W Cape needs R2bn for land reform
Budget needs to be increased
THE WESTERN Cape government will need a budget of R2 billion a year to meet the land reform targets, according to economic opportunities MEC Alan Winde. Winde together with the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Senzeni Zokwana was responding to questions from students from the Elsenburg Agricultural College in Stellenbosch yesterday during a farm visit event hosted by the ministers for a BRICS delegation.
The event was held under the theme “BRICS in Africa: Collaboration for Inclusive Growth and Shared Prosperity in the 4th Industrial Revolution”.
The farm visit was held in conjunction with South Africa assuming the rotational chairmanship of BRICS from January 1 to December and the 2018 Summit to take place next month will be a milestone for the BRICS partnership, as it represents a decade of BRICS co-operation at the highest level. Winde said the question around land was the key question being asked across the country at the moment. He said that in agriculture land was one component, but in order to have land there must also be water as well as funds to be able to invest.
“I personally believe that if we are to be serious about land reform, we need to up the budget. In this province we’ve worked out that if we want to meet just the National Development Plan (NDP) target, we need in this province R2bn a year to be able to achieve those targets. We haven’t got anywhere near that kind of money. I also believe that we have to build good partnerships,” he said.
He said that the private sector and the agricultural private sector had played a prominent role in funding land reform.
“When you have asked: How do I see myself on a farm that I own? I think we as government need to make sure that those leased farms actually get ownership and get title. Title makes a big difference. If you don’t have title, you really don’t complete the full circle,” he said. THE NATIONAL Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (Daff ) has warned that the devastating effects of climate change would be massive if global warming was not adequately addressed in the country.
Daff director-general Michael Mlengana said the department had adopted climate smart agriculture as a flagship programme to promote and upscale sustainable agriculture production while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Delivering the keynote address at the climate smart approaches seminar of the eighth BRICS Meeting of the Agriculture Co-operation Working Group in Skukuza, Mpumalanga, yesterday, Mlengana said the economies of agriculture-dependent provinces such as Mpumalanga would struggle if contingency measures were not implemented urgently.
“The reality facing us today is that the effects of climate change on agriculture are quite severe,” he said.
Mpumalanga is known as SA’s home of agriculture with nearly 68% of its land used for crops, subtropical and deciduous fruit, vegetables and cotton, among others.
Another sizeable part of the province’s fertile agricultural land is used by mining conglomerates for extensive coal and platinum production operations.
Mlengana said climate change would impose itself if it were not placed at the centre of the developmental agenda.
He called on his BRICS counterparts to co-ordinate efforts to mitigate the risks associated with global warming.