Financing emerging black farmers for agricultural development in South Africa: A wasteful and unworkable model for creating black farmers

The purpose of this article is to investigate the effectiveness of the model used by the South African government to finance emerging black farmers for agricultural development and empowerment. It is widely acknowledged that the South African government spends a vast amount of money attempting to help black community members become commercial farmers. In this article, I argue that those who currently qualify for the funding are mostly farmers with little experience, expertise or interest in agricultural farming. The huge investment spent on such farmers ends up being lost in failed agricultural projects, and the government has not succeeded in finding better alternatives to empower emerging black farmers. Such activities benefit neither the government nor the black farmers intended to be assisted in various areas of the country. The black South African farmers remain agriculturally underdeveloped, while the government on the other hand loses a huge amount of money financing unsuccessful agricultural projects, which potentially threatens future food security. This article is conceptual in nature and uses literature to argue that the financing of emerging black farmers can only succeed if emerging black farmers are financed on basis of experience or ability and interest in farming and that such funding does not exclude potential public and private sector motivated employees who want to access such funding to pursue agricultural farming

Towards a Framework for Achieving Clean Audit Outcomes in the South African Public Sector

Achievement of clean audit outcomes in every entity of the South African pu-blic sector would be something worth celebrating. However, very few public sector institutions have achieved clean audit outcomes, according to the audit evaluations and analyses published at the end of their financial reporting cycles. In addition, many public sector institutions are experiencing challenges in their leadership, financial management and governance functions. In response to this, South Africa’s Supreme Audit Institution, the Auditor General, South Africa (AGSA) put plans in place to help these public sector institutions to achieve clean audit outcomes. Since there is limi-ted published research in respect of public sector auditing, this paper addresses the sector’s ongoing failure to achieve clean audits by drawing on insights from the broa-der body of literature on leadership, financial management and governance, and from this to produce a generic framework within which clean audit outcomes can be achie-ved in the public sector. The method was based on a panel data regression analysis, 20KN Motubatse et. al.: TOWARDS A FRAMEWORK...Journal of Accounting and Management 2018, vol.: 08; no.: 01; page 19 - 36which provided results that were used in conjunction with the literature to draw the proposed framework. The proposed framework shows how the combination of posi-tive and effective leadership, financial management and governance could manifest as genuine accountability. This paper also finds that the audit committee aspect of governance has an important role to play in guiding the entity to achieve the desired clean audit outcome. This is achieved through maintaining the function’s independen-ce, demonstrating their financial literacy, experience, and commitment, and by their commitment to regular meetings. Based on these findings, the paper recommends a generic framework which could expedite the achievement of clean audit outcomes in the public sector institutions. In addition, the paper concludes that the effectiveness of the audit committee is key to the proposed framework’s ability to guide public sec-tor entities to achieve clean audit outcome

Drivers of Audit Quality in South African Public Sector

This paper examined the relationship between leadership, financial management, risk manageent, governance and clean audit. The independent variables (leadership, financial management, risk manageent and governance) were extracted from the Auditor General’s reports on audit outcomes for municipalities in South Africa for the five years from 2009/10 – 2013/4, and used to determine the degree to which they are related to the achievement of clean audit outcomes. A quantitative approach (panel data regression analysis) was employed, based on a positivist paradigm, to examine the relative effects of the independent variables as key to achieving clean audit outcomes. The findings show that leadership, financial management, risk management and governance jointly have a significant relationship with clean audit outcomes, with a value of P<0,005 (which is substantially below the 5% Alpha level anticipated at the start of the research for this paper) and additionally point to the existence of a much more significant relationship between achieving a clean audit outcome and governance. The paper contributes to theory and practice. The theoretical contribution is that the independent variables (leadership, financial management, risk management,governance) need to work jointly to deliver an effective accountability and quality audit – hence futher research should examined such influence jointly and also try to add additional independent variables. The practical implication is that public sector governance may not be blamed as a single factor that causes accountability or audit issues

