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Access to land and other natural resources for local communities in Mozambique: Current examples from Manica Province
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2004) Durang, Tom; Tanner, Christopher
Mozambique is still one of the poorest countries in the world. Given that poverty remains overwhelmingly rural in nature, measures to effectively address it should therefore be targeted to the areas where the rural poor live, and should be based on the resources within their control. A programme to achieve these objectives began after the end of the civil war in 1992. This coincided with the government of Mozambique embarking on a more market-oriented rural development model after a period of socialised agriculture. The government realised that, despite being marginalised, rural communities continue to play a crucial role in the development and land management process. Old beliefs that local communities only produce for subsistence and do not invest and respond to market dynamics proved to be inaccurate.
ANC election manifesto in relation to rural development and land reform
(PLAAS, 2009-06) PLAAS
In the last 15 years the Department of Land Affairs (DLA) has set out to achieve many things but, by its own admission, has been unsuccessful in meeting its objectives for land reform. Hence a few questions arise. Is land reform failing? With a new administration in place, is it possible to influence a new rural vision to transform the imbalances in the countryside with clearer and achievable alternatives for sustainable agrarian reform under the ambit of the ANC’s renewed focus on rural development and agrarian reform? Does the shift in the institutional arrangements provide an opportunity to assess the possibilities for a new direction for land reform and agriculture?
Cape Town's African poor
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2004) de Swardt, Cobus
The typical ‘face of poverty’ in South Africa is no longer that of a rural woman engaged in subsistence agricultural production. Poverty today also refers to the large number of unemployed men who wait daily in vain on street corners for a casual job, women suffering from among the highest rates of HIV/Aids infection in the world, large numbers of children living in areas with among the highest crime and murder rates in the world, and poor black communities which continue to be excluded from the economic riches of our country. We can no longer ignore the problem of urban poverty. A large part of Cape Town’s less affluent population live on the Cape Flats, which was relatively unpopulated until the 1960s. Since then, two waves of settlement took place: the period after the 1960s saw the forceful resettlement of so-called ‘Coloured’ people through apartheid socio-spatial engineering, and in the 1980s a then illegal process of large-scale African migration from the impoverished areas of the Eastern Cape began (see Hindson 1987; Tomlinson & Addleson 1987). Numerous studies (see Swilling et al. 1991, for example) demonstrate how the combined effects of social engineering, spatial planning and rural-urban migration have contributed to urban sprawl, the expansion of racialised economic geographies, and the creation of an apartheid city. At present, the townships of Khayelitsha and Greater Nyanga are home to three quarters of a million people. The uniqueness of Cape Town’s urban sprawl is not restricted to its recent and rapid population growth, but also lies in the fact that it reflects a nexus of extremes (DBSA 1998; O’Leary et al. 1998). Cape Town has a strong and relatively varied economy with a monocentric structure, characteristic of South African cities. In a typical centre-periphery fashion, it represents a polarised city centre where affluent suburbs and economic activity present a contrast to the overcrowded, impoverished township periphery (Myonjo & Theron 2003a; 2003b). Whereas the majority of white and wealthy black people live opulent lifestyles, the majority of those on the Cape Flats live in abject poverty. This paper seeks to gain a greater understanding of the socio-economic realities and livelihood challenges facing the residents of Khayelitsha and Greater Nyanga.
A case-study of the lekgophung tourism lodge, South Africa
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2002) Massyn, Peter John; Swan, Nick
The Lekgophung Lodge is a community-owned wildlife tourism lodge, located in the western part of the Madikwe Game Reserve in the North West Province of South Africa. The Lekgophung community is settled near the western boundary of this protected area. The key case-study question is: How and how much can community-owned lodge development within a protected wildlife area contribute towards sustainably improving livelihoods of households in communities bordering on the protected area? The study considers the following aspects: structural arrangements; funding; financial returns and ‘SMME’ (small, medium and micro enterprise) linkages; employment opportunities; skills acquisition and institution building; lodge governance; and development co-ordination. Direct benefits from the Lekgophung Lodge enterprise are expected to boost average household income in the village by about R3 150 per annum and overall disposable income by more than 26%. The rights and benefits to the Lekgophung community through the lodge are durably secured through a range of mechanisms including long-term lease rights, partnership contracts with private lodge operators, who are required to pay a fixed fee and a percentage of turnover to the community and participation by the community in a multi-stakeholder park-based development steering committee. The lodge is well-integrated with park and local government development initiatives. Although still in the construction phase, the lodge has added value at many levels. The project brings substantial economic benefits and works within the ënewí cost recovery paradigm of protected area management. However, the lodge remains dependent on a capital subsidy and private expertise mobilised via partnerships with the public and private sectors. In taking up lodge governance functions, the Trust and Lekgophung community could benefit from having tools and processes to assess the impact of the lodge on local livelihoods, and to monitor asset and livelihoods trends.
