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The Impact of Land Reform on Commercial Farm Workers' Livelihoods
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7. RECOMMENDATIONS
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Further research required:
It is of great concern that the whereabouts of those most seriously affected by land reform, i.e. farm workers who have lost their jobs and been forced to leave their homes, is largely unknown. As a matter of urgency, those displaced need to be traced and their situation assessed.
This assessment focused mainly on permanent farm workers and resident seasonal workers. The impact of the land reform programme on other seasonal workers who are not resident on the commercial farms needs to be considered by any agency carrying out future assessments on communal lands, in informal mining areas or in peri-urban areas (e.g. by members of ZINISA).
There are a number of questions to be answered concerning labour on resettled farms. Dividing a large, mechanised commercial farm into smaller plots presumably with limited mechanization should, in theory, create greater opportunities for manual agricultural labour. Therefore, given that plot sizes allocated to new settlers (reportedly over 5ha) are too large for an average household to cultivate without additional labour, who is doing the work on resettled farms? And did the new settlers previously employ others or labour for others in their communal lands, and therefore how have labour opportunities been affected in areas from where settlers are being moved?
Further research or assessments on commercial farms needs to be very conscious of the poor situation in which farm workers find themselves currently, and the frustration that research without subsequent action or intervention is causing. If a commitment cannot be made to act upon findings, a very high threshold must be set to justify extracting further information from farm workers.
Recommendations to the Government of Zimbabwe:
As has been stated in previous reports, there is an urgent need for the Government to give more consideration to the plight of commercial farm workers as it pursues its programme of land reform. In this, the report re-iterates some of the recommendations of a number of previous surveys and reports (e.g. Kibble & Vanlerberghe, 2000; SC UK, 2000; Zimbizi, 2000) regarding inclusion of farm workers in resettlement.
The timing of the designation and subsequent resettlement of commercial farms should give greater consideration to production cycles, and more advance and definite notice of resettlement should be given to all actors affected. (This will mitigate some of the potential and actual problems faced not only by the farmers and farm workers, but also by new settlers and by banks with outstanding loans to farmers.)
The problems experienced by farm workers with access to services, including health, education and water, will apply equally or to an even greater extent for new settlers. The provision of services, therefore, should be made an integral part of the resettlement process.
Recommendations to NGOs and other Interested Agencies:
Existing information needs to be consolidated to track the status of the commercial farms, and thereby to help monitor the likely situation of farm workers. Additional information needs to be compiled on whether farms have been designated, occupied and/ or resettled, and whether operations are still ongoing. Ideally the numbers of permanent and seasonal workers employed on each farm should also be gathered. FCTZ's work on monitoring events on farms in Mashonaland forms an excellent base upon which to build.
There is a need to strengthen mechanisms for sharing information on the status of farms and farm workers (presumably someone must know where unemployed workers have been displaced to, for example). The Farm Worker Action Group (FWAG) in particular, or one of the ZINISA sub-committees would seem appropriate starting points for this as they already comprise many interested agencies.
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