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The South African energy crisis harms the economy. Tax incentives are intended to help, but rules for incentives must be understood by all stakeholders for taxpayers to be encouraged to invest. Section 12L (S12L) is relatively new legislation that allows a tax deduction for verified year-on-year energy efficiency savings in South Africa. Concurrent benefits are excluded from this tax incentive, to prevent a double reward for the same activity. Although the prevention of double benefits is commonly addressed in the field of measurement and verification (M&V), non-technical guidelines are not available. This is a critical shortcoming since multiple professions (tax, audit and legal) need to understand the technical M&V requirements of S12L. This study reviews the current legislation and interpretations of concurrent benefits in terms of S12L. It shows that multiple energy-related incentives are utilised by industries and that, therefore, it must be determined if different programmes overlap, so as to create concurrent benefits with S12L. It is then critical to correctly apply M&V practice to ensure exclusion of concurrent benefits. This study also provides a simplified methodology to evaluate concurrency, based on the S12L regulatory requirements and standard M&V methods. Three case studies show how concurrency can occur and how M&V practice is applied to exclude double benefits. The test for concurrency is shown to reduce to the following question: Is the same energy saving funded twice? The tests must be done to ensure no double benefit occurs.

It is highly important today to assess what policy the leaders of Russia are pursuing in the Chechen Republic (CR), to identify all of its possible alternatives and their impact on Russia's South. Let's have a look at what was done between 2000 and 2004. In 2000 the Center restored its power in the republic, set up a system of military commandants across its territory, created a national administration and tied Chechnia to the federal budget system. The republic, however, remained a scene of the counterterrorist operation. In February 2001 the RF government adopted a Federal Target Program of Rehabilitation of the Economic and Social Sphere of the Chechen Republic for the Year 2001 (Resolution No. 96). According to expert assessments, it was fulfilled by 15 percent for lack of coordination among the federal partners in the program and their inadequate approach to its realization. Strange as it may seem the reasons lied outside the republic. The failure is explained by the low culture and practice of drafting, adopting, and realizing federal target programs of regional development adopted for implementation since the 1990s. (All of them remained practically unfulfilled.) This says that many of the top government bureaucrats have not completely realized that it was them who are responsible for the success or failure of such programs. In the European Union, for example, similar territorial programs are one of the most important elements of the states' regional policies, which explains why the aims and schedules are faithfully observed, while the results improve the living standards and create more jobs for the economically active population in such regions.

In this paper, we examine the dynamic nature of equity market integration for the South Asian countries. The daily data for local equity indices are used from 6 January 2004 to 31 March 2015. Copula GARCH models and Diebold and Yilmaz methodology have been employed to study the inter-temporal process of equity market integration. Empirical results show that the sample countries of the region exhibit very little or no levels of integration between them. Equity portfolio flows within the South Asian region reconfirms this trend for low integration in the region. Further, trend analysis of the fundamental determinants of financial integration for the SAARC countries was performed and the same was compared with its neighbouring regional economic bloc in Asia i.e. ASEAN + 6. It indicated that SAARC countries have to show sincere political commitment and require collaboration in efforts of policy realignment to work on their governance parameters, improve on their trade linkages and trade tariffs and develop their equity market infrastructure to achieve higher levels of financial integration. The paper contributes to the International Finance literature, especially dealing with regional economic blocs and has important implications for policy-makers, portfolio managers and academia.

It is frequently assumed that people's health is determined primarily by their access to technically-based disease treatment, the standard of which is decided by national health policies that allocate health services. However, evidence suggests that population health is determined more by social status & gradients than by access to clinical care. Moreover, in the present era, there is concern that economic globalisation is exacerbating inequities within countries, thus contributing to greater human insecurity. This paper examines these issues in the context of South Africa since the end of apartheid. It argues that the ANC government's attempts to reduce entrenched inequities in the health system & address the broad social determinants of health have been severely constrained by pressures of economic globalisation, which have induced the government to abandon the objectives of its socially-responsive Reconstruction & Development Programme (RDP) in favour of the neoliberal Growth, Employment & Redistribution Programme (GEAR). References. Adapted from the source document.

