The impact of global and regional markets on agricultural transformation in Southern Africa

Prior to the introduction of highly resistant sugarcane varieties, Sugarcane streak virus (SSV) caused serious sugar yield losses in southern Africa. Recently, sugarcane plants with streak symptoms have been identified across South Africa. Unlike the characteristic fine stippling and streaking of SSV, the symptoms resembled the broader, elongated chlorotic lesions commonly observed in wild grasses infected with the related Maize streak virus (MSV). Importantly, these symptoms have been reported on a newly released South African sugarcane cultivar, N44 (resistant to SSV). Following a first report from southern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa in February 2006, a survey in May 2007 identified numerous plants with identical symptoms in fields of cvs. N44, N27, and N36 across the entire South African sugarcane-growing region. Between 0.04 and 1.6% of the plants in infected fields had streak symptoms. Wild grass species with similar streaking symptoms were observed adjacent to one of these fields. Potted stalks collected from infected N44 plants germinated in a glasshouse exhibited streak symptoms within 10 days. Virus genomes were isolated and sequenced from a symptomatic N44 and Urochloa plantaginea plants collected from one of the surveyed fields (1). Phylogenetic analysis determined that while viruses from both plants closely resembled the South African maize-adapted MSV strain, MSV-A4 (>98.5% genome-wide sequence identity), they were only very distantly related to SSV (~65% identity; MSV-Sasri_S: EU152254; MSV-Sasri_G: EU152255). To our knowledge, this is the first confirmed report of maize-adapted MSV variants in sugarcane. In the 1980s, “MSV strains” were serologically identified in sugarcane plants exhibiting streak symptoms in Reunion and Mauritius, but these were not genetically characterized (2,3). There have been no subsequent reports on the impact of such MSV infections on sugarcane cultivation on these islands. Also, at least five MSV strains have now been described, only one of which, MSV-A, causes significant disease in maize and it is unknown which strain was responsible for sugarcane diseases on these islands in the 1980s (2,3). MSV-A infections could have serious implications for the South African sugar industry. Besides yield losses in infected plants due to stunting and reduced photosynthesis, the virus could be considerably more difficult to control than it is in maize because sugarcane is vegetatively propagated and individual plants remain within fields for years rather than months. Moreover, there is a large MSV-A reservoir in maize and other grasses everywhere sugarcane is grown in southern Africa. References: (1) B. E. Owor et al. J Virol. Methods 140:100, 2007. (2) M. S. Pinner and P. G. Markham. J. Gen. Virol. 71:1635, 1990. (3) M. S. Pinner et al. Plant Pathol. 37:74, 1998.

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The Matter of Encumbrance: How Management Structure Affects Hotel Value

Cornell Hospitality Quarterly ◽

10.1177/1938965516686116 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 58 (3) ◽

pp. 293-311 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Demian Hodari ◽

Panna Judit Balla ◽

Ramya Rajajagadeesan Aroul

Keyword(s):

Critical Issue ◽

Selling Price ◽

Hotel Management ◽

Sales Price ◽

Valuation Model ◽

Hedonic Valuation ◽

Regional Markets ◽

Selling Point ◽

Lease Contracts ◽

The Impact

Hotel owners have two fundamental concerns: the financial operating performance of their asset and its selling price. While they often contract a hotel management company to operate the hotel through a lease or management agreement, common industry perception holds that such encumbrance decreases the sales price of hotel real estate assets. This implies that owners who outsource the hotel’s management may be sacrificing a greater selling price in exchange for improved operating results. While this is a critical issue for investors given that a their returns are largely dependent on an asset’s appreciation, the impact of different management structures on the sales price of hotels has not previously been studied. A hedonic valuation model was constructed based on 442 past hotel transactions in the United Kingdom between 2000 and 2015. Hotels sold encumbered by hotel management agreements and lease agreements were found to sell at a premium compared with unencumbered properties. The impact across different geographic areas and different economic periods was also examined. Hotels under management agreement achieved the highest premiums during times of economic expansion while lease contracts did so in regional markets. The findings suggest that owners need not necessarily refrain from signing management agreements or leases out of concern for their detrimental effect on their hotel’s sales price. It also provides a strong additional selling point for management companies and should reassure lenders who prefer to underwrite loans for encumbered assets.

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The impacts of COVID-19 on the sustainable management of the forestry sector in Southern Africa

International Forestry Review ◽

10.1505/146554821833992785 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 23 (3) ◽

pp. 298-308

Author(s):

P.W. Chirwa ◽

J.M. Kamwi ◽

G. Kabia ◽

L. Makhubele ◽

W. Sagona ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Forest Management ◽

Southern Africa ◽

Sustainable Management ◽

Sustainable Forest Management ◽

Land Uses ◽

Illegal Logging ◽

Forest Production ◽

Forestry Sector ◽

The Impact ◽

Targeted Approach

The objective of the study was to examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainable forest management in southern Africa. The study employed a targeted approach, also referred to as purposive sampling, to select respondents from the various sectors. The results show that COVID-19 had an 80% impact on forest management operations. The COVID-19 pandemic did not have a significant effect on the conversion of land from forest to other land uses. However, there was severe illegal logging and moderate to severe fires. The COVID-19 pandemic also had a severe impact on the agriculture, environment and ecotourism sectors, with nature reserves completely closed. From the forest production perspective, the impact of COVID-19 on production, supply, demand and the price of timber was generally low due to the commercial nature of the forestry sector in South Africa; the largest economy in SADC being classified as an essential sector.

