The Economics of Households in South Africa

2021 ◽  
pp. 799-822
Author(s):  
Dorrit Posel ◽  
Katharine Hall
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Historical Review ◽  
Household Size ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Household Formation ◽  
Fertility Rates ◽  
Micro Data ◽  
Single Person ◽  
Sizeable Increase

Abstract: This chapter first provides a brief historical review of household formation and its disruption during the apartheid decades. It then uses national micro-data (1995–2018) to describe broad changes in household formation since the democratic transition. Among these trends, the chapter highlights a sizeable increase in household formation and a decrease in average household size, associated partly with a rise in single-person households and a fall in fertility rates. Gendered living arrangements have also changed considerably as the share of households with a co-resident couple has fallen. Specifically, the growth of households where all resident adults are either female or male has far exceeded overall household formation, and the share of children living only with their mother has risen apace. However, households also continue to be stretched to include members who live elsewhere for much of the year. The chapter then sketches the variation in economic resources across different household types, highlighting changes in recent decades.

scholarly journals Household transitions in rural South Africa, 1996—2003

2007 ◽  
Vol 35 (69_suppl) ◽  
pp. 130-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Wittenberg ◽  
Mark A. Collinson
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Surveillance System ◽  
Transition Probabilities ◽  
Rural South ◽  
Single Person ◽  
The Social ◽  
System Data ◽  
Rural South Africa ◽  
Hiv Aids

Aims: To investigate changes in household structure in rural South Africa over the period 1996—2003, a period marked by politico-structural change and an escalating HIV/AIDS epidemic. In particular, the authors examine whether there is dissolution of extended family living arrangements. Methods: Data from the Agincourt demographic surveillance system, in rural north-eastern South Africa, and the rural sub-samples of selected nationally representative data sets were used to compare changes in the cross-sectional distribution of household types. Surveillance system data were further analysed to estimate the transition probabilities between household types. The latent pressures for change within the Agincourt area were analysed by projecting the household transition probabilities forward and comparing the projected steady-state distributions to the current distributions. Results: The national surveys show dramatic changes in the social structure in rural areas, particularly an increase in the importance of single person households. These trends are not confirmed in the surveillance system data. The national ``changes'' can possibly be ascribed to changes in sampling frames or household definitions. The transition probabilities within the Agincourt area show considerable changes between household types, despite a slower change in the aggregate distributions. The most important projected long-run changes are an increase in the proportion of three-generation linear households. ``Simpler'' household types such as single person households and nuclear households will become relatively less common. Conclusions: The structure of households is evolving under the pressure of social change and increased mortality due to HIV/AIDS. There is no evidence, however, that the social fabric is unravelling or that individuals are becoming increasingly isolated residentially.

scholarly journals Where have all the susceptible gonococci gone? A historical review of changes in MIC distribution over the past 75 years

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Kenyon ◽  
Jolein Laumen ◽  
Dorien Van Den Bossche ◽  
Christophe Van Dijck
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Antimicrobial Resistance ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Historical Review ◽  
The United States ◽  
Antimicrobial Consumption ◽  
The Past ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Loss Of Susceptibility

Abstract Background Does the emergence of antimicrobial resistance in Neisseria gonorrhoeae include the erasure of highly susceptible strains or does it merely involve a stretching of the MIC distribution? If it was the former this would be important to know as it would increase the probability that the loss of susceptibility is irreversible.Methods We conducted a historical analysis based on a literature review of changes of N. gonorrhoeae MIC distribution over the past 75 years for 3 antimicrobials (benzylpenicillin, ceftriaxone and azithromycin) in five countries (Denmark, Japan, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States).Results Changes in MIC distribution were most marked for benzylpenicillin and showed evidence of a right shifting of MIC distribution that was associated with a reduction/elimination of susceptible strains in all countries. In the case of ceftriaxone and azithromycin, where only more recent data was available, right shifting was also found in all countries but the extent of right shifting varied and the evidence for the elimination of susceptible strains was more mixed.Conclusions The finding of right shifting of MIC distribution combined with reduction/elimination of susceptible strains is concerning since it suggests that this shifting may not be reversible. Since excess antimicrobial consumption is likely to be responsible for this right shifting, this insight provides additional impetus to promote antimicrobial stewardship.

scholarly journals The impact of adult mortality on the living arrangements of older people in rural South Africa

