Land Reform and Development: Evaluating South Africa’s Restitution and Redistribution Programmes

Land Economics/Use,

Poverty and livelihoods in rural South Africa: Investigating diversity and dynamics of livelihoods. Case studies in Limpopo

Food Security and Poverty,

Recognising poor black youth from rural communities in South Africa as epistemic contributors

In South Africa, students who are poor, black and come from rural communities with poorly resourced schools are vulnerable to being victims of epistemic injustice. This is because they are usually seen as under-appreciated knowers who have low (English) language proficiency and deficits in academic literacy. In an attempt to provide a nuanced characterisation of youth from rural areas, this paper reflects on one student’s life-history interviews and his photo- story that form part of data collected since 2017 for Miratho – a project on achieved higher education learning outcomes for low-income university students. The paper uses a capabilities approach as an interpretive framework for the qualitative data and theorises that students’ linguistic capital and narrative capital are epistemic materials that can be mobilised into the ‘capability for epistemic contribution’ as conceptualised by Miranda Fricker. The paper thus makes a case for higher education researchers and educators to recognise poor black youth from rural communities as both givers and takers of knowledge or ‘epistemic contributors’. It argues that doing so constitutes an ethical response to the structural inequalities that limit equitable university access and participation for youth in this demographic

Photocatalytic degradation of methyl violet in water using TiO2/Cellulose-N-MWCNTs

ABSTRACT TiO2-carbon based composites are of great significance in a wide range of applications including photocatalytic degradation. This is attributed to the high photodecomposition efficiency of the composites as compared to independent TiO2. Carbon materials such as cellulose polymer and multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) are considered as good supports for TiO2 owing to their unique properties such as lightweight, large surface area and high aspect ratio. Lately, the study of cellulose-MWCNTs composite has been an area of academic interest due to its large mass fraction, and prowess to facilitate toughening mechanisms in fiber bridging. However, a cost-effective method that can improve the dispersion and interfacial adhesion of the MWCNTs in the polymer is still required. Thus different modification methods of MWCNTs have been explored to increase the binding sites of the material. In this study, it was hypothesized that the cellulose’s potential as a TiO2 support can be improved by hybridizing it with MWCNTs resulting in high TiO2-C photocatalytic activity through synergistic effect. A catalytic decomposition of Fe-Co/CaCO3 was used over C2H2 to fabricate the MWCNTs. Thereafter, the MWCNTs were functionalized by (1) acid-treatment (referred to as fMWCNTs), (2) nitrogen doping by in situ and ex situ methods (referred to as in situ N-MWCNTs and ex situ N-MWCNTs, respectively) and (3) both acid treatment and nitrogen doping (referred to as in situ fN-MWCNTs and ex situ fN-MWCNTs). Moreover, cellulose-N-MWCNTs (C@fN-MWCNTs) hybrid was prepared by electrospinning a solution of cellulose acetate/in situ fN-MWCNTs (11/0.115) in DMAc at 25 kv and 1 mL/h. The prepared MWCNTs and cellulosic materials were further used as support materials of TiO2 in the photodegradation of methyl violet (MV 6B). The supported TiO2 catalysts were prepared by a sol-gel method and then analyzed using various techniques, such as transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and Raman spectroscopy. iii TGA results revealed that in situ N-MWCNTs contained high impurities inclusive of as Fe, Co, Ca, and amorphous carbon which were identified by XRD analysis. Nevertheless, TGA, BET and TEM, showed that acid treatment of MWCNTs improves their purity, surface area and anchoring sites for the TiO2, respectively. Furthermore, SEM results showed that C@fNMWCNTs hybrid interacts with TiO2 better than cellulose fibers. This was in accord with the PL results which showed a reduction in the electron/hole recombination. However, the surface area of C@fN-MWCNTs was very low compared to cellulose fibers which resulted in low dye adsorption capacity by C@fN-MWCNTs. The photocatalytic degradation activity commercial TiO2 was enhanced by 3.7% and 5.6% after being supported on cellulose and C@fN-MWCNTs, respectively. Thus, incorporating in situ fNMWCNTs with cellulose did improve the cellulose’s potential as a TiO2 support. However, the overall photocatalytic degradation performance of TiO2/C@fN-MWCNTs was less than that of in situ TiO2/fN-MWCNTs. This may be due to the reduction in the surface area, which resulted in reduced adsorption and thus lowers degradation efficiency.EM201

Think Piece: Building, repairing and maintaining trust in research relationships: towards an ethics of trust

In this think piece, I ask what it takes for research relationships to be centred on trust. My reflections are divided into three sections in which I share some lessons learnt from various research projects. At the end of each section, I pose a series of interrelated questions about the values, principles and practices that are indispensable to building, repairing and maintaining trust in research relationships. To conclude, I outline how these reflections will be brought together in my keynote address. &nbsp

Community Participation in the South African Local Government Dispensation: A Public Administration Scholastic Misnomer

