Another Countryside

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Moenieba Isaacs: Blue Justice for small-scale fisheries

Words by Moenieba Isaacs The Blue Economy development agenda raises a myriad of red flags relating to the issues small-scale fisheries face. Small-scale fisheries contribute to food security, poverty eradication, sustaining ecosystems, supporting local communities and livelihoods, and promoting cultural inheritance. The Blue Economy development agenda for coastal, lakes, and marine protected zones looks to protect and restore the ocean’s…
Esté Beerwinkel
July 23, 2019
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Emmanuel Sulle: Lack of policy implementation holds back women’s land rights in Africa

Words by Emmanuel Sulle For many African countries, the lack of proper implementation of existing policies, laws and programmes hold back women’s rights to access, use, control, and own land. Speaking to members of parliament during the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Learning Exchange in Kigali, Rwanda, it was argued that the high levels of illiteracy among their…
Esté Beerwinkel
July 19, 2019
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Mnqobi Ngubane: Immigrant farm workers on land reform farms in South Africa: the eastern Free State province

Words by Mnqobi Ngubane Should migrant farm workers from other countries such as Lesotho benefit from South African land reform? This was one of the questions raised at a land redistribution conference held at the University of Western Cape in February 2019. Opinion was divided. Some found the idea a rather shocking surprise, while others expressed sympathy for Lesotho immigrants…
Esté Beerwinkel
June 12, 2019
Blog

Nkanyiso Gumede and Katlego Ramantsima: Farm Worker Equity Schemes

Words by Nkanyiso Gumede and Katlego Ramantsima “We are tired!” shouted an angry farm worker. “We have been exploited for far too long. These schemes are not working for us”. That was the main message shared by farm workers from Witzenberg and surrounding regions in the Western Cape during the speak-out meeting held in Ceres on May 4, 2019. The…
Esté Beerwinkel
June 10, 2019
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Stephen Greenberg: Neoliberals capture South African smallholder farmer support policy

Ideological and factional divisions and contradictions between neoliberals, ‘patrons’ and progressives have manifested in South Africa’s smallholder farmer support policy. This was evident at a national stakeholder consultation held by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) in April 2019. The policy is meant to support marginalised producers. But it has been thoroughly captured by neoliberals under the banner…
Andries
May 20, 2019
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Florian Kroll: Picturing a nourishing food system

Can pictures and images be used to solicit thoughtful and reflective discussion about one’s position in the food system?   PLAAS  and the Centre for Excellence in Food Security (CoEFS) worked together in 2018 to build a platform for a Community of Practice on food sensitive planning, and have been trying out some interesting ideas.   Food systems research  has highlighted the…
Andries
May 13, 2019
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Ben Cousins: Land policy must change South Africa’s agrarian structure

In debates taking place about the direction of land reform in South Africa today, it is important to remember why we are doing this, and what reform is intended to achieve. One of its key objectives has to be to fundamentally change the agrarian structure inherited from the past. At present, a small minority of mainly white farmers own an…
Sam Salient
April 30, 2019
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Andries du Toit: Without the Blanket of the Land – the political consequences of jobless de-agrarianisation.

My latest journal article (‘Without the Blanket of the Land:  agrarian change and biopolitics in post–Apartheid South Africa’) is out at last, available now in the latest issue of the Journal of Peasant Studies.  (You can access it here:  a great issue, by the way, with thoughtful and important contributions on the current state of agrarian Marxism  from a range of international scholars).…
Sam Salient
November 7, 2018
Blog

Mnqobi Ngubane: Obstacles facing a young black farmer in South Africa – a personal story

A new sense of urgency has entered South Africa’s land reform process after the country’s parliament took a resolution to amend the constitution to effect land expropriation without compensation. But even this will fail if the country doesn’t improve support for small and emerging black farmers who should be allocated a prime role in any reform process. International experience shows that small…
Sam Salient
April 12, 2018
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Ben Cousins: Land debate in South Africa is clouded by misrepresentation and lack of data

South Africa’s parliament has passed a resolution to amend the constitution and allow expropriation without compensation. The decision has generated a storm of gigantic proportions as political parties, citizens, white farmers and commentators anticipate either the moment of salvation (‘real land reform at last!’) or disaster (‘the collapse of the market economy!’). Sadly, few contributions to the public debate are informed by…
Sam Salient
March 8, 2018