Caryatids of the Royal Tomb at Sveshtari

Author(s): Maria Chichikova / Language(s): English Issue: 19/2012

The author’s attention is focused on the interior and the ten caryatids of the royal tomb at the village of Sveshtari. The female figures are seen as characters of a funerary cult, bearers of the celestial canopy above the buried, divine or mortal – leading the dead as heroi to the world beyond. According to the author the tomb is dated to the very end of the first or the beginning of the second quarter f the 3rd century BC and was prepared for a Getan ruler.

The Cult of Dionysus in Seuthopolis

Author(s): Kamen D. Dimitrov / Language(s): English Issue: 19/2012

The article is an attempt to discuss the role of Dionysus in the cultural profile of the area of Seuthopolis pointing out that an official cult of Dionysus was worshipped on the agora and a second aspect of the worship was clearly related to the afterlife ideology in Seuthopolis.

Cultural tourism: new opportunities for diversifying the tourism industry in Botswana

Author(s): Jarkko Saarinen,Naomi Moswete,Masego J. Monare / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Botswana is known as a wilderness and safari-tourism destination,which attracts high-end overseas visitors to the country. Since the 1990s the country’stourism policy has been based on a so called ‘High Value – Low Volume’(HVLV) strategy referring to the aim of attracting limited numbers of tourists withhigh expenditure patterns. However, while such tourism operations have contributedto the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country and offered investmentopportunities for international companies, the position of Botswana as a HVLVdestination is increasingly criticised. It is seen as offering too narrow prospectsfor the growth of the industry and for the local participation and benefit sharingin tourism in future. Hence, there is a need for diversification of the product withdeeper involvement of local people to tourism. Therefore, communities and Botswana’scultural and heritage attractions are increasingly seen as one of the futurecornerstones of tourism development. This paper provides an overview of culturaltourism with specific reference to existing cultural and heritage attractions andthe potential thereof for tourism in Botswana. The paper concludes that while therole of culture is still underutilised in tourism, the cultural tourism in Botswanahas the potential to contribute to a more equitable distribution of tourism-baseddevelopment and the related benefits for local communities.

Rethinking slum tourism: tourism in South Africa's rural slumlands

Author(s): Christian M. Rogerson / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Slum tourism is an expanding domain of research focused on organized tours to poorer areas of cities in the global South, such as South Africa’s urban townships. The aim is to contribute towards a reframing of scholarship on slum tourism by directing attention to the phenomenon of tourism development occurring in rural slums or poverty areas of South Africa, namely the former rural Bantustan or Homeland areas. These rural areas are presently the focus of government attention for tourism promotion as part of economic upgrading and employment creation. The key findings are that the expanding tourism economy of these rural slumlands is dominated by domestic tourists rather than international visitors with most tourists engaged in VFR travel including trips to rural second homes. In addition, these areas are important foci for religious pilgrimage. In terms of international scholarship on slum tourism the paper offers the significant observation that the largest share of tourists originate in the country’s urban township areas which are the attractions for international slum tourists. The destinations for visits by international slum tourists are therefore the essential source regions of tourists for visits to the rural poverty areas or slumlands of South Africa. This points to an imperative for broadening the research agenda of slum tourism to incorporate research which examines the tourism mobilities of ordinary residents of townships or favelas.

Indian foreign direct investments in Africa: a geographical perspective

Author(s): Mohammad Amir Anwar / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Foreign direct investments (FDI) into Africa from developing economieshave grown substantially over the past decade. While the focus of the enquiryamong the geographers has been the rise of Chinese investments in Africa,India has become an important ‘Asian driver’ within the ‘new scramble for Africa’. This article highlights the geography of Indian involvement in Africa in termsof its growing scale, new patterns and the emerging complex structure of Indianinvestments. The article finds that the nature of India-Africa trade relationshipmirrors colonial trade relationships between India and the Great Britain. The Indianinvestments in Africa are resource- oriented and fused with geopolitical dynamics,driven by capitalistic agendas.

