scholarly journals The extent of benchmarking in the South African financial sector

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 315-321 ◽  
Author(s):  
W Vermeulen

Benchmarking is the process of identifying, understanding and adapting outstanding practices from within the organisation or from other businesses, to help improve performance. The importance of benchmarking as an enabler of business excellence has necessitated an in-depth investigation into the current state of benchmarking in South Africa. This research project highlights the fact that respondents realise the importance of benchmarking, but that various problems hinder the effective implementation of benchmarking. Based on the research findings, recommendations for achieving success are suggested. 

2006 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 14-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liz Stanley ◽  
Sue Wise

Feminist fractured foundationalism has been developed over a series of collaborative writings as a combined epistemology and methodology, although it has mainly been discussed in epistemological terms. It was operationalised as a methodology in a joint research project in South Africa concerned with investigating two important ways that the experiences of children in the South African War 1899-1902, in particular in the concentration camps established during its commando and ‘scorched earth’ phase, were represented contemporaneously: in the official records, and in photography. The details of the research and writing process involved are provided around discussion of the nine strategies that compose feminist fractured foundationalism and its strengths and limitations in methodological terms are reviewed.


1987 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 182-205
Author(s):  
J. J. Kritzinger

The remaining missionary task in South Africa This article is based on the results of a research project of the Institute for Missiological Research at the University of Pretoria which was recently concluded. The author and a team of co-workers researched practically the whole of South Africa in an endeavour to describe the contemporary situation of its population and the unfinished task of the church. The understanding of the missionary task which formed the basis of this project, and a sample of the kind of results obtained are illustrated in this article by means of 12 representative or typical scenarios which together indicate the dimensions of the future task for the South African church.


2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-29
Author(s):  
Bathmanathan Vasie Naicker ◽  
Md. Humayun Kabir

Since it has been observed that credit granting is a serious problem across the entire credit market, South Africa introduced National Credit Act 34 of 2005 in order to regulate the credit industry and protect credit consumers from becoming over-indebted. The study highlights and examines the implementation of the Act in relation to the South African home loans market, focussing on First National Bank home loans portfolio. The study documents that the current state of consumer indebtedness shows that both credit institutions and consumers were responsible for over extending retail credit. The study noticed that credit industry has significantly managed to regulate the retail credit through the implementation of the Act. Furthermore, the study finds that a new stakeholder such as a debt counsellor has been introduced into the retail credit value chain for debt counselling for over-indebted clients. However, the study recommends that internal forums within banks as well as industry-wide forums should be used in order to ensure that the implementation of a regulation that impacts the entire credit industry is implemented with all stakeholders to limit any possible misinterpretation of key sections of a new regulation.


2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 145-186
Author(s):  
Lee-Ann Steenkamp ◽  
Peter Cramer

The South African Revenue Service (SARS) implemented a more aggressive reporting system in 2008 by introducing new reportable arrangements ('RA') provisions in the Income Tax Act. In March 2010, SARS issued a revised Draft Guide to Reportable Arrangements for public comment. More than three years after its release, there is still no finalised, updated guide available to address the 'new' RA provisions. Determining when arrangements should be reported to SARS therefore remains both problematic and onerous. It is the purpose of this article to examine some of the problematic terminology in an attempt to afford South African taxpayers greater clarity in the identification and disclosure of RAs. The research findings are tested through a survey conducted among tax partners and directors at a sample of 40 leading audit and legal firms in South Africa. The majority of respondents agreed with the conclusions drawn from the literature study.


