South African land reform: the view from the right

Everyone seems to agree that the land reform program in post-apartheid South Africa hasn't exactly been a success. Even the ANC government acknowledges that about 50% of all redistributed farms are failing. What divide observers and interested parties is (of course) the cause behind the failures. A leftist split from the ANC, the EFF, demands the immediate expropriation of all farmland held by Whites, a World Bank report (sic) suggests that subdivision of the White-owned farmland into smaller plots more adapted to subsistence farming is the way to go, while the White “farmers” themselves (really large land-owners) usually oppose land redistribution outright. The book under review is written from such a perspective. It's published by Ostara, associated with Arthur Kemp, a Rhodesian who served in the South African apartheid army and police before moving to Britain. He currently defines himself as a White “separatist”. I think it's obvious that he has published Philip Du Toit's book to “prove” Black inferiority. That being said, “The Great South African Land Scandal” is nevertheless an interesting read. I think it can be used alongside other material concerning the land reform campaign and its political repercussions.

Very often, land redistribution doesn't benefit the actual farm workers or the rural poor. Rather, White farms are bought (with government money) by Black tribal aristocrats, who see the whole thing as a get-rich-quick scheme. After looting the treasury and selling off the machinery or the animals, the farm is in effect abandoned by its new owners. The Black farm workers are cheated out of their wages. In the “best” cases, the farms are taken over by squatters from urban townships eking out a living as subsistence farmers. The ANC's land distribution bureaucracy is another player in the drama, being notoriously corrupt and inefficient. While it seems to have money, 80% of its budget goes to salaries for its staff! It's also common that the land reform bureaucracy fail to follow up on redistribution projects. Thus, enormous sums are paid to acquire farmland for Blacks, but no additional support in the form of new capital is given if and when the Black-owned farm needs it, virtually setting it up for failure. One factor not sufficiently emphasized in this book is the ironic fact that the apartheid regime was strongly protectionist and dirigiste towards the farming sector, while the ANC government is neo-liberal, creating difficulties even for White farmers forced to compete on a volatile world market. Yet, somehow inexperienced Black farmers are expected to make it. Sometimes, the hypocrisy of the ANC is rather stunning, as when land with mineral wealth is leased by the government to foreign mining companies even when claimed by traditional African communities!

A problem encountered by all land reform campaigns is that smaller farms are usually less profitable than large, plantation-like units. Yet, the land-hunger of the poor can usually only be placated by giving them smallholdings, making it necessary to break up modern large-scale farming operations. This in turn could lead to decreased production of food, less cash from exports, and a shift to subsistence farming. Indeed, the author of this book suggests that this is happening in South Africa. A classical response to this problem is cooperative farming of larger units, but most cooperative ventures in South Africa have also failed for a number of reasons. There are often clashes of interest between the managers (usually White), sub-managers (who in some regions are Coloured), Black emerging farmers eager to learn the secrets of the trade, and local Black communities only peripherally involved in the day-to-day farming, but eager to reap the dividends. With no vibrant cooperative alternative, the only options left are White-owned capitalist plantations with Black labor, or Black squatting and subsistence farming on land that could have been used to produce food for the cities or cash crops for export. (Another “alternative”, I suppose, would be Soviet style collectivization/nationalization of all farming, but that's usually met with resistance even from the land-hungry poor!)

Since Philip du Toit opposes all land redistribution measures, he naturally holds out the specter of Robert Mugabe's “land reform” in Zimbabwe, where gangs of violent “war veterans” have taken over farms, murdered White farmers and evicted farm workers, destroying much of the country's food production in the process. Du Toit claims that something similar is happening in South Africa, with Whites being murdered or driven off their farms, and local “warlords” from the Black shantytowns setting themselves up as the new power, while the police is looking the other way (or being too busy with other criminal activity). It's all done on a lesser key than in Zimbabwe, but the Ostara editors of this book fear that an explicit Mugabe-like campaign is the next step. Somehow, I find that very hard to believe, as long as the ANC benefits from good relations with Anglo-American and the Western powers, and the pro-Mugabe EFF only gets 6% of the votes…

That being said, I will nevertheless give “The Great South African Land Scandal” three stars, since its case-by-case studies of various redistribution schemes are interesting in themselves.