Research Archive (595)

  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Rosanna Achterberg; Trudi Hartzenberg
The study provides a general overview of current issues in the South African Distribution Sector. It is restricted to focussing on three industries namely, pharmaceutical distribution, distribution in the food industry and distribution in the automotive industry. In examining the behaviour of SA retail pharmacies it becomes apparent that retailers…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Anmar Pretorius
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
This paper evaluates the impact of globalisation on income distribution in South Africa. There are broadly two ways in which it can affect income distribution and help to address poverty. On a macro level it can stimulate economic growth, create jobs and provide salary income to people previously not employed.…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Anmar Pretorius; Jessie de Beer
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
South Africa has experienced considerable currency volatility during the past few years, despite strong economic fundamentals. Recently this resulted in the appointment of the Myburgh Commission of inquiry into the depreciation of the rand. From January 1, 1996 to May 29, 2002, the value of the rand depreciated from R3.64…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Susanna Wolf
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
A close look at the specific causes of domestic and foreign private investment in the SADC countries is needed. This paper has the aim to look especially at those factors that are under direct control of governments like infrastructure and regional integration and where decisions have to be made in…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Adelaide Matlanyane
  • Countries and Regions Southern Africa Customs Union (SACU)
This paper looks at the policy of financial liberalisation within the context of a small developing economy that is experiencing financial sector distress. The performance and structure of the banking sector of the economy of Lesotho is in particular reviewed before, during and after the reform period. The paper also…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Daniel Ndlela
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
The paper will examine the structural characteristics of the SADC economies and its lop-sidedness in terms of size and patterns of production, consumption and trade. This basic problem of the transformation of the economies in the sub-region will constitute an important part of my analysis of the determinants of exports…

  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Mihalis Chasomeris
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
South Africa is a major sea trading nation with a relatively open economy that accounts for approximately six per cent of real world seatrade. This performance places South Africa within the top 12 international maritime trading nations. The literature reviewed clearly shows the importance of maritime transport costs and their…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Elsabe Loots
The aim of this paper is to investigate whether the process of globalisation, through trade and financial liberalization, benefits economic growth in emerging market economies in general and in South Africa in particular. The analysis of trade openness and liberalization in emerging market economies reveals that trade volume seems to…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Susan Wolf
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
To increase investment both foreign and domestic is one of the aims of the South African Development Community (SADC). Although investment in SADC is still lower than in industrial countries or emerging markets it is higher than for the rest of sub-Saharan Africa. Whereas the main determinants of investment like…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Anthony Black
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
Developments in the automotive industry have received considerable positive publicity over the last few years. Firstly, and most importantly, this is a consequence of rapid export expansion, initially of components, but latterly also of vehicles. Recently, for example, Toyota announced a R3.5 billion investment programme partly to provide for the…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Simon Roberts
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
The government's Integrated Manufacturing Strategy identifies competitiveness as its primary focus, and value-matrices as the framework within which to assess manufacturing performance. This paper addresses these issues through two main components. The first is a review of interpretations of competitiveness and its determinants. The second is an assessment of South…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Paul Robertson
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
The tourism sector of the South African economy has been characterized by rapid growth in the mid-1990s which has levelled off more recently, and an increasing contribution to overall employment. The question now is how South Africa's negotiation process in removing barriers to the trade in services might affect the…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) O.A. Akinboade; E.W. Niedermeier
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
In the early 1990s, about two-thirds of South Africans were without electricity, relying on dirtier and less convenient fuel such as coal. As a result, urban air is severely degraded, with health guidelines for concentration of particulate materials being exceeded. Eskom dominates the electricity market of sub-Saharan Africa generates about…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Samuel Asfaha; SN Huda
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
Based on Edwards' (1989) intertemporal general equilibrium model of a small open economy, this study attempts to estimate the degree of real exchange rate misalignment and its impact on the international trade competitiveness of the South African economy for the period 1985:1-2000:4. For this purpose, a one-step Engle-Granger approach and…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Alvin Birdi; Paul Dunne
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
This paper contributes to the debate over the effect of trade on the demand for labour in the manufacturing sector in South Africa. Previous work in the area has decomposed employment to find the likely contribution of trade effects, has investigated the correlation between employment and trade, and has used…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Lawrence Edwards
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
This paper uses two firm level surveys, the National Enterprise (NE) survey and the World Bank and Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Council (GJMC) co-ordinated survey, to explore the implications of globalisation on employment in South Africa. We use the firm surveys to analyse the impact of trade liberalisation on the level…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Trudi Hartzenberg
This paper provides an overview of the interconnectedness between trade, competition and investment in SADC, and explores the competition implications emerging therefrom. From a review of existing competition policy in SADC, key national and regional competition challenges are examined, with a view to suggesting options for regional collaboration to address…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Swapna Mukhopadhyay
A major argument for trade liberalisation has been that openness increases efficiency, ensures greater market access to goods and employment, and these factors in due course raise growth rates and reduce poverty. However, it is also recognized that distribution of trade benefits among trading partners may be skewed, and that…