2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Andre Mangu

After several decades of apartheid rule, which denied human rights to the majority of the population on the ground of race and came to be regarded as a crime against humanity, South Africa adopted its first democratic Constitution in the early 1990s. The 1996 Constitution, which succeeded the 1993 interim Constitution, is considered one of the most progressive in the world. In its founding provisions, it states that South Africa is a democratic state founded on human dignity, the achievement of equality, the advancement of human rights and freedoms. The Constitution enshrines fundamental human rights in a justiciable Bill of Rights as a cornerstone of democracy. Unfortunately, in the eyes of a number of politicians, officials and lay-persons, the rights in the Bill of Rights accrue to South African citizens only. Xenophobia, which has been rampant since the end of apartheid, seems to support the idea that foreigners should not enjoy these rights. Foreign nationals have often been accused of posing a threat to South African citizens with regard to employment opportunities. In light of the South African legislation and jurisprudence, this article affirms the position of the South African labour law that foreign nationals are indeed protected by the Constitution and entitled to rights in the Bill of Rights, including the rights to work and fair labour practices.


2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mokoko Piet Sebola ◽  
Malemela Angelinah Mamabolo

The purpose of this article is to evaluate the engagement of farm beneficiaries in South Africa in the governance of restituted farms through communal property associations. The South African government has already spent millions of rands on land restitution to correct the imbalance of the past with regard to farm ownership by the African communities. Various methods of farm management to benefit the African society have been proposed, however, with little recorded success. This article argues that the South African post-apartheid government was so overwhelmed by political victory in 1994 that they introduced ambitious land reform policies that were based on ideal thinking rather than on a pragmatic approach to the South African situation. We used qualitative research methods to argue that the engagement of farm beneficiaries in farm management and governance through communal property associations is failing dismally. We conclude that a revisit of the communal property associations model is required in order to strengthen the position of beneficiaries and promote access to land by African communities for future benefit.


2020 ◽  
Vol 72 (1-3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lungisani Moyo

ABSTRACT This paper used qualitative methodology to explore the South African government communication and land expropriation without compensation and its effects on food security using Alice town located in the Eastern Cape Province South Africa as its case study. This was done to allow the participants to give their perceptions on the role of government communication on land expropriation without compensation and its effects on South African food security. In this paper, a total population of 30 comprising of 26 small scale farmers in rural Alice and 4 employees from the Department of Agriculture (Alice), Eastern Cape, South Africa were interviewed to get their perception and views on government communications and land expropriation without compensation and its effects on South African food security. The findings of this paper revealed that the agricultural sector plays a vital role in the South African economy hence there is a great need to speed up transformation in the sector.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 117
Author(s):  
Jared McDonald

Dr Jared McDonald, of the Department of History at the University of the Free State (UFS) in South Africa, reviews As by fire: the end of the South African university, written by former UFS vice-chancellor Jonathan Jansen.    How to cite this book review: MCDONALD, Jared. Book review: Jansen, J. 2017. As by Fire: The End of the South African University. Cape Town: Tafelberg.. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in the South, [S.l.], v. 1, n. 1, p. 117-119, Sep. 2017. Available at: <http://sotl-south-journal.net/?journal=sotls&page=article&op=view&path%5B%5D=18>. Date accessed: 12 Sep. 2017.   This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/


1995 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 297-304
Author(s):  
Willem A. M. Botes ◽  
J. F. Kapp

Field dilution studies were conducted on three “deep” water marine outfalls located along the South African coast to establish the comparibility of actual achievable initial dilutions against the theoretical predicted values and, where appropriate, to make recommendations regarding the applicability of the different prediction techniques in the design of future outfalls. The physical processes along the 3000 km long coastline of South Africa are diverse, ranging from dynamic sub-tropical waters on the east coast to cold, stratified stagnant conditions on the west coast. Fourteen existing offshore marine outfalls serve medium to large industries and various local authorities (domestic effluent). For this investigation three outfalls were selected to represent the range of outfall types as well as the diversity of the physical conditions of the South African coastline. The predicted dilutions, using various approaches, compared well with the measured dilutions. It was found that the application of more “simple” prediction techniques (using average current velocities and ambient densities) may be more practical, ensuring a conservative approach, in pre-feasibility studies, compared to the more detailed prediction models, which uses accurate field data (stratification and current profiles), when extensive field data is not readily available.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document