'The Mkuze River it has crossed the fence'(1) - communities on the boundary of the Mkuze protected area

Author(s): Christopher N. Burgoyne,Clare J. Kelso / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Restricting access to wilderness and wildlife resources is a contestedtopic in a time when developing nations are seeking to increase quality of life fortheir citizens. A case in point is the Mkuze Game Reserve which encompasses richbiodiversity and is surrounded by under-resourced rural communities. A historyof exclusion from land and resources has left local residents feeling negative aboutwestern conservation ideals. Perceptions of protected areas and conservation objectivesare important if management authorities are to affect a meaningful buy-into conservation and sustainable resource use among local residents. In this paper,part of a larger mixed-methods study, we set out to explore the perceptionsthree rural communities have of 1) local land-cover and livelihood change and 2)the socio-economic benefits expected and derived from living adjacent to MkuzeGame Reserve, a publicly administered protected area in KwaZulu-Natal, SouthAfrica. People living around the reserve felt they receive few benefits from livingnear to a protected area. Management countered that they are not well fundedenough to provide much development support. In addition to this, the communitysees a contrast between this lack of benefit sharing and the successful benefitsharing experienced by a neighbouring community which borders a privatereserve. This has added to their negative view of the way Mkuze Game Reservemanagement has been engaging with communities. Effective engagement withcommunities and understanding their expectations will be important for strengtheningconservation initiatives and community engagement objectives in the area.

Community-based ecotourism: Its socio-economic impacts at Boabeng-Fiema Monkey Sanctuary, Ghana

Author(s): Gabriel Eshun,Joycelyn Naana Pokuaa Tonto / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

There is a lacuna in literature from Western Africa on how issue ofparticipation influence socio-economic impacts at ecotourism destinations. Thispaper investigates the socio-economic impacts of ecotourism based on BoabengFiemaMonkey Sanctuary in Ghana. The paper is based on primary data generatedfrom Boabeng and Fiema communities. Seventy mainly opened-ended questionnaireswere administered face-to-face to purposively selected residents from thetwo communities, alongside, in-depth interviews with the management of theSanctuary and focus group with purposively selected individuals from Boabengand Fiema. The study reveals that the residents of the communities face burgeoningchallenges such as shrinking livelihood options, inadequate involvement ofcommunity in the ecotourism, poor state of the visitor centre, inadequate governmentsupport and poor roads.

The role of state - business relations in the performance of Zambia's food processing sub-sector

Author(s): Godfrey Hampwaye,Soeren Jeppesen / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

In ensuring growth and development collaborative State-Business relations(SBRs) matters, and with economic growth comes increasing levels of employment,options for poverty reduction and hence more equitable development.Whereas it is known that SBR matters at a macro-economic level, the concept ofSBR has also been employed in a more or less all-encompassing way in the literature.Accordingly, while it is clear that SBRs work, there is lack knowledge aboutwhich dimensions of SBRs are the most important. Due to the continued importanceof agriculture in many developing countries, processing of the food producedin the sector is a key manufacturing activity of high economic importanceto many economies. Ensuring collaborative SBRs in the food processing industryis therefore of interest to growth and development, particularly as it is a sectorabout which little is known about the role of SBRs. The paper attempts toexamine how and why SBRs matter to and influence the growth and performanceof local owned firms in the food processing sub-sector in Zambia. In particular,the paper analyses the roles and influence of government regulations andpolicies compared to those of business associations for the performance of thefood processing sector in Zambia. The paper draws on primary data from a surveyof firms in the food processing sector which was conducted between 2013and 2014. It is shown that while the majority of the Zambian food processingfirms experienced growth over the last five years, with increased employment andin a  number of cases growing earnings, this seems to have happened in spite ofa business environment which is not particularly supportive. The firms’ experienceis that the SBRs mainly constitute institutional barriers to the performanceof firms and highlight that formal government institutions and polices are incapableof assisting the firms and in most cases government institutions formulateand enact insufficient support schemes.

Agritourism and local economic development in South Africa

Author(s): Christian Rogerson,Jayne M. Rogerson / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

The role of tourism for local economic development (LED) is a topicof critical importance for geographers. In the case of South Africa tourismis a priority sector for national economic development. The significance of researchissues around tourism and LED is underlined by the ‘developmental’ mandateof local governments. Although tourism has received attention in a growingbody of LED writings on South Africa issues around agritourism so far have beenoverlooked. Agritourism represents an evolving form of rural tourism which istargeted at mainly urban consumers. Against the background of a review of internationalscholarship on agritourism this article explores its potential implicationsfor LED planning in South Africa. A national audit of agritourism is presentedwhich shows its uneven geographical distribution. Agritourism is of special significancefor small town economic development in South Africa’s intermediate tourismspaces. Policy suggestions are offered for strengthening agritourism as a driverfor LED in South Africa.

