Browsing by Author "Butcher, Shirley"

Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Conservation priorities and management recommendations for the Erongo Region Coastal Zone, Namibia
    (1996) Du Preez, D; Braby, Rob; Williams, Tony; Fuggle, Richard Francis; Butcher, Shirley
    The most intensively used part of the Namib Coastline, the area between Walvis Bay and the Ugab river, contains some of the most important and most sensitive natural habitats. Apart from their ecological value, these habitats also attract large numbers of tourists. Tourism is one of the main sources of income in the coastal area of the Erongo Region, therefore it is in the interest of Namibians that these habitats are utilised in a sustainable way. The Department of Resource Conservation of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism is responsible for managing the West Coast Tourist Recreation Area as well as the wildlife in all of Namibia. Conservation managers from this Department have identified sites in the study area that are important for maintaining healthy populations of rare, threatened or endemic species or species of international and regional importance. These sites must be managed in such a way that their conservation and tourism value is not detrimentally reduced. In order to assist conservation managers with the allocation of resources, the sites that were identified are divided into three priority groups, namely imperative, urgent and desirable. The evaluation for priority rating was done according to the criteria of conservation value, tourism value and threats. Sites were compared using pair-wise comparison, and groupings were obtained through cluster analysis. The sites that were identified, their main reason for conservation, most important threats and management recommendations are listed below according to the priority groupings. Management recommendations are only done for the two highest groupings, namely the imperative and important sites.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    GIS-based decision support approach for selecting a new landfill site for the city of Cape Town
    (2006) Kimani, Gichobi Justin; Smit, Julian; Butcher, Shirley
    Recent studies indicate that the population of Cape Town generates approximately 2.2 milliontons of waste annually. Numerous waste minimization strategies have been developed whichhave not been successful in reducing the amount that needs to be disposed of at a landfill site.This results to mounting pressure on existing waste disposal sites thus necessitating an urgentneed for a new regional landfill. According to CCA Draft Environmental Impact Report (2006),the former Cape Metropolitan Council (CMC) appointed technical consultants in 2000 to identifyand assess the potential sites for a landfill to service Cape Metropolitan Area (CMA), presentlyreferred to as the City of Cape Town (CCT). The construction of a landfill has significant impacts on the environments. It is for that reason Integrated Environmental Management (IEM) has to be followed to assess the impacts. The principle of IEM is broadly interpreted as applying to the planning, assessment, implementation and management of any project proposal or activity that has a potentially significant effect on the environment. Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process, which lies in the heart of the IEM, is enforced to examine the environmental effects of development. These impacts are directly related to the physical location of the project. That makes site selection for proposed project a very important stage of the EIA process. Laws have been enacted to minimizeenvironmental impacts, including strict guidelines for siting landfills. Using landfill siting criteria and site selection methods, the technical consultants identified four potential sites, Atlantis being the only site falling within the City of Cape Town. The interviews, backed by secondary data sources such as websites and project reports, revealed that the techniques used to identify potential sites for the landfill, even when combined are costly and time consuming. Several scenarios were run using various ArcGIS extensions, including the ModelBuilder to identify sites that met the stated criteria. GIS analysis yielded agreeable results with the recommendations from the consultants who used techniques other than GIS to identify the regional landfill. The research findings demonstrate that GIS is an efficient and dependable stand-alone technique that can be implemented in landfill site studies thus expedite the decision making process.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Groundwater management using a GIS case study : Uitenhage Subterranean Government Water Control Area
    (2000) Baron, Jane Helen; Whittal, Jennifer; Butcher, Shirley
    The area around Uitenhage in the Eastern Cape forms the centre of one of the biggest artesian groundwater basins in South Africa. The Table Mountain Group quartzitic sandstones are overlain by a thickness of postPalaeozoic sediments giving rise to artesian groundwater. The most wellknown of this manifestation are the springs at Uitenhage which have been used since pre-historic times and are currently a principal source of water for the municipal supply. At the turn of the 20th century, with the introduction of drilling machines into the area a number of boreholes were constructed. The resultant tapping into the artesian supply resulted in the spring-flow lessening and a decline in groundwater levels on introduction of further boreholes. At the request of the local community this special region was proclaimed a groundwater protection area. Over the years the abstraction within the area has risen and is currently at 3.24 million m³/a. However the licensed, legally abstractable, figure stands at 6.15 million m³/a. Groundwater levels have declined although the flow from the boreholes has not. Using GIS aU the available and pertinent information required for the management of the control area and for the estimation of the groundwater resource has been brought together. Using raster modelling techniques the amount of groundwater available within the system and the viability of sustained abstraction were assessed. A site-specific raster model has been designed to visualise and quantify the expected effects of new boreholes in the area.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Patterns of land cover change in Kanyati communal land in Zimbabwe