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Representation of the Angolan low and Southern African Summer Precipitation in the CORDEX and CMIP5 models.

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-12531 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Sabina Abba-Omar ◽

Francesca Raffaele ◽

Erika Coppola ◽

Daniela Jacob ◽

Claas Teichmann ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Regression Analysis ◽

Southern Africa ◽

Summer Precipitation ◽

Precipitation Variability ◽

Cmip5 Models ◽

Impact Of Climate Change ◽

The Future ◽

Rainfall Patterns ◽

The Impact

The impact of climate change on precipitation over Southern Africa is of particular interest due to its possible devastating societal impacts. To add to this, simulating precipitation is challenging and models tend to show strong biases over this region, especially during the Austral Summer (DJF) months. One of the reasons for this is the mis-representation of the Angolan Low (AL) and its influence on Southern Africa&#8217;s Summer precipitation in the models. Therefore, this study aims to explore and compare different models&#8217; ability to capture the AL and its link to precipitation variability as well as consider the impact climate change may have on this link. We also explore how the interaction between ENSO, another important mode of variability for precipitation, and the Angolan Low, impact precipitation, how the models simulate this and whether this could change in the future under climate change.&#160;We computed the position and strength of the AL in reanalysis data and compared these results to three different model ensembles with varying resolutions. Namely, the CORDEX-CORE ensemble (CCORE), a new phase of CORDEX simulations with higher resolutions (0.22 degrees), the lower resolution (0.44 degrees) CORDEX-phase 1 ensemble (C44) and the CMIP5 models that drive the two RCM ensembles. We also used Self Organizing Maps to group DJF yearly anomaly patterns and identify which combination of ENSO and AL strength scenarios are responsible for particularly wet or dry conditions. Regression analysis was performed to analyze the relationships between precipitation and the AL and ENSO. This analysis was repeated for near (2041-2060) and far (2080-2099) future climate and compared with the present to understand how the strength of the AL, and its connection to precipitation variability and ENSO, changes in the future.&#160;We found that, in line with previous studies, models with stronger AL tend to produce more rainfall. CCORE tends to simulate a stronger AL than C44 and therefore, higher precipitation biases. However, the regression analysis shows us that CCORE is able to capture the relationship between precipitation and the AL strength variability as well as ENSO better than the other ensembles. We found that generally dry rainfall patterns over Southern Africa are associated with a weak AL and El Nino event whereas wet rainfall patterns occur during a strong AL and La Nina year. While the models are able to capture this, they also tend to show more neutral ENSO conditions associated with these wet and dry patterns which possibly indicates less of a connection between AL strength and ENSO than seen in the observed results. Analysis of the future results indicates that the AL weakens, this is shown across all the ensembles and could be a contributing factor to some of the drying seen. These results have applications in understanding and improving model representation of precipitation over Southern Africa as well as providing some insight into the impact of climate change on precipitation and some of its associated dynamics over this region.

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A Report on the Impact of the Living Conditions Studies (LCS) on disability in southern Africa

Development Southern Africa ◽

10.1080/0376835x.2019.1628709 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 37 (2) ◽

pp. 247-258

Author(s):

Richard Vergunst ◽

Leslie Swartz

Keyword(s):

Southern Africa ◽

Living Conditions ◽

The Impact

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Modeling Airline Cost Pass-Through within Regional Aviation Markets

Transportation Research Record Journal of the Transportation Research Board ◽

10.1177/0361198118792337 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 2672 (23) ◽

pp. 146-157

Author(s):

Bojun Wang ◽

Aidan O’Sullivan ◽

Lynnette Dray ◽

Andreas W. Schäfer

Keyword(s):

Empirical Evidence ◽

Carbon Tax ◽

Environmental Policies ◽

Operating Costs ◽

Fuel Price ◽

Regional Markets ◽

Pass Through ◽

The Cost ◽

The Impact ◽

Fuel Costs

Studies assessing the impact of market-based environmental policies in aviation rely on various scenarios of airline cost pass-through, because there is little empirical evidence with respect to the impacts of airline costs on airfares. Instead, the costs effect has been indirectly measured by proxy variables such as distance, fuel price, and aircraft sizes. This paper provides empirical evidence of airline cost pass-through by developing an airfare model that explicitly captures airline operating costs. Using a feasible generalized two-stage least squares (FG2SLS) approach, we obtained coefficients of airline fuel costs per passenger, non-fuel costs per passenger, and non-fuel costs per flight modeling for seven world regions (20 region-pair markets). A comparison of the estimated cost pass-through elasticities conducted across regional markets suggests that airlines may respond to the cost increases differently, depending on the cost types and the markets they operate in. Based on the estimated coefficients, we systematically evaluate the potential impacts of introducing a carbon tax policy within two major regional markets with distinct cost pass-through elasticities.

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