How integrated is SADC ? trends in intra-regional and extra-regional trade flows and policy

Do Southern African Development Community countries trade enough with each other and with the rest of the world? Although its share of world trade has fallen, appropriate benchmarking shows that, controlling for gross domestic product and other characteristics, Southern African Development Community countries have experienced an increase in openness that is comparable to other developing countries. Once market size and geography are taken into account, trade between Southern African Development Community countries is actually high. Southern African Development Community countries also trade more products with each other than they do with the rest of the world. In this sense, and contrary to stylized fears, the Southern African Development Community region is quite integrated. Although the Southern African Development Community has reduced its tariffs, the structure remains complex and could be lowered on intermediates. Other impediments make it costly and difficult to move goods, but are at levels that are comparable with countries at similar levels of development. Although this may be surprising, there is still scope for improvement and the disadvantageous geography of the Southern African Development Community makes it important for other trade impediments to be reduced.Free Trade,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research,Trade Policy,Trade Law

Education for transformative leadership in Southern Africa

This article argues that education for transformative leadership in a southern African context needs to nurture an understanding of the relationship between spirituality and charisma. This argument is based on a review of some literature pertaining to transformative learning, transformative leadership, and African value systems. The article explores the relationship between transformative leadership and transformative learning and education theories, and relates them to a specific southern African context. It proposes three arguments. First, transformative education may facilitate the transformative leadership development process. Second, transformative education and transformative leadership, although offering features that are sympathetic to African indigenous values, must also take account of particular African contexts. The article does not claim to be reporting from empirical research on this issue but, to support its position, draws on recent literature from an ongoing southern Africa leadership development project and some early empirical data from a small, related study in one southern African country. Third, the article suggests that a key difference between transformative learning and transformative leadership perspectives is the transformative leadership focus on charismatic qualities that inspire motivation to change. However, a defining conceptual thread of spirituality runs through the transformative learning and leadership literature that resonates with southern African core value systems. It is this thread that provides the overall conceptual link between the different strands of thought

Human-computer interaction for development (HCI4D):the Southern African landscape

Human-Computer interaction for development (HCI4D) research aims to maximise the usability of interfaces for interacting with technologies designed specifically for under-served, under-resourced, and under-represented populations. In this paper we provide a snapshot of the Southern African HCI4D research against the background of the global HCI4D research landscape.We commenced with a systematic literature review of HCI4D (2010-2017) then surveyed Southern African researchers working in the area. The contribution is to highlight the context- specific themes and challenges that emerged from our investigation

The Returns to Skill and Racial Difference in Parenting: Evidence from the Civil Rights Movement

On average, the parental practices adopted by African American parents of young children are much less cognitively stimulating than those of their white counterparts. This paper argues that these differences stem from the low rates of return to human capital historically experienced by African Americans. To study the relationship between the race-specific returns to skill and parenting, I use intergenerational data containing direct measures of parental behaviors, and examine the child rearing practices of mothers who came of age in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement, during a period of rapidly increasing returns to skill for African Americans in the US South. I find that among Southern African American mothers born between 1957 and 1964, each yearly birth cohort increased their parental investment levels by over .07 standard deviations, but that there was no increase among Southern whites or non-Southern African Americans. These differences are interpreted as being due to the disproportionately large increase in the rate of return to skill experienced by Southern African Americans, suggesting a strong relationship between the returns to human capital and parental behaviors. JEL Categories: J01; I24; J24; J71race, parenting, returns to skill, achievement gap and human capital development

How important is a regional free trade area for Southern Africa?: Potential impacts and structural constraints

"We develop a detailed trade analysis to assess the potential welfare impacts of a free trade agreement (FTA) on the agricultural sector of southern African countries and to determine opportunities and challenges faced by the region as a consequence of the agreement. Our approach combines an in-depth look at the current trading patterns of southern African countries with the application of a partial equilibrium analysis that uses bilateral trade data at the four-digit standard international trade classification (SITC) level for 193 agricultural industries in 14 southern African countries. Low diversification of agricultural exports in most southern African countries seems to be a major constraint for promoting regional trade. In most countries, overall welfare effects of an FTA would be positive but small. Inefficient agricultural producers with a regional comparative advantage for agriculture would benefit from trade creation with the rest of the world. Welfare results for regional importers would be negative because of increased imports from inefficient regional producers. These results suggest that the region should be looking at regional policies and interventions beyond trade arrangements, such as those targeting investment, agricultural productivity, and diversification, to enhance benefits of regional trade liberalization." from authors' abstractRegional trade agreement, Agricultural trade, Development strategies,

Mugabe’s Zimbabwe, 2000–2009: Massive Human Rights Violations and the Failure to Protect

This article reviews human rights violations in Zimbabwe from 2000 to 2009, under the rule of Robert Mugabe. It argues that these violations, including state-induced famine, illegal mass expulsions, and systemic rape, constituted crimes against humanity. This article considers what African regional organizations, including the African Union and the Southern African Development Community, and various organs of the international community did, and might have done, to restrain Mugabe and his inner circle from committing these violations. It concludes that the lack of forceful action by African and international organizations constituted a failure to protect the people of Zimbabwe

Private Property Rights to Wildlife: The Southern African Experiment.