Urban land restitution in Cape Town: demanding the return of land rights in Constantia and Kensington/Ndabeni

Author(s): Ronnie Donaldson,Glen Hyman,David Chang,André Confiado,Ana María Ruiz,Ssicarú Salud,Sanem Yildiz / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

One of the hallmark policies implemented post-apartheid, the Restitutionof Land Rights Act 22 of 1994, is a rights-based program aimed at addressingthe loss of land resulting from past racially discriminatory laws or practices.The aim of this research was to identify what are the factors that determine thedifferent outcomes of the restitution process when claimants are demanding thereturn of land rights and to highlight the challenges regarding the implementationof this land restitution policy. Focusing on two specific yet contrasting areasin Cape Town, Constantia and Kensington, it was determined that due to factorspertaining to the lands in question, the neighborhood surrounding the lands, theclaimants, as well as the organization, function, and performance of different publicentities, the policy has managed to fulfill restorative justice, but has yet to fulfillits ultimate goal of returning land rights to the claimants and undoing the injusticesof the apartheid regime.

Battlefields Tourism: The status of heritage tourism in Dundee, South Africa

Author(s): Clinton David van der Merwe / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Heritage tourism is a significant contemporary facet of tourism in manydeveloping countries. This paper analyses the economic opportunities for battlefield-heritagetourism in South Africa by examining the battlefields route withinKwaZulu-Natal. Through structured interviews with stakeholders and structuredquestionnaires with visitors and local residents, this research explores the understandingof heritage tourism as well as perceptions of its influence on the physicallandscape and gauges the importance of this form of tourism as a driver forlocal economic development in South Africa. Dundee, a small coal-mining townin KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa – where several battlefields are found, is used asa case study. The study demonstrates that several issues need to be addressed ifthis niche of cultural and heritage tourism is to be a sustainable and responsibleform of tourism in South Africa

Small enterprise development in South Africa: The role of business incubators

Author(s): Mukovhe Masutha,Christian M. Rogerson / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Business incubation is a relatively new phenomenon in scholarship andpolicy development for small enterprise development. Business incubators offertargeted business support and technical support services to accelerate the growthof emerging and small start-up business enterprises into financially and operationallyindependent enterprises. South Africa has adopted business incubationas one vehicle for upgrading the SMME economy. This article examines the evolutionof policy towards business incubation, current progress, institutional issuesand emerging geographies of business incubators as part of the unfoldingand dynamic SMME policy landscape in South Africa. Considerable differencesare observed between the activities of the network of state-supported incubatorsas opposed to private sector operated incubators.

Socio-cultural and socio-economic features of second homes in Rosendal, South Africa

Author(s): Anette Hay,Gustav Visser / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Second homes have seen increased research interest over the last decade. On the whole, these investigations have mainly been understood in the spatial context of the developed North. Second homes have only recently been seen as a role player in the changing economic spatialities of small town geographies in South Africa. This growing scholarship on second homes has, however, been less concerned with the social impacts of the phenomenon. The investigation is set against the argument that second homes have social impacts on the immediate and surrounding areas in which they are situated. This investigation also demonstrates that second homes are phenomena with which not only the elite engage but a range of different socio-economic cohorts, including the poor. The social impacts of second homes in this investigation are shown to vary along race and class lines. Against the backdrop that second homes are relevant to very large parts of South African society, the social impacts associated with second homes need to be taken into account in future development planning in South Africa.

Water quality awareness and barriers to safe water provisioning in informal communities: A case study from Ndola, Zambia

Author(s): Elisabeth S. Liddle,Sarah M. Mager,Etienne L. Nel / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Local water providers in developing nations typically view shallow hand-dug wells as traditional and backward sources of water supply. It has long been assumed that the urban poor do not have the ability to develop these in a way that allows them to be classified as 'improved' in terms of the Millennium Development Goal for water, believing that users do not understand the factors that constitute safe water and the threats to these sources. Our assessment of the level of environmental knowledge held by local water-users in Ndola in Zambia demonstrates a coherent understanding of the safety of their water sources, the quality of these, the threats to them, and the fundamentals of how their local hydrology works, all of which is contrary to the perspective of key informants who are involved in water supply. Despite their environmental awareness, the majority of users did not generally protect their wells from contamination nor treat their water. The apparent paradox between awareness of risks to water and implementing protection of that water source is a function of the complex suite of socially manifested attitudes, habits and behaviours when it comes to water protection and treatment, which is exacerbated by vulnerable community and family structures and entrenched poverty. For meaningful outcomes in improved access to safe water to be realised providers need to increase their engagement with the informal communities, moving deeper into community-based participatory planning and recognise the societal and cultural factors that are entrained into these communities water supply practices. A key part of this involves the need for providers to move away from simple knowledge-based education to the more holistic form of skill-based health education.