CBNRM, poverty reduction and sustainable livelihoods: Developing criteria for evaluating the contribution of CBNRM to poverty reduction and alleviation in southern Africa
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2004) Jones, Brian TB
This research paper has been prepared as part of the Centre for Social Studies (CASS), University of Zimbabwe/ Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape (PLAAS) programme ‘Breaking New Ground: People-Centred Approaches to Natural Resources Management in Southern Africa’. It explores the relationships between community-based natural resource management (CBNRM), poverty reduction/alleviation and rural livelihoods. CBNRM is often promoted by governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and donors as a means of addressing poverty issues in rural communities, particularly in terms of generating income from various natural resource-based activities. For example, in Namibia, the goal of the US Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded Living in a Finite Environment (LIFE) Project during Phases I and II was to improve the quality of life for rural Namibians through sustainable natural resource management (LIFE 2002). CBNRM is increasingly being adopted as a means of poverty reduction in the national development strategies of southern African countries (Jones 2004a).
Challenges of co-management on shared fishery ecosystems: The case of Lake Chiuta
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) Njaya, Friday
Fisheries co-management initiatives have been implemented in various water bodies of southern Africa since the 1990s (Geheb & Sarch 2002). A Participatory Fisheries Management Programme (PFMP) was introduced on Lakes Malombe, Chilwa and Chiuta in Malawi between 1993 and 1995 (Bell & Donda 1993; Hara & Banda 1997). In Zambia and Zimbabwe, the co-management arrangement has been implemented on Lake Kariba since mid-1990s (Hachongela et al. 1998; Malasha 2003), while Mozambique and South Africa are implementing the initiative in selected areas along the coast (Lopes et al. 1998; Sowman et al. 1998). Community participation in decision-making processes regarding resource monitoring and control through formulation and enforcement of fisheries regulations is a key element in these initiatives. On the other hand, the state is involved in promulgation of a legislative framework and, in some cases, assists the user community to enforce the regulations. The initiation process of these co-management arrangements varies from place to place. In some areas, the state initiated the co-management regimes, while in others user communities started the process. Consequently, outcomes – like equitable access to resources and cost-effectiveness – also vary. Evaluation studies conducted on some small water bodies such as Lake Chiuta and Lake Kariba show that the user community has potential to contribute to sustainable resource management if enabling conditions are created. While most of the previous studies have centred on resource attributes, behavioural patterns and decision-making processes, very little work has focused on the implementation of co-management arrangements in shared water bodies, which is one of the complex factors (Knox & Meinzen-Dick 2001). There has been an emerging interest in transboundary natural resource management (TBNRM) initiatives since 1990, with some countries like South Africa, Malawi, Mozambique, and Botswana already advanced in creating enabling conditions (Griffin et al. 1999). However, the approach has mainly been applied to wildlife and forestry sectors. It is against this background that this study was designed to identify some of the major challenges of implementing co-management in shared fishery ecosystems. Lessons will be drawn from Lake Chiuta, which is shared between Malawi and Mozambique.
Chronic and structural poverty in South Africa: Challenges for action and research
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) du Toit, Andries
Ten years after liberation, the persistence of poverty is one of the most important and urgent problems facing South Africa. This paper reflects on some of the findings based on research undertaken as part of the participation of the Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) at the University of the Western Cape in the work of the Chronic Poverty Research Centre (CPRC), situates it within the broader literature on poverty in South Africa, and considers some emergent challenges. Although PLAAS’s survey, being only the first wave of a panel study, does not yet cast light on short term poverty dynamics, it illuminates key aspects of the structural conditions that underpin long-term poverty: the close interactions between asset poverty, employment-vulnerability and subjection to unequal social power relations. Coming to grips with these dynamics requires going beyond the limitations of conventional ‘sustainable livelihoods’ analyses; and functionalist analyses of South African labour markets. The paper argues for a re-engagement with the traditions of critical sociology, anthropology and the theoretical conventions that allow a closer exploration of the political economy of chronic poverty at micro and macro level.
Civil society advocacy for an amendment to the KwaZulu-Natal Cemeteries and Crematoria Act
(PLAAS, 2005-11) PLAAS
Welcome to the fourth issue of Umhlaba Wethu, the update on land and agrarian reform in South Africa from the Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies at the University of the Western Cape. With the recent National Land Summit, South Africa’s Land Reform Programme came under public debate (see page 2). The slow progress of land reform was highlighted by both government and civil society and debate primarily focused on whether this is due to the ‘willing seller, willing buyer’ approach. The resolution to abandon this approach was welcomed by many of the landless, but what it means in terms of government’s strategy is still unclear.
