Search results

The study aims to find the causes of road projects implementation delays in Blantyre, one of the four city councils (CCs) in Malawi.

The study followed a qualitative research approach using a Blantyre City Council (BCC) as a case study. This study combined in-depth, face-to-face interviews with councillors, secretariat staff, consultants, and contractors who worked on the city's road projects. Data gathered were analysed using thematic content analysis. Also, some road project documents were examined.

The findings from the case study revealed the primary cause of road project construction delays as the shortage of engineers in conducting detailed proposed projects surveys resulting in incomplete project scope definition before contractor's procurement. Other identified factors were service providers delaying the removal of existing public utility infrastructure from project sites, client funding issues, scope changes, and client delays in issuing instructions to the contractors during project implementation. Another factor was the shortage of construction equipment and construction materials experienced by some appointed contractors.

Only road construction projects and stakeholders operating from Blantyre city, Malawi, were contacted for the study; thus, the findings may not be generalizable.

There is an urgent need to increase technical employees, especially engineers and other critical technical staff such as quantity surveyors in Blantyre. Employees' conditions of service should be conducive to attract qualified people to undertake effective management and assessment of projects before commencement to identify the feasibility of proposed projects to decrease the rate of road construction project delays.

The study has established Blantyre city's core challenges in implementing its road projects seamlessly and has provided mitigation measures for dealing with the shortcomings.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of market-based approach to provision of housing to low-income households in urban Malawi.

This study was conducted in Blantyre, Malawi, between 2019 and 2022 and used both quantitative (household survey) and qualitative (in-depth interviews and document study) methods of data collection. Interviews were conducted with key players and investors in the housing sector. Household survey data were analyzed through descriptive statistics, which allowed the generation of descriptive housing valuables, whereas qualitative data were analyzed through content analysis.

This paper demonstrates that, rather than ameliorating the housing problems facing low-income households, the market approach to provision of housing in Malawi has worsened the housing situation in the country. This is so because the market approach to the provision of housing in Malawi is not only enforcing the logic of capitalistic accumulation in the housing sector but also supporting mechanisms of exclusion based on economic stratification within the community.

Completeness of data over time as there is no market data bank available in the country.

The findings from this study suggest that some degree of state intervention in addressing the housing problem in Malawi is required.

The study findings suggest that a market approach to the provision of housing can increase social inequality as low-income households face challenges in accessing housing.

There is a paucity of research on the effects of the market approach on the provision of affordable housing to low-income households in Malawi. This paper assesses this important policy gap and provides significant policy directions.

This paper seeks to examine the impacts of the new public management (NPM)‐oriented management accounting on political control at the Malawian local government level. The objective is to investigate the extent to which NPM‐based management accounting practices have increased managerial autonomy and reduced political control.

The paper is based on an empirical study conducted in six local government assemblies in Malawi. These include Salima Town Assembly, Blantyre City Assembly, Lilongwe City Assembly, Mzuzu City Assembly, Mzimba District Assembly, and Zomba Municipal Assembly. It is based on qualitative research methodology. The qualitative data were mainly collected through personal interviews with assembly managers and councillors. In addition, the study also relied on a review of various literature and newspaper articles providing insights to the subject under study.

The paper has found that the NPM‐based management accounting has led to loss of local political control. In this regard, politicians resort to unproductive behaviors which include interference, sabotage and corruption to regain their lost political control. On the other hand, the administrators sustain their managererial autonomy through NPM‐based managerial prerogatives, seeking central government intervention and colluding with the councillors in corrupt activities.

The paper is of both theoretical and empirical value. Theoretically, the paper contributes to the management accounting literature by looking at management accounting in the context of new organizational arrangement models. In addition, the paper makes an empirical contribution to the knowledge vacuum of the impacts and applicability of the NPM‐based management systems in developing countries. It provides information and insights for reformers to consider the social, political, and cultural environment of the implementing countries so as to prevent counter‐productive consequences that may present massive negative implications on public policy outcomes.

Institutional development (ID) can be an elusive concept when attempts to analyse it are made. The notion of sustainability is even more intangible, save for the fact that the results of any ID should be able to continue after the external or technical assistance is withdrawn. Attempts to define both ID and sustainability and reviews the case of establishing an urban management system. Addresses its performance and sustainability and presents a method of quantifying the analysis of sustainability, using the case material. The method is dominated by the client′s self‐assessment. The role of the expert is to offer a quantified structure for that assessment.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the unaffordability of housing and limited access to finance as limiting factors to the provision of adequate housing in the urban areas of Malawi.

Primary data were collected by means of questionnaires followed up by semi‐structured personal interviews. These interviews were conducted with all major role players in the urban housing finance industry. Secondary data were obtained through scrutiny of the stakeholders' relevant official records and reports kept at their offices. The subset of analysis was chosen to be the local authorities of Blantyre, Zomba, Lilongwe and Mzuzu.

Finance from the formal sector is accessible to fewer than 35 per cent of the urban population and less than 16 per cent of households in the major urban areas can afford an average house. No government subsidies are available for end users and development financing is limited and extremely dear. The contribution from non‐conventional finance sources to housing finance is negligible.

It is suggested that the use of various instruments may alleviate the situation. Such instruments could include a housing tax for the implementation of subsidies, subsidies from developed countries, the formation of cooperatives and the implementation of securitisation.

Limited research exists on the problem of housing finance in Malawi. This paper quantifies the situation. Implementation of the recommendations will contribute to the provision of adequate housing in Malawi.

