Browsing by Author "De Kock, Imke H."

Now showing 1 - 10 of 10
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    An analysis of the extent to which industry 4.0 has been considered in sustainability or socio-technical transitions
    (Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2019) Asiimwe, Martha Mukama; De Kock, Imke H.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: A growing database of literature is geared towards the analysis and evaluation of Industry 4.0. One of the points of interest is the assessment of Industry 4.0 in the context of sustainability and sustainable development. However, there seems to be a gap in the literature focusing on transitions to more sustainable states that are evidently fostered by socio-technical [system] transitions, sometimes referred to as ‘sustainability transitions’. This presents the need to evaluate the interfacial layers of these disciplines, given the larger challenge of sustainability and Industry 4.0’s potential to support complex problem-solving. This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of the literature that jointly considers the concepts of sustainability, sustainable development, and socio-technical systems, and the transitions thereof with Industry 4.0.
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    Considering the need for alternative intervention strategies for the management of diabetic policy formulation in South Africa
    (South African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2018) Thomas, Victoria Val; De Kock, Imke H.; Bam, Louzanne
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The increasing prevalence of diabetes in South Africa, alongside other non-communicable diseases, places a heavy burden on the health care system; especially when faced with the significant difference in quality of care between private and public health care, and the increased burden of disease. This paper analyses various diabetic policies already implemented in South Africa, and considers the need to investigate alternative policies and intervention strategies to manage diabetes in South Africa. Due to the complex nature and non-linear interactions which exist within the health care system, a system dynamics-based approach is suggested as a useful analysis tool to evaluate and understand the dominant factors that influence the effective management of diabetes to potentially inform more effective and efficient diabetic policy formulation.
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    Demand forecasting for network capacity planning in electrical utilities – a review of existing methods considering the evolving technologies of the energy arena
    (South African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2018) Breedt, Jana; Louw, Louis; De Kock, Imke H.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Planning for sufficient energy resources in a country is of paramount importance to ensure sustainable development of the economy and prosperity of its citizens. In South Africa the national utility, Eskom, is tasked to create a balance between the electricity demand and the supply thereof. Forecasting the electricity load on the networks to supply the country demand becomes an important task to ensure that capacity planning does not constrain potential growth, and neither does it construct overinvestment to compromise feasibility of implementation. The landscape of energy utilization is currently experiencing rapid evolution in technology and poses significant challenges to the way the electricity demand forecast needs to be done. Technology is evolving to provide more efficient, cost effective and reliable alternative energy sources than the conventional methods used in the past. Improved electricity efficiency and user behavior plays a significant role in future electricity demand requirements. This paper provides a comparative literature review on current forecasting methodologies to provide insight to which of these methods can be utilized in the future. A set of requirements is concluded on to identify the most relevant and effective forecasting methodologies to improve accuracy on forecasting electricity demand into the technology advanced future.
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    Developing a challenges landscape relating to drug safety, provision, and distribution in resource-limited settings for the case of HIV/AIDS
    (Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2018-11-09) Huysamen, Biance; De Kock, Imke H.; Bam, Louzanne
    ENGLSH ABSTRACT: Since 2010, pharmaceutical organisations have begun to provide drug patents in sub-Saharan Africa through the UN Medicine Patent Pool. This initiative allows any pharmaceutical manufacturer to access these patents and manufacture the drugs, thereby aiming to decrease the associated lead times and costs. The participation of numerous manufacturers, some of whom may not have well-established quality control systems in the market, intensifies the need for effective drug quality monitoring. Research indicates that it is often the case that these ‘niche drug provision systems’ face many challenges with the quality of new-generation drugs and the implementation of effective pharmacovigilance (PV)1 systems for the reporting of adverse drug reactions. The lack of resource efficiency in adverse drug reaction reporting within the sub-Saharan context is also a growing concern.
