Vol. 10 No. 1(J) (2018)

Green marketing is growing in importance as it is tied to the universal goal of sustainable development. Although green marketing is gaining in prominence as a strategic imperative, mixed accounts a bound on its ability to create sustainable competitive advantage. Against this backdrop, this conceptual paper discusses the concept of green marketing, its drivers, challenges and future directions in the context of emerging markets. With the aid of a systematic literature review, this paper discusses market opportunities and challenges, implementation gaps, future directions and misconceptions associated with the adoption and implementation of green marketing. Results of literature review showed that the adoption of green marketing is driven principally by market opportunities, environmental legislation, operating efficiencies and improved profitability. Literature reviewed also notes challenges associated with green marketing implementation such as consumer cynicism, variability in demand of green products and exorbitant investment costs related to green technologies. This paper concludes that successful implementation of green marketing depends on a green vision that meticulously counterbalances the vested interests of key stakeholders in the value chain such as suppliers and customers. Effective green marketing implementation is also contingent on the ability of top management to integrate, coordinate and re-configure corporate competences to achieve green marketing goals. This paper recommends that marketers should resist the green marketing bandwagon but rather focus on understanding implementation imperatives that are preconditions for creation of sustainable competitive advantage. Marketers should also note that green marketing is not a panacea to all marketing challenges as it needs to be supported by sound marketing acumen.

The development of shopping malls is a major social and global phenomenon that has unearthed a novel facet for customer satisfaction and their consequent or relative buying behavior. The aim of his paper was to explore the gender differences in consumer buying behavior at selected Durban shopping malls. It is an observational cross-sectional study carried out on 700 randomly selected respondents to study buying capacity, buying behavior and shopping experience of male and female consumers at shopping malls in the city of Durban, South Africa. Data was collected through pre-tested semi-structured questionnaire with closed ended questions. The study revealed that there are notable gender differences, which shape shopping behavior among men and women. Time and money spent at the mall was significantly high among female as compared to male consumers. Consequently, the results attributed that personal attributes and shopping mall attractiveness factors played a crucial role in influencing customer shopping behavior amongst the mall shoppers. The study concludes that gender differences are prevalent in the buying behavior of customers at the select shopping malls in Durban, South Africa. Average time spent by female is high as compared to male which also affect their average money spent at shopping mall. Psychological, Social and Cultural factors are highly influencing customers’ buying behavior at shopping malls.

Following the end of colonialism in the Southern African sub-region, the SADC has experienced a thorough rearrangement with South Africa as the front-runner as opposed to her pre-1994 stance on integration. African regional cooperation has nevertheless been revitalised in some ways as a result of the two major events which started in the beginning of the 1990s that include the abolition of the apartheid regime in South Africa, and the eventual stabilisation of both political and economic relationships in the Southern Africa sub-region. This study employs the use of content analyses to assess the position of South Africa investments in SADC. Through the use of regional integration, the study further examined various South Africa’s Key Economy Performance since 1994 which are the main contributing factors to South African economic growth; furthermore, it looks at her material, commodity and political investment in the subregional integration process to determine if it serves as the strategy for National Economic Development for South Africa. The paper finds out that regardless of South Africa’s economic clout within the SADC region, its Foreign Direct Investment is predominantly from its investment and market penetration of Southern Africa region while maintaining constant economic growth.

The objective of this study was to investigate the relationship between real exchange rate and economic growth in South Africa. Using time series data, the period from 1980 to 2015 was covered in the study. Data was collected from the South African Reserve Bank, the International Monetary Fund and International Financial Statistics. The Johansen cointegration and the Vector Error Correction Model estimation techniques were employed in the study, followed by VEC Granger causality test, variance decomposition and impulse response function. The long-run results revealed a negative and significant relationship between real exchange rate with export and economic growth. On the other hand, money supply and foreign direct investment have a positive and significant relationship with real exchange rate. Only export was significant and positively related to real exchange rate in the short-run. Results of granger causality showed that only export granger causes real exchange rate thus, a unidirectional causality exists between export and real exchange rate. Results of variance decomposition revealed that the real exchange rate is highly affected by shocks from economic growth. The impulse response functions showed that real exchange rate responds positively to shocks from real exchange rate and money supply. On the contrary, real exchange rate responds negatively to a shock from economic growth. There is, therefore, a need to increase exports, money supply, foreign direct investment and economic growth as these would lead to an increase in the Rand and consequently, appreciation of the Rand.

This article aims to put forward the imperatives of emerging technologies in playing fundamental role on administration work effectiveness and efficiency. The nature of office work has changed through time due to the emergence of new technologies that are adopted and implemented in the government departments. The emerging technologies are the heartbeat of any organisation and simultaneously they are the structure and thread holding it all together. With this study, a survey design was adopted and data collection was done through structured questionnaire. The study argues that the influx of emerging technologies increases the relationship with stakeholders and shareholders, responsiveness, transparency and accessibility of quality service delivery. This has resulted in government departments enhancing the effective communication between government and citizens, while it creates opportunities for government employees. Therefore, the study concludes that with the emergence of technologies, it is important for government departments to initiate new technologies in the departments to faster transactions, provide excellent service delivery to citizens of South Africa and as well as improving mass communication.