2005 ◽  
Vol 25 (6) ◽  
pp. 431-444 ◽  
Author(s):  
VICTORIA HOSEGOOD ◽  
IAN M. TIMÆUS
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Older People ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Adult Mortality ◽  
Living Alone ◽  
Rural South ◽  
Kwazulu Natal ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Quality Infrastructure ◽  
Rural South Africa

This paper examines changes in households with older people in a northern rural area of KwaZulu Natal province, South Africa, between January 2000 and January 2002. The focus is the impact of adult deaths, especially those from AIDS, on the living arrangements of older people. The longitudinal data are from the Africa Centre Demographic Information System. In 2000, 3,657 older people (women aged 60 years or older, men 65 years or older) were resident in the area, and 3,124 households had at least one older member. The majority (87%) of older people lived in three-generation households. Households with older people were significantly poorer, more likely to be headed by a woman, and in homesteads with poorer quality infrastructure than households without older members. By January 2002, 316 (8%) of the older people in the sample had died. Of all the households with an older person, 12 per cent experienced at least one adult death from AIDS. The paper shows that older people, particularly those living alone or with children in the absence of other adults, were living in the poorest households. They were also coping with an increasing burden of young adult deaths, the majority of which were attributable to AIDS.

People at the Gates

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Flordeliz T. Bugarin
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Oral Traditions ◽  
Eastern Cape ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Traded Goods ◽  
Economic Interaction ◽  
The Impact

During the early nineteenth century in South Africa, the British built Fort Willshire on the banks of the Keiskamma River. At its gates, they established the first official trade fairs and mandated that trade throughout the Eastern Cape be confined here. This area became a vortex in which a variety of people convened, traded goods, and influenced cultural and economic interaction. This chapter introduces the various Africans who gravitated to the region, claimed the surrounding lands throughout the river valley, and vied for economic resources and political power. By looking at the archival records, oral traditions, and archaeological evidence, research demonstrates that the region consisted of a variety of people with different backgrounds and affiliations. Furthermore, this area provides a model for understanding the impact of the British on the Xhosa, yet it is just as much a window to the interactions between various Xhosa factions and chiefdoms.

Growing Women Entrepreneurship in the Creative Industries in South Africa

2021 ◽  
pp. 237-261
Author(s):  
Ndwakhulu Stephen Tshishonga
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Job Creation ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Creative Industries ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Women Entrepreneurship ◽  
Women Business Owners ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
New Ideas

This chapter interrogates the potential of women entrepreneurship as an economic strategy to address unemployment and job creation. The chapter focusses on creative industry to demonstrate that creativity and innovations can activate entrepreneurship among women in South Africa. It is through entrepreneurship that entrepreneurs transform their innovative and creative ideas into business enterprises and job creation. Although female entrepreneurship for economic development is recognised internationally, it lags behind those of men especially in the number of women business owners and the size of businesses including access to economic resources. The chapter argues that entrepreneurs are central in boosting the economy and the optimal use of their skills, innovative new ideas that sustain entrepreneurial creative projects. The chapter makes use of a visual profile, participant observation, case studies, and face-to-face interviews with women involved in creative industries such as bead making, pottery, traditional dress-making, and traditional dance.

Brief Historical Review of Membrane Development and Membrane Applications in Wastewater Treatment in Southern Africa

1992 ◽  
Vol 25 (10) ◽  
pp. 1-4 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. R. Botha ◽  
R. D. Sanderson ◽  
C. A. Buckley
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Mining Industry ◽  
Historical Review ◽  
Mine Waters ◽  
Considerable Potential ◽  
South Africans ◽  
Charged Membrane ◽  
The World ◽  
Membrane Development

Away back in 1953 few people in the world, let alone South Africa, knew or had heard about membrane desalination, but there was an increasing awareness that electrodialysis had considerable potential for the desalination of brackish water. In South Africa the development of the new gold fields in the northern Orange Free State and the problems posed by the presence of excessive volumes of very saline mine waters stimulated interest in desalination and the CSIR* in collaboration with the mining industry became involved in the development of the electrodialysis process. By 1959 the largest brackish desalination plant in the world had been built and commissioned. South Africans were thus in the forefront of this technology, even to the extent of making the required membranes locally. Our historical review of membrane development and the applications of membrane technology in Southern Africa encompasses both pressure- and voltage-driven processes. Examples of the pressure processes are microfiltration, ultrafiltration and charged membrane ultrafiltration or nanofiltration, and finally reverse osmosis with fixed and dynamically formed membranes. The voltage-drive processes considered are electrodialysis and electrodialysis reversal.

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