The Communal Land Rights Act and women: Does the Act remedy or entrench discrimination and the distortion of the customary?
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) Claassens, Aninka
This paper discusses the likely impact of the Communal Land Rights Act (CLRA) of 2004 on the land rights of rural women. It asks whether the Act is likely to enhance or undermine tenure security, not only for women, but for rural people in general. In the context of declining rates of marriage it focuses particularly on the problems facing single women. It examines two inter-related issues. The first is the content and substance of land rights, including the question of where rights vest. The second relates to power over land, particularly control over the allocation and management of land rights. It begins with an account of the parliamentary process and the last minute changes to previous drafts. The Bill was opposed by all sectors of civil society with the singular exception of traditional leaders. The most vehement opposition came from rural women and women’s organisations who argued that the Bill undermined the principle of equality in favour of an alliance with traditional leaders. By contrast, traditional leaders welcomed the Act as a triumph of tradition and African custom.
Constituting the commons in the new South Africa
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2000) Isaacs, Moenieba; Mohamed, Najma; Ntshona, Zolile; Turner, Stephen
This set of papers results from participation by staff members of the Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies in the eighth biennial conference of the International Association for the Study of Common Property, held at Bloomington, Indiana, from 31 May to 4 June, 2000. We are grateful to IASCP for accepting our proposal for a panel on 'Constituting the commons in the new South Africa', at which these papers were presented. We are also grateful to Dr James Murombedzi and the Ford Foundation for their role in stimulating and funding our participation in the conference, and their support for work at PLAAS on community-based natural resource management. However, we take full responsibility for any inadequacies in these papers, and for the opinions expressed in them.
Contested fishing grounds: Examining the possibility of a transboundary management regime in the Lake Kariba fishery
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) Malasha, Isaac
Community-based natural resources management (CBNRM) programmes in the southern African region emerged as a reaction to colonial ‘fortress’ conservation policies that criminalised and marginalised local people, preventing their use of natural resources. These colonial approaches did not lead to the sustainable use of the resources. They merely contributed to continued conflicts between government agents and local users. In the immediate post-colonial period very little was done to rectify these policies. It was only in the mid-1980s that a paradigm shift towards CBNRM began to occur. The political integration brought by the formation of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) presented favourable conditions for the scaling-up of these CBNRM initiatives. Transboundary natural resources management (TBNRM) projects began to be implemented in the joint-management of resources that straddle international boundaries.
Contested land tenure reform in South Africa: The Namaqualand experience
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2004) Wisborg, Poul; Rohde, Rick
The legacy of apartheid land policy in South Africa remains one of the most conspicuous manifestations of past injustices. To correct this legacy, diverse land reform efforts have centred on the constitutional mandate for land restitution, redistribution and tenure reform. The Transformation of Certain Rural Areas Act 94 of 1998 (Trancraa) is the first post-apartheid legislation to be passed and implemented to reform 'communal' land tenure. It aims to transfer state land in 23 former 'coloured rural areas' to residents or accountable local institutions. During 2001 and 2002 civil society organisations, local people, municipalities and the Department of Land Affairs introduced the Act in six areas in Namaqualand of the Northern Cape. During the same period, a Communal Land Rights Bill for the former 'homelands' has been the subject of consultation, published in August 2002, and adopted in a fundamentally revised version by Cabinet in October 2003 and by Parliament in February 2004. With its reliance on non-elected 'traditional councils', the Communal Land Rights Bill of 2003 departs in major ways from the policy approach of Trancraa. Trancraa was enacted in the context of the 1997 White Paper on South African Land Policy with its emphasis on individual rights and community choice about ownership and administration of land. The Act emphasised the role of municipalities both in implementation of tenure reform and envisaged future governance. In spite of dramatic policy changes, the experience of implementing Trancraa in Namaqualand may hold lessons for the implementation of the Communal Land Rights Bill with respect to resources, process, power relations and protection of rights. The Trancraa process represents a small but significant investment by government, but the time, funding and institutional support required to carry out effective tenure reform was seriously underestimated. Furthermore, the Act and implementation process did not address the constitutional right to 'comparable redress', and did not include land development or guarantees of future institutional support. Strengthened tenure rights appear vulnerable if isolated from training, finance and integrated development initiatives. A neo-liberal assumption that 'property rights' and 'markets' by themselves will transform rural areas where people are in deep crisis due to unemployment, HIV/Aids, corruption and food insecurity appears ill-founded and dangerous.
A decade of fisheries co-management in Africa: Going back to the roots? Empowering fishing communities? Or just an illusion?