The South African retail sector continues to experience a decline in sales and returns amidst growing external competition and a drop in consumer confidence stemming from the recent credit downgrades in the country. Yet, firms in this sector appear to maintain high debt to equity levels. This study investigated whether the capital structure practices of these firms influence their profitability. A Panel data methodology, using three regression estimators, is applied to a balanced sample of 16 retail firms listed on the Johannesburg Securities Exchange (JSE) during the period 2008-2016. The analysis estimates functions relating capital structure composition with the return on assets (ROA). Results reveal a statistically significant but negative relationship between all measures of debt (short-term, long-term, total debt) with profitability, suggesting a possible inclination towards the pecking order theory of financing behaviour, for listed retail firms. Additionally, retail firms are highly leveraged yet over 75% of this debt is short-term in nature. Policy interventions need to investigate the current restrictions on long-term debt financing which offers longerterm and affordable financing, to boost returns. While this study’s methodology differs slightly from earlier studies, it incorporates vital aspects from these studies, and simultaneously specifies a possible model fit. This helps to capture unique but salient characteristics like the transitional effects of debt financing on firm profitability. It therefore delivers some unique findings on the financing behaviour of retail firms that both in form policy change, while stimulating further research on the phenomenon.

The study investigates the effect of corporate governance on financial distress in the Nigerian banking industry and examines the discriminatory power of corporate governance mechanism of the board, audit committee, executive management and auditor in one model for financial distress prediction. Secondary data obtained from annual financial statements of twenty banks between 2005 and 2015 were used for the study. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and generalized quantile regression model. The empirical evidence from the study suggests that financially distressed banks are characterized by large board size with members who may not be well versed in banking complexities, chairmen and CEOs with significant shareholding both individually and collectively. Furthermore, the evidence also shows that distressed banks suffer major decline in customer deposits despite increase in size. The study concludes that financial distress can be caused by poor corporate governance mechanism.

Increasingly services to airline passengers have evolved into the digital and technological realms. This study examined the extent to which South African own-registered airlines (SAORA) utilize emerging information technologies in delivering service quality to air passengers. The acronym “SAORA” refers to Six South African own-registered airlines which was focus of this study. The research methodology adopted for this study was a descriptive approach focused on cross-sectional analysis. Using a quantitative research method and non-probability convenient sampling technique, primary data was collected from 684 passengers at O.R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg and King Shaka International Airport in Durban. The study revealed that by utilizing emerging technologies, SAORA stand to offer superior service quality to air passengers, thereby gaining competitive advantage, continuous patronage, loyalty and increased profitability.

In this study, the researcher investigated the biographical and human resource management (HRM) predictors of union membership. The literature reviewed revealed that there is little research on this topic in the South African context. The literature reviewed also showed that males, permanent employees, employees who are less committed, who have a level of quality of work-life (QWL) and engagement, and those who are satisfied are more likely to be unionized. A cross-sectional survey design was used to address the research questions. One thousand questionnaires were distributed and 874 were completed by the respondents at Marabastad Mall in the City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality (CTMM) in South Africa. The study results showed that employment status was the highest predictor (  = -1.782, p<0.05) of union membership, and gender and job satisfaction were not predictors of union members. This study had managerial implications, in the sense that when hiring employees on a part-time basis, having employees who are committed and offering employees QWL (i.e. excellent fringe benefits) will impact negatively on union membership. In terms of policymakers, the study revealed that developing remuneration policies that are pro-employee (i.e. offering excellent working conditions and fringe benefits) would make them satisfied, possibly be productive, and they would engage less in counterproductive industrial actions like strikes, which in South Africa are the amongst highest in the world.

The task of reducing food insecurity in Africa is very challenging. This is because of the changing conditions such as adverse climate change impacts. This study examined food insecurity, urbanisation and ICT in Africa. The paper employed a combination of both secondary and historical information obtained from different sources (UNHCR, FAO, Mo Ibrahim Foundation etc). Analytical method used include descriptive statistics such as charts. Food security indices in Africa is alarming and disturbing. One in four people in Africa do not have access to food in adequate quantities and one in five African children are underweight. African agriculture is rendered unattractive by low productivity hence the exodus of labour from rural to urban areas. Africa is the most rapidly urbanising continent in the world with enabling factors comprising of infrastructure deficits in rural areas, dearth of employment opportunities and glamour of city life. However, Africa’s urban centres are not immune to the challenges inducing rural-urban migration in the first place. In fact, youth unemployment in Africa is 6 times higher in urban areas than in rural areas. About 72percent of urban dwellers live in slums with the most of them having no access to basic amenities. These culminated in what is regarded in literature as ‘urbanisation of poverty’. Migrants are generally scapegoated as the causes of crimes, violence and even unemployment in urban areas. Therefore, they are subjected to sub-human living conditions. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is particularly critical to the achievement of food security in Africa. This is because of the huge gap between markets and farmers which it is capable of filling. The paper therefore recommends increased but monitored investments in infrastructure in Africa in order to make rural areas more attractive and discourage rural-urban migration. There is also the need to provide favourable micro and macro-environment for businesses to grow especially in rural Africa.