  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Nnzeni Netshitomboni; Matthew Stern
The paper extends simple trade analysis techniques used to evaluate barriers to goods trade to identify opportunities and barriers to South African trade in services. Using available services trade data from four of South Africa's major trading partners, under-traded service imports are identified and compared to trade restrictions listed in…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Ethel Teljeur; Matthew Stern
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
The South African architectural, construction and engineering services industries have notable competitive advantages, particularly in providing basic infrastructure and particularly on the African continent. However, the sector has been in decline for over two decades, threatening the survival of those advantages. Exporters face many hurdles, ranging from corruption in Africa…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Daniel Ndlela; Thandinkosi Ndlela
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
The major objective of this study is to evaluate the role of exchange rate policy in determining trade flows with respect to Southern African economies. The study provides a structural analysis to the empirical strength of the influence of exchange rate movements on trade flows for small low-income countries on…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Linda de Vries
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
Economic empowerment reflects the challenges, the changes and the strategies of a large part of the South African population to have entry into industries, business sectors where the ownership and the skills were located in the hands of a few South Africans. The attempts of the private and public sector…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Pieter Laubscher
  • Countries and Regions South Africa
This paper was inspired in the first place as the author observed extraordinary resilience in the domestic real economy in the wake of not only the world recessionary conditions of 2000/1 but also the dramatic slide of the currency towards the end of 2001. As possibly the first hard evidence…

  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Albert Mafusire
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
Intra-SADC trade remains very low despite the shift in the focus of the regional body from being driven mainly by political objectives to a position where economic imperatives are accorded greater weight. By calculating the revealed comparative advantage indices for the regional countries, results from this paper suggest that relative…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Frank Flatters
  • Countries and Regions Southern African Development Community (SADC)
SADC Member States have chosen regional integration as part of their strategy for global participation. While not a first best strategy, regionalism can complement more general trade and investment liberalization. Unfortunately the SADC Trade Protocol is seriously flawed. Back-loaded and confusingly differentiated tariff reduction schedules are well-known problems. Less clearly…
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  • Year 2002
  • Author(s) Joseph Francois; Will Martin
Most of the large tariff reductions achieved in multilateral trade negotiations have involved the use of tariff-cutting formulas, such as the "Swiss" formula. But the wide variations in initial tariff rates may create a demand for new approaches in the Doha Development Agenda. This paper surveys some options and examines…
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  • Year 2001
  • Organisation University of Oxford, department of Economics
  • Author(s) Simon Cowan
In the 1980s the UK (and Chile) began the processes of privatizing and restructuring stateowned enterprises, liberalizing the markets in which they operated and regulating their conduct. Since then many countries at all levels of development have implemented their own programmes of regulatory reform. Almost two decades after the process…

  • Year 2001
  • Organisation ERSA, University of the Witwatersrand
  • Author(s) Johannes Fedderke
Explaining the Growth Absence: reviewing the evidence that can account for the poor growth performance of the South African economy South Africa's democratic transition now lies close to a decade in the past. The transition carried with it much by way of hopes in terms of a greater access by…

  • Year 2001
  • Organisation OECD Development Centre – Paris and BNDES – Rio de...
  • Author(s) Andrea Goldstein;Jose Claudio Linhares Pires
In recent years, dozens of OECD and non-OECD countries have followed the United States in establishing strong autonomous regulatory institutions empowered with regulatory instruments and financial independence. Flexibility and agility are required to implement ad hoc policies through regulations, resolutions, and decrees. Their special status also responds to the need…
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