    (1999) Howard, Madeleine A; Butcher, Shirley; Cumming, Dave
    Expanding areas under cultivation and settlement are a global trend with significant effects on existing land cover types and ecosystems. High rates of human population growth in southern Africa and subsequent increased pressure on land has led to the extension of cultivation and settlement into marginal lands. This study investigates the spatial patterns ofland cover change in a communal land in Zimbabwe over the period 1973 to 1993, and their likely ecological effects. The study site is in the Zambezi Valley and has a well­ preserved area ofmiombo woodland and has the potential to become an important wildlife corridor between a national park, safari area and communal lands with local community based wildlife management projects. The area is divided into wildlife and settled areas by a game fence so provided an opportunity to compare patterns ofland cover change vvith and without extensive human impact within the same administrative area. The land cover types were derived from manually interpreted aerial photographs as multispectral satellite imagery is not available before the 1980's and is expensive. Geographical Information Systems were used to analyse the spatial patterns ofland covers identified, the sizes and shapes of spatial entities and the spatial distribution of land cover types in relation to slope and proximity to rivers. The likely ecological effects of land cover change were investigated by deriving habitat suitability maps using the habitat requirements of seven large herbivore species: buffalo, bushbuck, elephant, kudu, sable, waterbuck and zebra.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Race and the post-Fordist spatial order in Cape Town
    (2007) Graham, Nancy; Crankshaw, Owen; Butcher, Shirley
    The post-Fordist shift from manufacturing to service sector economies, which began in the 1970s, has occurred worldwide and has changed occupation and income structures. This global force has a spatial manifestation at the urban level. In order to conceptualise the post-Fordist spatial order in Cape Town, his thesis engages examples of post-Fordist spatial forms in cities worldwide, particularly Johannesburg. A Geographic Information System is used to look at the location of the middle class in Cape Town and the spatial patterns of post-apartheid desegregation by mapping the Census 2001 class and race data. This is to determine the extent to which the decentralisation of office parks and shopping centres is reinforcing the spatial divide, established under apartheid, between the white and black races. This thesis shows that, in middle-class, former whites-only areas, decentralised employment nodes have developed. These middle-class residents are still largely white. However, other former white Group Areas nearby, which have experienced significant desegregation, are located along the railway lines in both the northern and south-western suburbs. The profile of these new residents are coloured, rather than black African, and they are employed in clerical, sales, service worker and middle-class occupations. Therefore these coloured residents are able to access decentralised service sector employment, thereby reducing the apartheid spatial divide between the white and black middle class. While white-coloured racial spatial segregation has decreased, the south-east sector of the city has become an 'excluded ghetto' of the coloured and black African underclass, who make up a large percentage of residents in Cape Town. Therefore the extent of class-based desegregation near market-driven, decentralised, service-sector employment has not yet significantly eroded the apartheid racial spatial divisions upon which the post-Fordist class divisions are superimposed.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    A spatial analysis of the Alternative Admissions' Research Project at the University of Cape Town, 2000 - 2005.
    (2012) Takalani, Takadzani; Butcher, Shirley; Meadows, Michael E; Cliff, Alan
    The purpose of this dissertation is to demonstrate the potential contribution of spatial analysis using GIS on candidates who undergo the Alternative Admissions Research Project (AARP) tests for alternative admission to University of Cape Town (UCT). Spatial analysis may be useful in interrogating existing information on the geographical distribution of AARP candidates, in particular, those who are regarded as educationally disadvantaged as a result of apartheid policy and practices of the past. GIS techniques and tools were applied in order to assess accessibility of UCT AARP services provided to students nationally, and to demonstrate how GIS may be incorporated into the various academic faculties at UCT, particularly academic faculty recruitment planning.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Open Access
    The SIA of the upgrading of the Olushandja Dam
    (1995) Sharma, Neeta; Butcher, Shirley
    This report is the social impact assessment (SIA) of the upgrading of the Olushandja Dam in north west Namibia as commissioned by Department of Environmental Affairs, Namibia. The report is to serve as specialist study for the environmental impact assessment (EIA) of the project.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Using Geographic Information Systems and remote sensing to improve the management of kelp resources in South Africa
    (2006) Rand, Andrew M; Bolton, John J; Anderson, R J; Butcher, Shirley
    In 2002 the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEA&T), Marine and Coastal Management (M&CM) and the Seaweed Unit undertook a program to document the localities and quantities of the standing crop of the economically important kelps, Ecklonia maxima and Laminaria pallida, in the fourteen commercial seaweed Concession Areas that contain commercial quantities of kelps. The primary objective of this study was to establish a coastal kelp resource database for the South African coastline from Cape Agulhas to the Orange River (the international border with Namibia). The method was designed to integrate past and current analysis of multi-year kelp data from commercial harvesting, biomass and kelp bed extent while allowing for the integration of future surveys within the inventories.