Denied Investment: A Case of Community Member’s Attitudes towards Volunteering in Corporate Social Investment Initiatives

Companies use corporate social responsible investment (CSI) initiatives to contribute to the wellbeing of the society they operate in. South African companies continue to increase their involvement in CSI initiatives in the areas of education and training, capacity building, community development and health care. The impact of these initiatives can be extended, if community members, who are mostly the beneficiaries of these initiatives, are willing to work with companies through volunteering in CSI initiatives. This study used a combination of qualitative and quantitative research designs to assess the attitude of community towards volunteering on a CSI project. Interviews and survey questionnaire were used to collect data from households’ members who benefited from a CSI initiative of re-roofing houses in one of low income areas of South Africa. Qualitative analysis revealed that the CSI project provided skill which opened employment opportunities to community members who worked on the project. However, quantitative results showed that only 30% of participants were willing to volunteer on the CSI project. The majority of those who were not willing to volunteer on the CSI project were unemployed and did not have any skills; implying that volunteering on the CSI project could have provided them with some skills. Based on the investment model of volunteering, findings of this study showed that beneficiaries of the CSI initiative denied an investment opportunity due to their attitude towards volunteering. Hence, it was concluded that CSI initiatives could have a greater impact if community members are encouraged to participate in CSI initiatives as volunteers

Manufacturing Production and Non-Agricultural Employment rate in South Africa: Time Series Analysis

South African is faced with a high unemployment rate; however, the country’s manufacturing sector is one of the sectors that have been linked with job creation. Nevertheless, the growth in manufacturing production may not increase employment opportunities if this sector continues to shift to technology-intensive methods of production, which displace labour. This study uses a vector autoregressive (VAR) model to estimate the interaction between manufacturing production and the employment rate in South Africa from 1970 to 2013. Results revealed that both variables were stationary at the first difference and there was a long-term equilibrium relationship between the variables. In the short term, a significant positive relationship between manufacturing production and employment rate was observed. Granger causality test showed that there is a causal link from manufacturing production to the employment rate. A comparison between apartheid and post-apartheid periods showed the long-run relationship only existed in the post-apartheid period of a more open economy. Findings of this study revealed that a growth in the South African manufacturing sector is linked with employment opportunities in the short-run. However, these opportunities may be reduced by changes in technology which promote capital intensive production. As such, policy-makers should encourage policies that promote a mix of labour and capital intensive production in order to maintain these employment opportunities in the manufacturing sector

Testing the Expectations Hypothesis of the Term Structure of Interest Rates in BRICS Countries: A Multivariate Co-integration Approach

The BRICS is a group of major emerging economies in the world which have combined financial resources to form the New Development Bank in an effort to address economic challenges faced by these countries. Thus, the flow of funds among the BRICS countries are expected to increase and this has implication on interest rates changes in these countries. Employing monthly short and long term interest rates from June 2005 to June 2015, this study used a multivariate cointegration approach to test for the validity of the expectations hypothesis (EH) of the term structure of interest rates in BRICS countries. The results of the co-integration analysis revealed that the EH only holds in three of the five countries, namely China, India, and South Africa. Short and long term interest rates for these three countries converge to the long-run equilibrium at different speed, where the convergence was found to be quick in South Africa and slow in China. This study found no evidence of EH in Brazil and Russia. Findings of this study are relevant to current developments within BRICS financial markets and provide valuable information that can be used to forecast future changes in interest rates in BRICS countries

Analysis of Government Expenditure and Sectoral Employment in the Post-apartheid South Africa: Application of ARDL Model

The current study has been designed to analyse the interactions between real government spending and job creation in South Africa focusing on five major economic sectors, namely construction, financial, manufacturing, mining, and retail sectors. The main objective of the study was to determine how job creation in different economic sectors responds to changes in real government spending. To achieve this objective, the study used five different autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) models to analyse the long-run and shot-run relationships between government spending and employment rate in each of the aforementioned five economic sectors. The sample period consisted of quarterly observations starting from the first quarter of 1994 to last quarter of 2015. The study found a long-run relationship between government spending and job creation in the mining sector but there was no evidence of long-run relationships between government spending and jobs creation in construction, financial, manufacturing, and retail sectors. The short-run analysis showed that government spending could create jobs in all five sectors. This paper concluded that increasing government spending can only create short-term jobs but does not create lasting jobs in most sectors, except the mining sector. To increase the number of durable jobs, the South African government should therefore increase spending on mining sector