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    Exploring factors that influence the mainstreaming of gendered energy interventions in poor urban environments : a structured literature review
    (Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2020-11-11) Oosthuizen, Lelani; De Kock, Imke H.; Musango, Josephine K.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Energy sectors are faced with the interconnected challenges of urbanisation and providing a growing population with accessible and sustainable energy that facilitates economic development, energy security, and poverty reduction. The Sustainable Development Goals address issues that include poverty, gender equality, energy, and sustainable cities, and highlight the need to improve the lives of poor communities and to address economic marginalisation. However, recent studies show that poor urban areas have a considerable number of female-lead households. Energy is a critical input for these households, resulting in women being increasingly vulnerable to unsustainable energy consumption patterns and energy insecurity. In this article, a structured literature review is conducted to investigate energy technologies that contribute to energy security among energy-poor women. The key factors to consider in the mainstreaming of a gender perspective into energy technology innovations are then identified and contextualised. How these factors can help achieve the sustainable development goals and contribute to ensuring sustainable energy sectors is also highlighted.
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    Incorporating product categorization to improve the performance of SA’s public healthcare supply chain : a research agenda
    (South African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2018) Mapowo, Newton; Bam, Louzanne; De Kock, Imke H.; Van Eeeden, Joubert
    In an influential publication from the late 1990’s, Marshall Fisher argued that many of the challenges in supply chains could be traced back to a lack of alignment between the type of product and the type of supply chain. Subsequently, the idea of tailoring supply chain management practices and policies to the characteristics of the products being supplied has received significant research attention, and various researchers have worked on modifying the premise as well as on its application to diverse sectors, with promising findings. The South African National Department of Health is in the process of rolling out the Visibility and Analytics Network (VAN) reference framework, with the aim of ensuring sustained availability of and access to commodities. At present, the VAN strategy does not incorporate a product categorization element. This paper proposes a research agenda for determining how product categorization could be incorporated into the VAN strategy to enable supply chain practices and policies to be tailored to the characteristics of products.
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    Investigating a green economy transition of the electricity sector in the Western Cape Province of South Africa : a system dynamics approach
    (Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2016) Oosthuizen, Juan; Brent, Alan Colin; Musango, Josephine Kaviti; De Kock, Imke H.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The Western Cape Government in South Africa has identified the concept of a green economy as a way to transform the Province’s economy to one that is more sustainable from an economic, social, and environmental perspective. System dynamics modelling was used to develop a better understanding of the implications of different green economy policies and investments in the electricity sector of the Western Cape Province. The results suggest that continuing on the current policy path would increase the gap between demand and supply, increase the carbon footprint of the electricity sector, and not provide growth in employment in the sector. Strategic green economy investments are therefore expected to impact positively on a number of indicators across a number of sectors.
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    Managing technology within the context of sustainability transitions: An integrated framework
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2020-12) De Kock, Imke H.; Brent, Alan C.; Grobbelaar, Sara S.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Industrial Engineering.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: There is an increasing awareness and understanding that addressing the numerous sustainability challenges that we face on a global scale poses a grand challenge. Addressing the sustainability challenges without innovative technologies will be difficult, and thus the development and diffusion of technologies that contribute towards addressing sustainability challenges are deemed to be among the main pathways towards a sustainable future. However, technologies that could contribute towards increasingly sustainable socio-technical systems face a number of challenges; for example, ‘sustainable’ technologies may not offer the same (often economic) benefits as traditional, ‘unsustainable’ technology(ies). Nevertheless, the role that technology plays in achieving sustainability, its prospects and possible contributions (both positive and negative), its dynamics, and the technology-related factors that influence the progression of a socio-technical system towards sustainability, must all be understood in order to govern such transitions. It is evident, however, that the grand societal challenges and quest for sustainability pose substantial challenges for the management of technology within these contexts, and in turn also highlight the need to consider the management of technology within tA bibliometric and linkage analysis was performed to confirm or refute the disconnect that exists in the literature between that pertaining to technology