Durban – South Africa’s top commercial farmers have agreed to hand over 20% of their farms to their workers in a deal that organised agriculture says is the start of a new land settlement plan with the government.
In a meeting in Stellenbosch on Wednesday, 38 “mega-farmers” who control hundreds of thousands of hectares of intensive agriculture unanimously accepted a draft proposal which they will hand to the government in April.
KwaZulu-Natal sugar farmer Charl Senekal, who chaired the Stellenbosch meeting, said the full deal would be hammered out over the next month before the final document was adopted.
“We all realise something has to be done about the land claims. Farmers cannot continue with this sword hanging over their heads. What we are proposing is that each of us will give 20% of our farms to our workers in return for a 40-year government loan (equitable to the value of the land) at 2% interest. While the money could be used for anything, we are confident most will use it to develop their operations further or buy other farms for development,” he said…
photo credit: IITA Image Library via photopin cc
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