Search

Identifying sound strategies to manage climate risks requires understanding complex systems, characterised by; a large number of potential factors that interact; multiple stakeholder constituencies with diverse values, deep and dynamic uncertainties. This paper assesses the general understanding and dominant narrative regarding climate change in particular societies in order to track the trends regarding the management of climate risk. In this regard, this paper considers climate risk from a Zimbabwean perspective between 1980 and 2021. The assessment of climate risk in Zimbabwe took cognisance of the fact that climate change is a subject that has received a considerable amount of attention in Zimbabwean focused literature. As such, secondary data were used to understand the dominant narratives regarding climate risk in Zimbabwe. The climate risk discussion in Zimbabwe has significantly grown over past four decades nonetheless, it is evident that the dominant narrative is biased towards climate change adaptation particularly on aspects of agricultural and livelihoods sensitivity from a water scarcity perspective. Other adaptation components such as the exposure to hazards, indigenous knowledge systems, ecological and infrastructure vulnerability, communication and gender dimensions of climate change also form the bulk of issues that dominate the adaptation centred narrative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When disasters happen in the world, government departments and NGOs collaborate to support survivors through various interventions. Whether these interventions respond to the gendered impacts of these disasters is an area that has not been given adequate research attention. This paper provides a gendered analysis of the interventions targeted at Cyclone Idai survivors in Zimbabwe's Chimanimani District. It draws from data generated through focus group discussions, in-depth interviews, and key-informant interviews with cyclone survivors and representatives from government agencies and NGOs that provided humanitarian assistance in Chimanimani District. The study revealed that the interventions were implemented without comprehensively integrating gendered issues due to the absence of a clear gender responsive national policy framework for disaster management in Zimbabwe. The study recommends gender sensitive training to those who assist in distributing humanitarian assistance and the need to address gender-skewed responses caused by treating gender as synonymous with women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessing destination competitiveness from a tourist perspective has been limited, especially for distressed destinations such as Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe has been facing ongoing political and economic challenges for more than two decades which puts pressure on the growth of the tourism industry. However, all destinations compete in the same space for tourists' attention, forcing marketers to continuously develop strategies to enhance competitiveness and increase tourist returns and recommendations. This paper focuses on identifying competitiveness factors that influence tourists' intention to return and recommend. Based on a sample of 450 international tourists to Zimbabwe, results show that unique to a distressed destination, the residents' hospitality and friendliness is the most important predictor for the intention to return. This emphasises the role of residents in making the destination more competitive and attractive. General amenities, attractions and destination management are also significant predictors of return intentions. Tourists' intentions to recommend are largely predicted by the destination's resources. Encouraging visitors to revisit and recommend can assist a distressed destination in increasing visitor numbers on a limited marketing budget. Understanding these factors could also help managers to improve the negative image of the destination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper describes sources of resilience in Zimbabwe's supermarket value chains and the strategies for building resilience. Although Zimbabwe has witnessed a steady growth in the number of supermarkets, that growth has been disrupted by the volatile operating environment. Data was collected from an online survey of supermarket managers, websites and secondary sources. The study found that franchising, extensive branch networks, mergers and acquisitions and multiple store formats have provided major supermarkets such as OK, TM/Pick n Pay and Spar with an adaptive capacity that has enabled them to operate for several decades in Zimbabwe's volatile food retail sector. These findings have implications for improving government policy making and supermarket managers' knowledge on developing resilient food systems under a turbulent macroeconomic environment. Further, the study provides key insights on strategies that are indispensable for building the necessary resilience ingredients required by supermarkets to absorb shocks and recover in a timely way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flood-induced displacements are a common feature in rural Zimbabwe and there seems to be a lack of deliberate policy and political commitment from the government. Several factors have increased the susceptibility of communities to flood hazards, ranging from poor housing structures, lack of building standards to ensure resilient structures, and climate change. This paper is an outcome of a one-year study from March 2018 to March 2019. The study adopted a qualitative approach which entailed the use of semi-structured interviews and questionnaires. Fifty participants were purposively sampled for the study. Study findings reflect a gap in political attention as a root to addressing internal displacement. Lack of social and economic capital also plays an attributional role as a factor that has exacerbated the plight of internally displaced persons. The study recommends the government to adopt an Internally Displaced Persons policy and establish a commission that monitors rural settlement structures to enhance community resilience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ineffectiveness of enterprise policy in some southern Africa's rural areas has led to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) attempting to increase their political influence by engaging in the enterprise policy process. This paper examines the case of one NGO from one of the poorest southern African countries – Zimbabwe – in order to bring insights to its role as policy influencer in the regional approaches of enterprise policy-making. The paper argues that an understanding of such role requires the appreciation of how people and organisations are embedded to their contexts. The evidence suggests that in the case study the NGO's role is only modest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban household food insecurity has become a widespread dilemma in Zimbabwe. The paper investigates the extent to which various in-kind transfer programmes in two Bulawayo townships Zimbabwe, have attempted to enhance access to adequate food by poor urbanites. It also pays attention to the influence of in-kind transfers on food consumption behaviours in two ways: first, in relation to the number of meals consumed and second, in increasing quantities of food consumed by poor households. Data was collected through 10 key informant interviews, 50 semi-structured in-depth interviews and 237 questionnaires. Contrary to popular beliefs, we find that in-kind transfer programmes in the two townships have not meaningfully alleviated household food insecurity due to the distribution of incomplete food baskets, distances to distribution points, targeting systems, quantities of food items received and irregular distributions. We recommend the allocation of more resources for alleviating urban poverty and food insecurity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unpredicted shocks such as weather, pests or price changes affect agricultural households negatively or positively. The shocks have two opposite effects (income and substitution) on parents’ investments in the human capital of their children, and it is not predictable from theory whether the income effect or the substitution effect of a shock has a greater impact on the investments. Therefore, it is unknown whether human capital investments (i.e. sending children to school rather than having them work) are procyclical or countercyclical. In this paper we show how hyperinflation may affect investments in the education of children by their parents using three data-sets from Zimbabwe. We find that human capital investments are countercyclical (the substitution effect dominates) in rural areas of Zimbabwe during a shock. Therefore, policymakers in Zimbabwe need to be worried about decreased schooling of children during positive shocks in the rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]