management, and that pertaining to socio-technical transitions. On the basis of the findings of the bibliometric and linkage analysis, it thus was concluded that the integration of socio-technical transitions, approaches, concepts, frameworks and aspects with those oftechnology management theories and practices, and vice versa, are not addressed adequately in the literature. Given the role of technology, and the management thereof, to address the grand challenges, more research efforts are required across these bodies of knowledge to enable a just transition towards sustainability. The aim of this research was thus twofold: firstly, to provide a premise for the integration of technology management and the concept of socio-technical transitions, and secondly, to provide the basis for the definition and identification of technology management considerations within the context of socio-technical transitions. This study can be described as a theory-building or model-building study and, due to the nature of this research, a constructivist philosophical perspective was embraced, and a primarily qualitative and deductive research strategy was followed.The Integrated Technology Management-oriented Sustainability Transitions (ITMST) framework, as a designed result of the requirement specification, consists of five key features that collectively provide the premise for the integration between technology management and socio-technical transitions. The features are: (i) transition value creation, (ii) collective and individual consideration of transition progress, transition capability and system performance, (iii) co-management of incumbent and emerging/alternative technology domains, (iv) contextual specificity, and (v) contribution-requirement view. Given the conceptual nature ofthe ITMST framework and the stated importance of practical utility, the proposed framework was he context of socio-technical transitions towards operationalised by translating the framework into a methodology. The ITMST methodology, in contrast with the conceptual framing of a premise for the integration between technology management and the concept of sustainability transitions in the ITMST framework, outlines the practicability of the framework to provide decision support pertaining to considerations for the management sustainability. of technology within the context of a sustainability transition. The ITMST methodology thus addresses the second part of the research aim, which was to provide the basis for a robust analysis to identify and define technology management considerations within the context of sustainability transitions. The evaluation of the developed ITMST framework and methodology looked to address (i) whether the ITMST framework provides a premise for the integration of technology management, and (ii) whether the ITMST methodology provides the basis for the definition and identification of technology management considerations within the context of socio-technical transitions. The evaluation was addressed through a review of literature, a theoretical verification, and the operationalisation of the framework with a case study – on the required transition of the electricity sector of South Africa. The case study addressed whether theframework and methodology are implementable. The findings of the case study showcased that the ITMSTmethodology provides a basis for the definition and identification of technology management considerationswithin the context of sustainability transitions. And the evaluation of the validity and applicability of theITMST framework, along with the theoretical verification, highlights that the ITMST framework provides apremise for the integration between technology management and socio-technical transitions.
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    Towards a more efficient and effective pipeline of tuberculosis medication : the value of identifying trends and influencing factors
    (South African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2018) Hanekom, Nicola; Bam, Louzanne; De Kock, Imke H.
    Tuberculosis poses a significant risk to global health with estimated 1.7 million deaths worldwide in 2016. One key issue in tuberculosis management relates to the drug pipeline, with drug development not keeping pace with the rate at which the disease expands and changes. Identifying and addressing factors that inhibit tuberculosis research and development is essential. Research to identify trends in the drug pipeline and evaluate the relations between these trends and other influencing factors will strengthen the existing body of knowledge, enabling improved decision-making on investment in drug research and development, and structuring incentives to encourage investment.
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    Water resource infrastructure implications of a green economy transition in the Western Cape Province of South Africa : a system dynamics approach
    (Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2017-08) Pienaar, Aliza; Brent, Alan C.; Musango, Josephine K.; De Kock, Imke H.
    ENGLISH ABSTRCT: The Western Cape Province government in South Africa has established the transition to a green economy as a high priority. The sustainable use of water resources has been identified as a critical necessity for such a green economy transition. The research summarised in this paper conceptualised the factors that relate to water resources, and that influence the transition to a green economy in the Western Cape Province. Subsequently, a system dynamics model was developed to evaluate the impact of key strategic interventions of the green economy transition. The results from the model show that the Province could possibly experience extreme water shortages in the near future if a business-as-usual scenario continues. However, with sufficient investment and effective management, the water demand of the Province can be met.