The impact of load shedding on ICT enterprises in Matlosana

Abstract

The study focuses on the impact of load shedding on Information and Communications Technology based enterprises. The problem that enterprises have is that they are heavily dependent on electricity which, during load shedding, is not always available thereby causing stoppages to day to day business transactions that the enterprises need to carry out. In light of the last stated problem the study was guided by the question: What is the impact of load shedding on ICT based enterprises in Matlosana? This study is a qualitative study which implies that only factual data was collected from a sample drawn from around Matlosana. The sample was made up of five entrepreneurs in the ICT sector who were purposefully selected. They took part in semi-structured interviews which were used to collect their perceptions. The analysis of the data was made following procedures for qualitative data analysis. The study found that load shedding has a negative impact on ICT based enterprises. The entrepreneurs lose financially because they spend a lot of money on alternative power sources, payments of overtime to employees and at times, they need to replace broken devices that break because of load shedding. Furthermore, the qualitative analysis uncovered that the brand image of the enterprises gets tarnished as a result of load shedding which also renders the enterprises vulnerable to security threats because some of the security features depend on electricity. All these facts are important because at the moment, there is not much empirical work that has been done on this issue seeing that the concept of load shedding is still new and unfolding. The study was concluded with a set of recommendations for all stakeholders to undertake in order to mitigate the impact of load shedding on ICT based enterprises.