Drivers of Audit Quality in South African Public Sector

This paper examined the relationship between leadership, financial management, risk manageent, governance and clean audit. The independent variables (leadership, financial management, risk manageent and governance) were extracted from the Auditor General’s reports on audit outcomes for municipalities in South Africa for the five years from 2009/10 – 2013/4, and used to determine the degree to which they are related to the achievement of clean audit outcomes. A quantitative approach (panel data regression analysis) was employed, based on a positivist paradigm, to examine the relative effects of the independent variables as key to achieving clean audit outcomes. The findings show that leadership, financial management, risk management and governance jointly have a significant relationship with clean audit outcomes, with a value of P<0,005 (which is substantially below the 5% Alpha level anticipated at the start of the research for this paper) and additionally point to the existence of a much more significant relationship between achieving a clean audit outcome and governance. The paper contributes to theory and practice. The theoretical contribution is that the independent variables (leadership, financial management, risk management,governance) need to work jointly to deliver an effective accountability and quality audit – hence futher research should examined such influence jointly and also try to add additional independent variables. The practical implication is that public sector governance may not be blamed as a single factor that causes accountability or audit issues

Towards a Framework for Achieving Clean Audit Outcomes in the South African Public Sector

Achievement of clean audit outcomes in every entity of the South African pu-blic sector would be something worth celebrating. However, very few public sector institutions have achieved clean audit outcomes, according to the audit evaluations and analyses published at the end of their financial reporting cycles. In addition, many public sector institutions are experiencing challenges in their leadership, financial management and governance functions. In response to this, South Africa’s Supreme Audit Institution, the Auditor General, South Africa (AGSA) put plans in place to help these public sector institutions to achieve clean audit outcomes. Since there is limi-ted published research in respect of public sector auditing, this paper addresses the sector’s ongoing failure to achieve clean audits by drawing on insights from the broa-der body of literature on leadership, financial management and governance, and from this to produce a generic framework within which clean audit outcomes can be achie-ved in the public sector. The method was based on a panel data regression analysis, 20KN Motubatse et. al.: TOWARDS A FRAMEWORK...Journal of Accounting and Management 2018, vol.: 08; no.: 01; page 19 - 36which provided results that were used in conjunction with the literature to draw the proposed framework. The proposed framework shows how the combination of posi-tive and effective leadership, financial management and governance could manifest as genuine accountability. This paper also finds that the audit committee aspect of governance has an important role to play in guiding the entity to achieve the desired clean audit outcome. This is achieved through maintaining the function’s independen-ce, demonstrating their financial literacy, experience, and commitment, and by their commitment to regular meetings. Based on these findings, the paper recommends a generic framework which could expedite the achievement of clean audit outcomes in the public sector institutions. In addition, the paper concludes that the effectiveness of the audit committee is key to the proposed framework’s ability to guide public sec-tor entities to achieve clean audit outcome

African societies, nation-states, governance, human migration, xenophobia and cultural contestations: Editorial framing

NO ABSTRAC

An Analysis of the Link between Water Infrastructure Financing and Water Provision South Africa

This paper evaluated the relationship between water infrastructure financing and water provision in South Africa. The research followed a quantitative research design; secondary data for water infrastructure financing and water provision in South Africa was obtained from the Trans - Caledon Tunneling Agency (TCTA) and the World Bank for the period 1994 - 2014 . The regression results indicated two separate findings which offers unique contribution to the current literature; results from water asset finance as a single independent variable on water provision showed a significant relationship. However, an addition of two control variables , corruption and violence, neutralised the effectiveness of water asset finance on water provision to the extent that water asset finance became less significant with a P value of 0.05. The paper makes a nuance contribution from the findings, which specifically is that finance alone may not deliver target water provision if corruption and violence is left unbridled. The paper thus recommends the need for public policy makers to control the rate of corruption and violence to enable effective application of water infrastructure finance in water provision. The paper also recommends the need for further research on other government departments to integrate corruption and violence as control variables.&nbsp