Search

Access to finance is one of the factors influencing economic activities. The current study aimed at determining the role of finance in the South African agro-industrialization relationship. To achieve the study objective, bounds testing, the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) and error correction approaches were applied on quarterly time series data spanning between the first quarter of 1994 and the last quarter of 2021. Additionally, an interaction term was included to assist the aforementioned models in determining linkage between agriculture and industrial outputs through farmer's access to finance. Findings revealed that agricultural output and finance are valid forecasters of the industrialization behaviour in the long-run. Access to finance leads to industrial growth while agricultural output growth causes a decline in the industrialization. Nonetheless, aggregate growth of both financial access and agricultural output are associated with industrial output in the short-run. Grounded of the study findings, this study concludes that financial access influence both agriculture and industrial output. Consequently, improving famers' financial access through financial facilities, financial intermediaries and government subsidies could be a worthwhile strategy or policy to enhance a country's industrialization. As implication of the study, obtained finding can assist in linking effectiveness of primary, secondary and tertiary economic sectors in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Global Journal of Economics & Business is the property of Refaad for Studies, Research & Development and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The purpose of this study is to investigate the application of forensic accounting techniques in relation to fraud risk mitigation. This study employed an explanatory research design and a qualitative approach accompanied with a purposive sampling method. A primary data source was devised with a focus on the 17 licensed commercial banks registered in South Africa. By obtaining a true reflection of the situations in the banks, a conclusion was drawn following the outcome of the inferential statistical analysis. The research was conducted at the individual and organisational levels, with the bank consultants presenting their views. One hypothesis was formulated and non-parametric statistical analyses involving the use of Chi-square test, Fisher's Exact test and Spearman's correlation were carried out. The results obtained substantiate that the loopholes created as a result of non-effective application of forensic techniques are partly responsible for some cyberfraud incidents in the banking industry. There is no sufficient evidence to ascertain whether the fraud risk assessment and management in the banking industry has a relationship with the effective application of forensic accounting techniques in terms of the identified causes of cyberfraud. However, the findings establish a positive correlation between fraud risk assessment and management as it relates to forensic accounting implementation. This study provides an insight into the significance of forensic accounting applications for fraud risk mitigation. There is still a death of information regarding the forensic accounting for fraud risk mitigation; hence, it is envisaged that this study will add to the existing literature in this regard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores factors that affect the adoption of agroforestry (AF) technologies in 'Tsolo' and 'Lusikisiki' areas in O.R. Tambo district in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is based on empirical evidence gathered from households in the study areas. The aim and objective of the study are consistent with the strategic priorities of the South African Department of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries. The study finds that agricultural farming experience, education level of the household head, a proxy variable for household wealth status, land size owned, number of livestock owned, pace of adoption of other agricultural technologies, the scale of slope of farm land, and percent of severely degraded farm land affect the adoption of AF technologies in the study areas significantly and with the higher magnitudes of the odds ratios. These variables need to be considered in all the initiatives by government and non-governmental organizations to promote AF as a strategy to realize integrated rural development in the study areas. These findings have policy implications to advance integrated sustainable rural development strategies. The local government in the study areas can use the promotion of AF technologies for multiple purposes, particularly as a tool toward rural poverty alleviation and climate change mitigation measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agroforestry plays a significant role in increasing agricultural productivity. In South Africa, there is a pressing need for promoting smallholder agriculture to promote sustainable rural livelihoods, to ensure food security, to lower inflation in food prices, and address rampant rural unemployment in the country. The agricultural economy is characterised by a monopoly structure where almost every single staple in South Africa is already produced by large manufacturers that can produce it at better quality and lower cost than the average smallholder enterprise or cooperative. Such a monopoly structure fundamentally undermines the development of local markets, where local small-scale producers sell to their local community. The novelty of this study is addressing the research gap that conventional rural livelihood analyses often neglect, i.e., the role of environmental products in general, and forest and agroforestry products. Using a log linear regression model with cross-sectional data collected from a sample of 300 households, this study explores the likely impact of agroforestry practices in promoting the livelihood of rural communities in the study areas. Results obtained from multiple linear regression analysis showed that average household income increased as a function of utilization of agroforestry practices. Agroforestry contributes to sustainable rural livelihoods in South African provinces where the predominant means of livelihoods is rural subsistence farming and agriculture. Since valuation of agroforestry products and services are technically difficult, farmers often underestimate the contribution of agroforestry to the household's livelihood income. These findings have policy implications in promoting food security in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Cyberfraud is a global problem, which has negative impacts on the financial institutions, global economy and the public. The existing policy and regulatory frameworks for mitigating cyberfraud in South African banks are not holistic, thus, the purpose of this study is to develop a holistic policy and regulatory framework that integrates the legal, governance, internal control and supervisory frameworks for cyberfraud mitigation in the South African banking industry., Method: ology: The study employs a mixed method comprising of both qualitative and quantitative approaches. A structured questionnaire was developed and made available to selected members of staff of the 17 licensed banks in South Africa. These experts deal directly with the banking operations, administration and customers' services. Non-parametric statistical analysis, specifically the Chi-square, Fischer's Exact, Spearman's correlation and cross tabulation statistics, were employed for the statistical analysis of the data gathered from the survey. From the outcome of the survey, a simplified policy and regulatory framework was developed for the mitigation of the effects of cyberfraud in order to enhance the performance of South African banks., Findings: The outcome of the survey indicated that there is a relationship between the methods of cyberfraud identification and the occurrence of cyberfraud in the South African banking industry. Furthermore, the methods of cyberfraud identification were presumed to be effective based on the evidence presented in this study. Despite this, the effect of cyberfraud perpetration was still found to be detrimental to the South African banks., Practical Implications: This study presents a simplified and executable policy as well as regulatory framework for mitigating cyberfaud in South African banks. The proposed policies and regulations are geared towards improving cyber resilience and minimising the effects of cyberfraud occurrences., Novelty: Existing works have not sufficiently reported on the integrated policy and regulatory framework for mitigating cyberfraud. Thus, this study developed a simplified integrated policy and regulatory framework for mitigating cyberfraud to enhance the performance of South African banks in the area of cyberfraud mitigation., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2023 The Authors.)