The interpretation, application and understanding of community participation in the South African local government discourse in particular, is ambiguous, thus, creating a more simplistic and superficial meaning for operationalization. This paper seeks to challenge the notion that community participation is a substitute in its ontological and epistemological form and connotation for public participation. Many scholars in public administration have jumped on the bandwagon of dispensation, thus creating a misnomer in relation to a distinct nature of community participation and public participation which clearly undermines the authenticity of conception within the discipline and scholarship in general. Using a variety of qualitative secondary data collection and analytical techniques, this paper interrogates the misnomer in public administration scholarship in relation to the use andapplication of community participation specifically in local government. To successfully demonstrate this misnomer regarding the use, application and understanding of the concepts and their impact on scholarship, five selected articles on community participation and five others on public participation on local government published in the Journal of Public Administration (JOPA) were reviewed. The paper therefore concludes that the influential role of public administration as a scientific discipline is to forge relations with public administration as a practice for the purposes of conceptualizing and operationalising concepts and terminologies. This will ensure conciseness and bypass the contradictions which have potency of denting both scholarship and practice

Photocatalytic degradation of methyl violet in water using TiO2/Cellulose-N-MWCNTs

ABSTRACT TiO2-carbon based composites are of great significance in a wide range of applications including photocatalytic degradation. This is attributed to the high photodecomposition efficiency of the composites as compared to independent TiO2. Carbon materials such as cellulose polymer and multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) are considered as good supports for TiO2 owing to their unique properties such as lightweight, large surface area and high aspect ratio. Lately, the study of cellulose-MWCNTs composite has been an area of academic interest due to its large mass fraction, and prowess to facilitate toughening mechanisms in fiber bridging. However, a cost-effective method that can improve the dispersion and interfacial adhesion of the MWCNTs in the polymer is still required. Thus different modification methods of MWCNTs have been explored to increase the binding sites of the material. In this study, it was hypothesized that the cellulose’s potential as a TiO2 support can be improved by hybridizing it with MWCNTs resulting in high TiO2-C photocatalytic activity through synergistic effect. A catalytic decomposition of Fe-Co/CaCO3 was used over C2H2 to fabricate the MWCNTs. Thereafter, the MWCNTs were functionalized by (1) acid-treatment (referred to as fMWCNTs), (2) nitrogen doping by in situ and ex situ methods (referred to as in situ N-MWCNTs and ex situ N-MWCNTs, respectively) and (3) both acid treatment and nitrogen doping (referred to as in situ fN-MWCNTs and ex situ fN-MWCNTs). Moreover, cellulose-N-MWCNTs (C@fN-MWCNTs) hybrid was prepared by electrospinning a solution of cellulose acetate/in situ fN-MWCNTs (11/0.115) in DMAc at 25 kv and 1 mL/h. The prepared MWCNTs and cellulosic materials were further used as support materials of TiO2 in the photodegradation of methyl violet (MV 6B). The supported TiO2 catalysts were prepared by a sol-gel method and then analyzed using various techniques, such as transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and Raman spectroscopy. iii TGA results revealed that in situ N-MWCNTs contained high impurities inclusive of as Fe, Co, Ca, and amorphous carbon which were identified by XRD analysis. Nevertheless, TGA, BET and TEM, showed that acid treatment of MWCNTs improves their purity, surface area and anchoring sites for the TiO2, respectively. Furthermore, SEM results showed that C@fNMWCNTs hybrid interacts with TiO2 better than cellulose fibers. This was in accord with the PL results which showed a reduction in the electron/hole recombination. However, the surface area of C@fN-MWCNTs was very low compared to cellulose fibers which resulted in low dye adsorption capacity by C@fN-MWCNTs. The photocatalytic degradation activity commercial TiO2 was enhanced by 3.7% and 5.6% after being supported on cellulose and C@fN-MWCNTs, respectively. Thus, incorporating in situ fNMWCNTs with cellulose did improve the cellulose’s potential as a TiO2 support. However, the overall photocatalytic degradation performance of TiO2/C@fN-MWCNTs was less than that of in situ TiO2/fN-MWCNTs. This may be due to the reduction in the surface area, which resulted in reduced adsorption and thus lowers degradation efficiency.EM201

Policy Implications of the Disruptive Impact of China\u27s Slowdown on Commodity Trade with the Developing World

The economic relations between China and developing mineral-rich countries have primarily been on the bases of the mineral resources of these developing countries. Hence, China\u27s rapid economic growth ofrecent had positive disruptive impacts on these developing States. Conversely, China\u27s economic recline more recently has had adverse, disruptive effects on these developing States. Based on the findings of the spillover effects of this decline in SA\u27s mineral export value to China, this paper aims to instigate the policy-makers of these developing States (including SA) to see the need for their current policies to be re-assessed. This re-assessment is for determining whether their policies are capable of enabling their economies to handle the disruptive changes that can occur in their trade relations with a superpower like China. The result should be restructuring their policies so they would have buffers for changes in global mineral prices and demand, as well as make them better prepared to enter more beneficial engagements with China when its economy grows stronger again

Clinical management of hyphaema

Hyphaema is the presence of red blood cells in the anterior chamber. A minimal amount of tiny red blood cells suspended in the aqueous humour is termed a microhyphaema. Microhyphaema may be visible only with the slit lamp, in the form of eryth-rocytes floating and circulating in the aqueous humour. Slightly larger amounts of red blood cells settle as variously shaped masses on the surface of the iris, lens or vitreous. Still larger volume of red blood cells gravitates to the anterior aspect of the interior chamber, producing a grossly visible layered hyphaema, which may be partial or complete. The management of hyphaema can present a challenge to a clinician, because medical treatment is of little value for hyphaema itself but is useful for complications. South African Family Practice Vol. 48 (10) 2006: pp. 60-6