EMERGING BUSINESSES: THE SOUTH AFRICAN WINE INDUSTRY CASE

Emerging economies such as South Africa, only a few years out of apartheid, have been feeling the strains of socio-political change. While South Africa has experienced political reform, economic reform and access are slow to come. Currently, South Africa is the 7th largest producer of wine in the world. Although this industry is impressive, the apartheid era production practices have caused primarily the European consumers and media to be vocal about this issue. However, this concern has spread to other regions. The South African government and wine industry must respond to the external and internal market pressures and minimize transaction costs. Both entities want to increase wine exports and expand market share, however, given the socio-economic and political climate in the country neither knows how to manage this difficult process which emanates from deeply rooted distrust of groups within the country. Socio-political constraints facing previously disadvantaged groups (PDG) as emerging business owners need to be understood; and, measures which could be undertaken by government and industry need to be identified. The objectives of this research were to identify: institutional constraints and transaction costs faced by PDGs aspiring toward production and leadership roles in the wine industry; ways the government can collaborate with the KWV to build social capital and promote PDG ownership in the wine industry, thus minimizing social conflict; and, identify industry strategies to increase exports and international market share under the "New South Africa" banner. This analysis was based on primary and secondary data and information gathered on site. Several potential solutions were suggested for ways to include PDGs in the South African wine market while minimizing the impact on the market shares of existing producers. It is anticipated that the window of opportunity to increase exports and involve PDG is quite small.Agribusiness,

Resonating bipolarons

Electrons coupled to local lattice deformations end up in selftrapped localized molecular states involving their binding into bipolarons when the coupling is stronger than a certain critical value. Below that value they exist as essentially itinerant electrons. We propose that the abrupt crossover between the two regimes can be described by resonant pairing similar to the Feshbach resonance in binary atomic collision processes. Given the intrinsically local nature of the exchange of pairs of itinerant electrons and localized bipolarons, we demonstrate the occurrence of such a resonance on a finite-size cluster made out of metallic atoms surrounding a polaronic ligand center.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, to be published in Europhysics Letter

The Effect of Immune Serum on the Infectivity of Sonically Damaged Plasmodium berghei Infected Erythrocytes

Author Institution: Department of Microbiology, The Ohio State UniversityThe reduction in the infectivity of those Plasmodium berghei containing erythrocytes which remained unlysed following exposure to sonic energy and treatment with immune serum was shown to be far greater than that caused by the sum of the separate actions of immune serum and sonic energy applied separately. This indicates that, after exposure to sonic energy, plasmodia in surviving, parasitized erythrocytes are more susceptible to neutralization by immune serum than are plasmodia in unsonicated, parasitized erythrocytes. The membranes of parasitized erythrocytes that survive sonication thus appear to be permeable so that intracellular parasites are accessible to antibodies in immune serum

How Will the Proposed Crop Marketing Authority Affect Food Market Performance in Zambia: An Ex Ante Assessment to Guide Government Deliberation

This paper aims to summarize the rationale and objectives of the Crop Marketing Authority and the possible consequences of adopting the proposed legislation. We also identify where the proposal, in its current form, requires additional specificity in order to evaluate its ability to meet Government’s objectives of enhancing food security and sustainable crop marketing.food security, food policy, crop marketing authority, Zambia, Marketing, Q18,

Macroscopic ordering of polystyrene carboxylate-modified nanospheres self-assembled at the water-air interface

Copyright © 2010 American Chemical SocietyThis document is the Accepted Manuscript version of a Published Work that appeared in final form in Langmuir, copyright © American Chemical Society after peer review and technical editing by the publisher. To access the final edited and published work see http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/la1009658We present results from an experimental study of ordering characteristics in monolayers of polystyrene nanospheres self-assembled at a water-air interface. We demonstrate that the interaction of spheres, governed by the dissemination of surface charge, leads to the formation of macroscopic close-packed ordered areas or "domains" with a well-defined orientation of the lattice axes over areas of 25 mm(2). It was found that by changing the surface chemistry of the spheres it is possible to modify the balance between the attractive and repulsive forces and thus to control the ordering characteristics. We implemented a model that simulates the process of self-assembly and examines the ordering characteristics for layers with different ratio between attractive and repulsive forces. A good qualitative agreement was found between the simulations and experiment. These studies are technologically relevant as a method of producing nanosphere templates for large area patterned materials

Загальна характеристика надання транспортних послуг в Україні

Транспортна послуга – результат діяльності на транспорті, пов'язаний із задоволенням потреб населення в перевезеннях. Ринок транспортних послуг – сфера надання послуг пасажирського автотранспорту з урахуванням сукупності соціально-економічних відносин на транспорті

The impact of antiretroviral therapy on adult mortality in rural Tanzania.

OBJECTIVE: To describe the impact of antiretroviral therapy (ART) on mortality rates among adults participating in an HIV community cohort study in north-west Tanzania. METHODS: Serological and demographic surveillance rounds have been undertaken in a population of approximately 30,000 people since 1994. Free HIV care including ART has been available since 2005. Event history analysis was used to compare mortality rates among HIV-negative and HIV-positive adults in the 5-year period before and after the introduction of ART. Crude and adjusted hazard ratios were calculated using exponential regression models. Interaction between time period and HIV status was assessed to investigate whether there was a non-linear relationship between these two variables. RESULTS: Male and female mortality patterns varied over the pre- and post-ART period. In women, the crude death rate fell for both HIV negatives and HIV positives hazard rate ratio (HRR = 0.71; 95%CI 0.51-0.99 and HRR = 0.68; 95%CI: 0.46-0.99, respectively). For men, the mortality among the HIV negatives increased (HRR = 1.47; 95%CI: 1.06-2.03) while the decline in mortality among the HIV positives (HRR = 0.77; 95%CI 0.52-1.13) was not statistically significant. The largest decrease in HIV-positive mortality over the two periods was among the 30- to 44-year-old age group for women and among the 45- to 59-year-old age group for men. CONCLUSION: There has been a modest effect on mortality in the study population following the introduction of free ART 5 years ago. Improving access to treatment and placing greater focus on retaining individuals on treatment are essential if the full potential of treatment for reducing HIV-related mortality is to be realised

How Will the Proposed Crop Marketing Authority Affect Food Market Performance in Zambia? An ex Ante Assessment to Inform Government Deliberation

Abstract: This policy synthesis highlights some of the key messages contained in the full report with the same title. It aims to summarize the rationale and objectives of the CMA and the possible consequences of adopting the proposed legislation. We also identify alternative or additional measures that the government could take to overcome constraints in crop marketing.food security, food policy, Zambia, crop marketing, Marketing, Q18,