The division between town and country in most areas of the world is marked and shows little evidence of any closer association, but in this country recent history with its wide economic changes has made the division less deep than in times past, but still within living memory. Time was when country folk were almost a distinct breed, living under conditions for the most part primitive.

In its passage through the Grand Committee the Food Bill is being amended in a number of important particulars, and it is in the highest degree satisfactory that so much interest has been taken in the measure by members on both sides of the House as to lead to full and free discussion. Sir Charles Cameron, Mr. Kearley, Mr. Strachey, and other members have rendered excellent service by the introduction of various amendments; and Sir Charles Cameron is especially to be congratulated upon the success which has attended his efforts to induce the Committee to accept a number of alterations the wisdom of which cannot be doubted. The provision whereby local authorities will be compelled to appoint Public Analysts, and compelled to put the Acts in force in a proper manner, and the requirement that analysts shall furnish proofs of competence of a satisfactory character to the Local Government Board, will, it cannot be doubted, be productive of good results. The fact that the Local Government Board is to be given joint authority with the Board of Agriculture in insuring that the Acts are enforced is also an amendment of considerable importance, while other amendments upon what may perhaps be regarded as secondary points unquestionably trend in the right direction. It is, however, a matter for regret that the Government have not seen their way to introduce a decisive provision with regard to the use of preservatives, or to accept an effective amendment on this point. Under existing circumstances it should be plain that the right course to follow in regard to preservatives is to insist on full and adequate disclosure of their presence and of the amounts in which they are present. It is also a matter for regret that the Government have declined to give effect to the recommendation of the Food Products Committee as to the formation of an independent and representative Court of Reference. It is true that the Board of Agriculture are to make regulations in reference to standards, after consultation with experts or such inquiry as they think fit, and that such inquiries as the Board may make will be in the nature of consultations of some kind with a committee to be appointed by the Board. There is little doubt, however, that such a committee would probably be controlled by the Somerset House Department; and as we have already pointed out, however conscientious the personnel of this Department may be—and its conscientiousness cannot be doubted—it is not desirable in the public interest that any single purely analytical institution should exercise a controlling influence in the administration of the Acts. What is required is a Court of Reference which shall be so constituted as to command the confidence of the traders who are affected by the law as well as of all those who are concerned in its application. Further comment upon the proposed legislation must be reserved until the amended Bill is laid before the House.

Floods are among the most frequent urban disasters in cities of the global south where capacity and resource limitations collude with rapid urbanization to force many poor people to live in flood prone settlements. This paper investigated the impact of flood disasters on social resilience of low-income communities in Mzuzu City, Malawi.

Using a quantitative design, 345 households were interviewed in Zolozolo West and Mzilawaingwe Wards in Mzuzu City. The survey instrument achieved a 100% response rate. A reliability test using Cronbach’s alpha showed internal consistency of survey instrument at 0.711 for Zolozolo West Ward and 0.730 for Mzilawaingwe Ward.

Out of the eleven indicators of social resilience used in this study, six indicators showed no correlation with the outcome expectancy of social resilience. Of the five indicators that showed relationship with social resilience, only improvisation and inventiveness (r_s = 0.356, p = 0.000 at two-tailed, n = 213; r_s = 0.610, p = 0.000 at two-tailed, n = 132) had a strong relationship with the outcome expectancy of social resilience.

The study was only conducted in two settlements; caution should be observed when generalizing the results.

Practitioners should ensure that social resilience strengthening mechanisms are incorporated in flood risk management as they strive to achieve SDG 11 of making cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.

The study showed how floods can negatively impact the social resilience of low-income communities, which is different from common knowledge that floods can enhance community social resilience.

The new authorities created by this Act, probably the most important local government measure of the century, will be voted into existence during 1973 and commence functioning on 1st April 1974. Their responsibilities and the problems facing them are in many ways quite different and of greater complexity than those with which existing councils have had to cope. In its passage through the Lords, a number of amendments were made to the Act, but in the main, it is a scheme of reorganization originally produced after years of discussion and long sessions in the Commons. Local government reorganization in Scotland takes place one year later and for Northern Ireland, we must continue to wait and pray for a return of sanity.

If additional evidence were needed of the connection between food supply and the spread of infectious disease, it would be found in a report recently presented to the Finsbury Borough Council by its Medical Officer of Health, Dr. GEORGE NEWMAN. It appears that in the early part of May a number of cases of scarlet fever were notified to Dr. NEWMAN, and upon inquiry being made it was ascertained that nearly the whole of these cases had partaken of milk from a particular dairy. A most pains‐taking investigation was at once instituted, and the source of the supply was traced to a farm in the Midlands, where two or three persons were found recovering from scarlet fever. The wholesale man in London, to whom the milk was consigned, at first denied that any of this particular supply had been sent to shops in the Finsbury district, but it was eventually discovered that one, or possibly two, churns had been delivered one morning, with the result that a number of persons contracted the disease. One of the most interesting points in Dr. NEWMAN'S report is that three of these cases, occurring in one family, received milk from a person who was not a customer of the wholesale dealer mentioned above. It transpired on the examination of this last retailer's servants that on the particular morning on which the infected churn of milk had been sent into Finsbury, one of them, running short, had borrowed a quart from another milkman, and had immediately delivered it at the house in which these three cases subsequently developed. The quantity he happened to borrow was a portion of the contents of the infected churn.