which global trade is evolving. This dissertation argues that the GVC framework is an important means for conceptualising horticulture in Zambia, highlighting the need to grasp how it operates in order to understand the linkages between buyers and small-scale horticulture growers. Evidence suggests that as quality, timely delivery, and other post-harvest handling requirements by supermarkets and other well-informed consumers are ever on the rise, it is likely influencing the structure of value chains. This is profoundly impacting small-scale horticulture producers, who are conceptualised to be ill-prepared for these changes. This study explored respondents’ perceptions of their perceived performance relative to customer requirements in order to understand the farmers’ performance gaps, aimed at strengthening the horticulture value chains and also help the small-scale farmers’ competitiveness. This dissertation hopes to contribute to available research on the ability of small-scale farmers to espouse corresponding critical success factors (CSFs) in the value chains aimed at securing their livelihoods. Accordingly, a questionnaire was used that developed CSFs to identify how the farmers actually undertake market analysis, and how these are used to inform the type of activities they undertake. For the purpose of analysis, the study divided the respondents into four categories: farmers supplying open markets, local consumers, marketeers and retailers to determine the extent to which the farmers benefit from the interactions at each stage of these chains. Several results were revealed. One is that specific chains influence turn-over; the type of assets owned that result into farmers’ competitiveness. This suggests that GVC can be touted as a panacea to profitability, asset development, including better incomes that are pro-poor. However, the study shows that this finding only holds if the farmers properly integrate by igniting market fundamentals to their favour. Secondly, the findings reveal that most of these farmers are locked in low-value chains, where they are experiencing erosion to their profit margins. Overally, none of the farmers except those who serve the retail trajectory realize better returns to boast of asset accumulation and optimal poverty reduction. Thirdly, it was found that the retail value chain govern the domestic value chains by placing emphasis on delivery speed, product innovation, and delivery reliability among other things. This produces two effects on small-scale farmers: (1) limited bargaining power in the industry, and they face some limits to upgrade their ethical and environmental practices implying lack in extension services, and (2) Many are unable to fully participate in rewards that high-value chain offers in terms of better terms and prices. This finding implicitly means they are failing to properly integrate as the new governors in the chains are influencing who or who should not be their supplier. Therefore, emanating from the results and drawing on the theory's implications, is the importance of a policy intervention as a result of insights of high entry barriers in rewarding markets, or it can be ignored at industry and farmers’ peril.
Interrogating the impact of industrial clustering on firm-level employment growth : a case study of the Durban Automotive Cluster (DAC).
(2012) Kirby, Sean.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
More than a decade since the democratic transition in 1994, South Africa still grapples with incredibly high levels of unemployment. An underperforming manufacturing sector has hampered economic growth and job creation in a country with a large pool of low and semi-skilled labour. In response to these challenges the South African government has initiated a guiding framework (NIPF) and action plan (IPAP) spearheaded by a sectoral and geographic focus to place the country on a more labour-intensive industrial growth path. Given this context, it is instructive to note that industrial clustering has been identified as critical to the sustainable development of industry in both developed and developing economies. Whilst the role of industrial clustering in assisting industrial development is well documented, this paper aims to further interrogate the impact of industrial clustering on another critical developmental issue, employment. Using the Durban Automotive Cluster (DAC) as a case study, the primary objective of this research is to interrogate the impact of industrial clustering on firm-level employment. A mixed-method methodology is utilised in the study, collecting both primary and secondary data from face-to-face interviews conducted with nineteen firm-level representatives and two DAC representatives. The research findings and analysis conclude that on average, the impact of the DAC on firm-level employment is positive, although largely indirect. In particular, small or firms with low degrees of production-related technological intensity on their production perceive the impact of the DAC on their firm-level employment most positively. The majority of member firms believe the DAC has either helped sustain or in some cases grow their firms’ employment levels. The only variable that has had a more positive impact on firm-level employment is the MIDP, with labour market policies perceived to have had the most negative impact on employment. The study suggests that greater communication between the DAC and local and national governments to ensure each stakeholder’s objectives are better aligned to ensure growth of the industry (to stimulate job creation). This process will not be simple and will depend heavily on the country’s ability to address critical macro-constraints that the study has shown to hinder employment growth amongst the DAC firms. Whilst the findings relate specifically to the automotive industry in KwaZulu-Natal, the relevance of the findings extends well beyond the automotive sector. The study provides key lessons for South Africa’s sectoral and geographically focused industrial policy focus that aims to achieve industrial development and employment growth in South Africa.
Is there a dependent relationship between firms' value chain positions and their commitment to human resource and skill upgrading? : a case study of automotive components manufacturing firms in the KZN, Eastern Cape and Gauteng Benchmarking Clubs of South Africa.
(2002) Earle, Elizabeth Nicola.; Barnes, Justin Raymond.
No abstract available.
Kwazulu Natal's institutional environment : its impact on development imperatives.
(1995) Barnes, Justin Raymond.; Morris, Michael.
The study of development in the 1960s and early 1970s was characterised by major struggles between competing ideological positions . Writings were dominated by attempts at getting the ideologies right , hence the proliferation ofNeo-Marxist and Neo-Classical discourses. The vociferous debates between development theorists such as Andre Gunder Frank (1966), Paul Baran (1962), W.W. Rostow (1963) and their followers) were indicative of this period. A fundamental shift occurred in the late 1970s, however, when the focus of development studies shifted to the more technical issue of how to get prices right. World Bank and International Monetary Fund intervention in state affairs were a characteristic of this fundamental shift, with the now notorious Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) of the 1980s being a direct result of this movement. The whole terrain of development studies has once again, however, undergone reconstruction, with the emergence of an entirely new strain of development-oriented thought in the 1990s. The key development problem being identified by social scientists at present is the institutional context in which development takes place. It has finally emerged that this issue surpasses those debates concerning ideology and monetary issues. Development protagonists now acknowledge that they can no longer look at development without considering the institutional environment in which it is to take place. Irrespective of ideology and price factors, then, it has finally been realised that development is highly contingent upon the establishment of a sound development-oriented institutional environment. Although the international development arena has experienced this fundamental shift, very little research has been done , thus far, on the dynamics of KwaZulu Natal 's institutional environment. As such very little is known about its efficacy in supporting or initiating development programmes in the province. If one considers the enormity of the development task in KwaZulu Natal this is an extremely unsatisfactory situation. KwaZulu Natal undoubtedly needs a sound institutional environment that supports development, thus making a study of how the province's institutional environment impacts on development imperatives an extremely important endeavour. It is hoped that this dissertation helps in some small way to fill the research void that is clearly apparent in KwaZulu Natal. It needs to be iterated right at the outset, however, that this dissertation is not meant to be an extensive, all encompassing critique of KwaZulu Natal's institutional environment. It is rather an exploration of those important issues pertaining to its institutional environment that impact so dramatically on development imperatives in the province.