Barry Streek
The government spent R108,8-million on buying farmland in all nine provinces for redistribution and tenure during the current financial year, Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Thoko Didiza told Parliament this week.
But, she added, her department’s first quality of life survey, undertaken in 1998, found a “bleak … overall picture” in agricultural land bought communally by means of the R15E000 household land grant.
The survey “showed projects being assembled and transferred by the Department of Land Affairs, leaving beneficiary communities without access to basic services, and little likelihood of any improvement in their economic circumstances.
“The report,” she said, “identifies the key problem facing the land reform programme as the way in which it fails to integrate properly with local planning and other development processes. It also suggests that decisions about land use are made by a select few. The general institutional framework was identified as weak.
“The report points to the fact that in many cases, projects are placed out of the reach of services provided by the Department of Agriculture. Generally, the contribution of agriculture to projects is seen as minimal, and the need to boost this area is identified.”
Didiza said that the 1999 survey was an improvement on the previous report but was still in the process of being written up.
Meanwhile, in reply to questions tabled in the National Assembly by Manie Schoeman (New National Party), she said 588E772,9ha of farmland had been acquired in terms of the Provision of Certain Land for Settlement Act of 1993 in 331 grants, and had been allocated to 34E597 families, involving 172E985 people.
During the 1998/99 financial year, R28,9- million has been spent on this, but was increased to R108E787E843 during the 1999/2000 financial year, including R20,3- million on redistribution and R88,5-million on tenure.
Didiza listed all the farms that had been allocated, in a mammoth 124-page document. This included 5E980ha for the black-owned Klein Begin Boerdery at the Nelson’s Creek wine estate.
She also said 1E047 farms had been purchased by individuals or groups of individuals under the R15E000 grant scheme. This had benefited 34E597 households.
Since 1994/95 R470,8-million had been spent under this scheme for redistribution and R63,6-million for tenure.