In most nations around the world wildlife are owned and managed by the State. However, in the past 30 years Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa have altered their legal regimes to give full control over the use of wildlife to the private owners of the land on which the wildlife are located. Following the privatization of wildlife management in southern African nations, wildlife tourism on private lands has boomed. In Zimbabwe, a majority of many desirable species - including 94 percent of eland, 64 percent of kudu, 63 percent of giraffe, 56 percent of cheetah, and 53 percent of both sable and impala - are found on commercial ranch properties. In Namibia, wildlife populations on private lands have risen by 80 percent since the creation in 1967 of a regime of private wildlife ownership. Privatization of control over use of wildlife has had more success in promoting biodiversity in the southern African region than any other policy measure. Other parts of the world may be able to benefit from the lessons learned from the successes of southern African nations in privatization and commercialization of wildlife. Based on the southern African experience, many wildlife managers should reconsider whether positive incentives might not be more effective in the future in promoting wildlife populations than the past club of state commands and controls.Wildlife; Privatization; Africa; Biodiversity; Economic Development

What is really in the economic partnership agreements for the Southern African region? A perspective from Botswana’s beef export markets

The signing of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between the European Union (EU) and the African Caribbean Pacific (ACP) nations dominated the multilateral trade agenda in late 2007 and early 2008. While the Caribbean nations signed the full EPAs, some of the African countries only singed interim agreements with the EU and a number of West African countries chose not to sign any EPA. Using the case of Botswana’s export markets, especially in agriculture, it is argued that the interim Southern African Development Community (SADC) EPA, which was signed by Botswana and her neighbours, with the exception of South Africa, may have been economically sensible in protecting Botswana’s rural poor, at least in the short run. By tracing trade flows from the border to specifically poor sectors of the country, the importance of the beef exports sector to the poor and rural communities was found. The potential effects on the most significant exports of tariff bands associated with preferential agreements with the EU were found to be most beneficial in comparison to the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) and the South Africa-EU Trade Development and Cooperation Agreement (TDCA) tariff bands. But it is also argued that the EPA will most likely have far reaching long run costs on regional economic development and institutional integration, within the SADC and Southern African Customs Union (SACU).Botswana, economic partnership agreements, European Union, exports, beef,

No. 04: Gender Concerns in South African Migration Policy

This paper draws attention to the need for a gender analysis of the South African government’s proposed new policy on international migration, by identifying a number of areas of implicit gender discrimination. Such “discrimination by default” is of more than academic relevance, having important implications for national and regional development. Research undertaken by the Southern African Migration Project indicates a growing “feminization” of migration to South Africa from the Southern African region, as well as gender-specific motives and patterns of migration. If migration is to be effectively managed, such realities must be taken into account. The paper concludes by advocating a development-centred, household strategies approach, both in understanding international migration to South Africa and in the further development and implementation of legislation. The paper was written by Dr Belinda Dodson, a research associate of SAMP. The opinions expressed are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect those of SAMP, its staff or its funders

Groundwater dependence and drought within the southern African development community

A groundwater situation analysis of the SADC region has been undertaken as part of the World Bank GEF Programme as a basis for ensuring equitable use of groundwater resources, particularly during periods of drought, both for human needs and for sustaining ecosystems. Much of the groundwater in the region occurs in weathered crystalline rocks suitable for dispersed supply to rural communities, although there are several aquifers capable of sustaining urban demand that contribute to the supply of several major cities and towns. A number of SADC Member States, such as Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, are very dependent on groundwater, whereas the Democratic Republic of Congo is least dependent. Groundwater dependence and groundwater demand, together providing an indication of drought vulnerability, have been assessed from the availability and coverage of groundwater data, but it is very apparent that reliable and comprehensive groundwater data are major deficiencies throughout the SADC region. Few attempts have thus been made to calculate renewable groundwater resource volumes or develop optimum use of groundwater, despite the fact that susceptibility of many Member States to drought requires them to consider mitigation strategies to lessen the hardships imposed largely on their rural population. Such strategy requires long-term intervention and not short-term emergency responses, a process that is directly related to availability of comprehensive groundwater datasets. Considerable effort in groundwater assessment and monitoring and the accumulation, evaluation and dissemination of essential datasets will thus be required to maintain population livelihoods in future years when water supply is projected to be in deficit in over half of the SADC Member States