Includes bibliography. ; 'Smuts and ,the Politics of Colonial Expansion: South African Strategy in Regard to South-West Africa [Namibia] and the League of Nations Mandate: c.1914-1924' is an analysis of Jan Smuts's central role in the Union's conquest of South West Africa in 1915, the fight for annexation of the territory in 1918-1919, and his subsequent shaping of the Mandate as Prime Minister of the Union until 1924. In addition it is an investigation of Smuts's motivations during this period. Three significant conclusions emerge from this dissertation. Primarily, I argue that Smuts was involved in all three above described stages of the Union's acquisition of South-West Africa, as both a policy-maker and the lead representative of South Africa's interests. Most importantly, I evaluate Smuts's incentives for so passionately leading the attempt to incorporate South-West Africa and contend that Smuts wanted to annex the territory because of his desire to create a white-led superstate in southern Africa, independent of European influence and with regional hegemony, and that the annexation of South-West Africa was an important step in that direction for Smuts. Additonally, I assess Smuts's successes and failures and conclude that his failure to fully realize annexation of the territory was responsible for Namibia's eventual independence. In order to prove my assertions, I rely on both secondary and primary information from South African and Namibian archives. My primary sources are drawn from the papers of the Governor-General of the Union, the Prime Minister of the Union, the Secretary and Administrator of South-West Africa, and others such as the American Ambassador to South Africa.

Gewürdigt werden die Verdienste der Weltbank (IBRD) beim Aufbau regionaler und nationaler Entwicklungsinstitutionen. Die Entwicklungsbank der RSA und der vier sogenannten TBVC-Staaten ("Nationalstaaten") hat sich an Weltbankkonzepten orientiert. Im Vergleich werden Management und Abstimmungsmodus sowie die Kapitaleinlagen verglichen. Vergleichbar ist auch die Kreditvergabe. Hinzu kommen gleiche Verpflichtungen der Mitgliederstaaten gegenüber dem Internationalen Währungsfonds. Allerdings arbeitet die 'Development Bank of Southern Africa' in einem bescheideneren Rahmen: nicht nur sind die Ziele regional, auch der Personaleinsatz ist zwanzigmal geringer. (DÜI-Wsl)

Piketty's (2014) book titled "Capital in the Twenty-First Century" sparked widespread interest in global inequality, the distinction between wealth and income inequality and the economic, social and political processes accounting for changes in economic inequality over time. Piketty's (2014) study controversially stated that widening economic inequality is the normal state of affairs in capitalist societies. The return from capital/wealth (terms used interchangeably) will almost always outpace the returns from labour. In contrast with Piketty's (2014) thesis that the returns on non-human capital drive growing income inequality, economists such as Leibbrandt et al. (2012), Van der Berg (2014) and Hundenborn et al. (2016) have found that the labour market and human capital (HC) are the primary sources of income inequality. The research problem for this study stems from these contrasting views. ; Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Commerce, Economics and Economic History, 2021

This book examines the crime-terror nexus in South Asia, focusing in particular on the activities of non-state actors that operate out of Pakistan, and challenges the conventional wisdom that the Pakistan Taleban (TTP) and Al-Qaeda are Pakistan's most serious security threats. Much research has focused on the policies of India and Pakistan towards Kashmir. But surprisingly little attention has been paid to several notable Pakistan-based non-state actors who are increasingly operating on their own, and who have the potential to greatly inhibit, if not derail, the peace process there. These groups blur the line between terrorism and organized crime with serious implications for policy in the region. India and Pakistan can engage in confidence-building measures, but if criminal actors such as Lashkar-i-Taiba (LeT) and D-Company cannot effectively be controlled, a lack of trust between both sides will remain. Although the role of regular military forces is not to be discounted, many of the non-state actors in Indian-Held Kashmir, such as LeT, are not confined by the same restraints as state forces, thus allowing them engage in more violent actions without fear of reprisal. In order for lawmakers, security personnel, and others to develop sound, comprehensive policies, these forces and their potential to undermine political initiatives must be fully appreciated. This book explores the dynamics of the relationship between Pakistan, D-Company, and LeT and how it affects strategic thought, decision-making, and security interests in the region and explains the triangular relationships between states, terrorist groups, and organized criminal syndicates in general, and in India and Pakistan in particular. This book will of much interest to students of South Asian politics, terrorism, organised crime, war and conflict studies, and Security Studies in general. --