Feasibility of Monetary Union in the SADC And EAC: Evidence from Business Cycle Synchronisation

Through the Association of African Central Bank Governors, in 2003, Africa committed itself to work for a single currency and common central bank by 2021. In pursuit of this grand objective, many regional trading blocs including the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the East African Community (EAC) are involved in various economic integration activities. Forming a monetary union is a serious endeavour that needs serious and deliberate consideration. Sufficient and sound economic basis, such as similar economic structures, should be in place. The purpose of this paper was to assess the feasibility of monetary union in the SADC and EAC by determining the similarities of the economic structures in the regions through business cycle synchronisation. This study uses annual real GDP of each country in the two regions for a period of 30 years. The results of ccorrelation analysis and T-Y Granger causality test suggest that there is overwhelming lack of business cycle synchronisation in the two economic regions, suggesting that it is not feasible to form a monetary union in these two economic regions as envisaged in the timeframe. The two economic regions, therefore, need to set and coordinate major macroeconomic policies to harmonise and achieve sustainable economic development goals in their respective regions

Modelling Return Volatility in the Main Board and the Alternative Exchange of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange: Application of GARCH Models

Volatility has been a major concern for the stock market because it poses risk challenges to stock markets’ investors. This paper estimated and compared the level of volatility in the two boards of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) namely, the Main Board and the Alternative Stock Exchange (AltX), and tested whether there are volatility spill-over effects between these two boards. Different GARCH models were used to analyse daily returns for the sample period running from January 2007 to December 2016. Results show that the best volatility capturing model for the JSE Main Board was EGARCH(1,1); while the best model for AltX was GARCH (1, 1). The JSE AltX was found to be more volatile than the Main Board and there was no spill-over effect between the two boards. The absence of the spill-over effect is an indication that the risks do not spill-over between the two boards of the JSE. The findings of this study therefore suggest that investors can minimise risk by diversifying their investment between the two major boards of the JSE

Analysis of South African household consumption expenditure and its determinants: Application of the ARDL Model

oai:ojs.localhost:article/4785Aggregate consumption expenditure is considered to be a major variable in determining a country’s growth, and is mostly used in forecasting the economic prospects of a country. Thus, understanding of a country’s consumption behaviour plays a central role in macroeconomic analysis. The aim of this paper is to conduct an econometric analysis of the key macroeconomic determinants of consumption expenditure in South Africa from 1995 to 2015. The autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model was utilised to analyse short- and long-run relationships between real aggregate private consumption and selected macroeconomic variables. The sample period consists of quarterly time series from 1995 quarter 1 to the last quarter of 2015. Long-run results revealed that South African households consume a large portion of their real income and that real consumption increases with the appreciation of the domestic currency (rand). Additionally, price levels and interest rates were found to have a negative effect on real consumption expenditure in the long run. In the short run, price levels and interest rates were found to have negative effects on real consumption expenditure in South Africa, while the effect of real exchange rates were not statistically significant. Findings of this study suggest that macroeconomic stability factors play a crucial role in determining real consumption in the South African economy

Attitude of Undergraduate Students toward Leisure Activities

The purpose of this study was to explore the attitude of undergraduate students towards leisure activities focussing on first-year and senior (2nd and 3rd year) students. A sample of 427 students enrolled in a South African University was selected to meet the analytical needs of the study. The instrument used is based on the Leisure Attitude Scale developed by Beard and Ragheb (1982). The results indicated that, overall, the study subjects are associated with positive attitudes towards leisure activities. One-way ANOVA procedure revealed a statistically significant difference between junior and senior students in overall leisure attitude and within cognitive and behavioural subscales. Pearson’s Correlation Analysis showed a significant positive correlation between the overall LAS and different sub-scales