The making of the South African timeshare industry: spatial structure and development challenges

Author(s): Wayde R. Pandy,Christian M. Rogerson / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Research on the accommodation sector attracts only a small fraction of contemporary tourism scholarship relating to sub-Saharan Africa. This paper contributes to this expanding literature on segmentation and the accommodation sector in South Africa. Specifically, it examines the establishment and making of the timeshare industry as a distinctive form of accommodation within the national tourism economy. The timeshare industry in South Africa is the largest and most mature in sub-Saharan Africa and among the most important in the developing world. The analysis uses a longitudinal perspective in order to interpret the emerging spatial organisation and evolving structural issues that impacted upon the development of the timeshare industry in its formative years from 1978 to 2002. The study addresses a knowledge gap around the minimal pursuit of historical research within the existing international literature about timeshare.

Planning for economic development in a secondary city? Trends, pitfalls and alternatives for Mangaung, South Africa

Author(s): Lochner Marais,Deidre van Rooyen,Molefi Lenka,Jan Cloete / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

This paper examines Mangaung's economic development initiatives against the background of the latest literature on secondary cities, with a specific emphasis on the 20-year period that has elapsed since the dawn of the postapartheid era. Although some of the plans aim to reverse apartheid planning it is argued that these plans are being hampered by the fact that they tend to focus on a local "buzz" option, and run counter to historical pathways for the city. Moreover, they do not take the value of an increasing knowledge economy into account, and they fail to contextualise the city's development and future prospects in terms of its regional role. The paper identifies a number of pathways that build on history and include options for ensuring active participation in an increasing knowledge economy. Our contention is that the regional role of the city remains one of the key assets with a view to building future economic development pathways. Finally, a number of research themes are identified.

Regional development of Saldanha Bay region, South Africa: The role of Saldanha Steel

Author(s): Lesley Welman,Sanette Ferreira / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Since 1970 the Saldanha Bay region on the West Coast of the Western Cape Province has been high on South Africa's national development agenda. The region has been struggling for years to meet the preconditions for economic take-off. In this analysis the Saldanha Bay region is positioned in the contexts of global competition among steel-producing countries, South Africa's national development plan and the Greater Cape Town functional region. The aim is to explain the nature and extent of the relationship between a single secondary industry - ArcelorMittal Saldanha - and the economic development of the larger Saldanha region. Following a brief introduction and background to the Saldanha Bay region, the evolutionary economic geography (EEG) approach and the role of institutions in the development of regions are reviewed. Saldanha Steel (ArcelorMittal), the pioneer industrial firm, is analysed by using a mixed-method approached, where semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire survey are the main research instruments. The contribution of Saldanha Steel to regional development is explored.

Green commercial property development in urban South Africa: emerging trends,emerging geographies

Author(s): Christian M. Rogerson / Language(s): English Issue: 26/2014

Within sub-Saharan Africa South Africa is one of the leaders in greening and initiatives for sustainable urban development. Notwithstanding the central role of climate change impacts and of the green challenge for the future, the greening of urban development has not been a major focus in local geographical research. The task in this paper is to investigate one aspect of reorienting the economy towards a pathway of low carbon growth and of addressing the green urban challenge. Specifically, issues around the greening of commercial property developments in South Africa are explored. Under the ratings of the Green Building Council of South Africa 50 green buildings existed by early 2014. Geographically these properties cluster in South Africa's major cities, in particular Johannesburg, the country's economic powerhouse and centre for corporate headquarters, and Pretoria, the administrative capital. New proposals for building retrofitting may result in a greater spatial spread of green buildings in the near future.

Цигански елементи в аргото на руските крадци?

Author(s): Viktor V. Shapoval / Language(s): Bulgarian,Romany Issue: 84-85/2016

Из “Печални тропици”. V. Намбиквара. По телеграфната линия

Author(s): Claude Lévi-Strauss / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 84-85/2016