How successful are land reform farms in Limpopo Province?

Simon Ikenoue

Land reform in South Africa is aimed at transforming racial structure and inequality in rural areas, and is considered to be an engine to boost pro-poor economic growth.

However, the aim of redistributing 30% (24.6 million hectares) of the country’s total farmland by 2014 is hardly realistic with less than 6% transferred to date. Additionally, as many of the land reform projects are collapsing due to a lack of focus on land-use planning, beneficiaries and taxpayers are getting increasingly frustrated.

A study to identify actual land use and the problems new owners face on land reform farms was conducted in the Mopani district of Limpopo Province. The region is famed for its fruit production and also supplies vegetables to the country’s large cities. However, with the consequences of land reform becoming increasingly evident, there is a need to assess its impact on farming activities in the area.

As part of the study, semi-structured interviews were conducted on 13 land reform farms to obtain information on current and former land use, as well as on farming management practices. In addition, production areas were observed.

All farms in the study area were engaged in some sort of agricultural activity at the time of our visit. Vegetables were grown on twelve of the farms, whereas grains (maize) were cultivated on only two, which indicates that the farmers’ intentions are income generation rather than ensuring food security for the households.

Land reform farms vs commercial farms

Of the twelve farms mentioned above, eight had a cropping area of less than 5 ha, two had 5,1 and 10,0 ha respectively, and the other two had more than 10,1 ha. When compared with neighbouring commercial farms, these are substantially smaller. Most of the land was irrigated using drip irrigation. Application of fertilizer as well as the use of pesticides and herbicides were observed. However, these were not applied at optimal level.

Eleven farms had orchards on their property, consisting mainly of mango trees, with a surface area ranging from 3 – 80ha. All farmers indicated that they sell the fruits to the market rather than using them for consumption. Orchards were planted by former landowners prior to land transfer. In general, current management of orchards was found to be poor, with many of the farmers failing to slash the grasses growing underneath the trees. Evidence of fire events — such as damaged leaves and tree trunks — could be observed on some of the farms. However, at least in the case of the Mopani district, orchards may be a good source of income even though additional funds and skills are required to utilise these in the long run.

As cattle herding was widely observed in communal areas, it was expected that there would be cattle on the newly acquired land as well. However, livestock was found on only seven of the farms, with cattle being kept at six of these. Even though only two of the farms actually had an established grazing camp and the others simply let the cattle graze on open area within the property, the environmental impact could be considered to be minimal as numbers were low.  

Two of the landowners leased fairly large sections of their land to a neighbouring farmer and a distant white farmer respectively, where crops were produced at optimal conditions. These landowners said that they were not permitted to put their land into collateral to access a loan, but were able to lease their land instead. Although this arrangement does not contribute to land reform, it is nevertheless a good source of income for the beneficiaries.

In general land reform farms were in poor condition. As no quantitative data of former land use was available, it was not clear whether this state of affairs existed before the land was transferred. In some cases, the former owners had not been actively managing the farms for a number of years prior to the transfer and the farms were run down by the time the beneficiaries arrived.

Land-use change

Two of the farms experienced a marginal change in land-use pattern after land transfer when a section of the former grazing land was transformed into cropping land. In general, the structure of the farms remained unchanged, with the farm retaining its original form. Land-use change is shifting towards extensification or abandonment of the farming area. Even though the farms have the set up of commercial farms, with the current land use they can only be regarded as  small-scale farms. Based on field observations, there were clear signs that the land reform farms have been under-utilised in comparison with the surrounding commercial farms.

Land reform still has a long way to go to successful farming. Nevertheless, there is evidence that new landowners are trying to make a difference. More emphasis should be placed on land-use planning and post-settlement support for land reform to deliver benefits.