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2002) Hara, Mafaniso; Nielsen, Jesper R
This paper provides an overview of co-management in Africa and the historical, political and paradigmatic reasons for the shift. The historical context is important when analysing the performance of the regime. The main reasons why co-management is being increasingly adopted in Africa are explained by analysing the objectives hereof. The paper evaluates what is meant by co-management in the African context using the variety of types of user involvement in practice and the standard continuum of possible arrangements under the co-management regime. Next, it will look at how co-management is being implemented, including whether it is achieving the objectives it is supposed to achieve. The final section will discuss and draw some lessons from the co-management experience on the continent. The paper draws on experiences from southern Africa (Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe), East Africa (Lake Victoria grouping ñ Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda) and West Africa (Benin, Congo, Ivory Coast, Senegal, etc.) where co-management arrangements in fisheries have been or are in the process of being implemented. In most of these countries, fisheries co-management is a relatively new approach that has only been formally introduced in the last five to eight years. The comparative analysis of the cases at this early stage could give indications of what seem to be the critical issues in the planning and implementation of fisheries co-management arrangements in Africa.
Decentralisation and natural resource management in rural South Africa: problems and prospects
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2002) Ntsebeza, Lungisile
In this paper, the issue of decentralisation and natural resource management will be interrogated primarily through a focus on local government reform and land administration. This focus illuminates problems that are on the horizon for other natural resources, such as forests, wildlife and fisheries, especially as these latter resources are to be managed through similar structures that are being constructed and contested in the local government and land policy arenas. Within this context, the role of traditional authorities (chiefs of various ranks) and municipal councillors will be assessed
Devolution and democratisation of natural resource management in southern Africa: A comparative analysis of CBNRM policy processes in Botswana and Zimbabwe
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2007) Rihoy, Elizabeth; Maguranyanga, Brian
This paper examines the policy processes of devolution and democratisation of natural resource management as they relate to community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) outcomes in Botswana and Zimbabwe. Devolution and democratisation of natural resource management are socially and politically contested issues that reveal interesting insights about the nature of local governance and democratic practices in these two countries. Through an analysis of factors affecting the CBNRM policy process – including the role of key actors, sets of policy ideas and narratives, and political influences – the authors identified evidence of shrinking political and policy spaces for local communities and civil society to effectively influence policy. This shrinking of political and policy spaces reflects a limitation of democratic practice and space in Botswana and Zimbabwe due to authoritarian political practices and socio-political and economic challenges. These factors have stifled opportunities for devolution of natural resource management and positive CBNRM outcomes. Based on primary and secondary data, this study argues that if this impasse is to be overcome, policymaking and implementation of CBNRM should take cognisance of socio-economic and political forces at local and national levels and recognise the intimate links between these levels. Evidence from the two countries indicates that strong and influential actor-networks – which are necessarily locally driven – are vital in mobilising strong political support which in turn is central in the development of an appropriate policy environment. The evidence further suggests that local government can play a crucial role in sustaining CBNRM in the face of threats of recentralisation from political and economic elites in whose interest recentralisation lies. At the national level, local government can play a critical role in maintaining political support and legitimacy for CBNRM. At the local level, it provides essential checks and balances that can prevent elite capture of benefits and provide neutral arbitration services when community polarisation stalls momentum. Ultimately, the paper argues that local government can be a vital element in ensuring democratic outcomes, serving as an effective link between local and national scales. CBNRM implementers and advocates need to ensure that institutional and legal arrangements strike a delicate balance in serving the interests of marginalised communities through devolution and allowing decentralisation to empower local communities to direct their destiny through the creation of democratic policy spaces. This requires paying attention to the political landscape of CBNRM and engaging in innovative and strategic political manoeuvring and dialogue with government bureaucrats, politicians and other relevant stakeholders.
Dialogue of theory and empirical evidence: A weighted decision and tenurial niche approach to reviewing the operation of natural resource policy in rural southern Africa
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) Mandondo, Alois
Considerable research has been conducted on community-based natural resource management in rural southern Africa. Many interesting insights have accumulated from the literature on the research issues of earlier generations. The challenge is to break new ground by unraveling insights relevant to later generations. This study identifies the issue of scale in complex natural resource management systems as one of the more important among emerging issues in the sector. The study develops a theoretical framework implying trade-offs between deciding for others, deciding with others and deciding for oneself in the operation of natural resource policy. This weighted decision framework is used to critically interrogate the human ecology of land and resource use across a variety of tenurial niches in rural southern Africa. The study argues that in arriving at decisions regarding the operation of natural resource policy, the emphasis needs to shift from what should be done, to how it should be done. The study suggests that the ‘how it should be done’ of policy operation is a calibration problem. The calibration problem concerns itself with reconciling diverse preferences through the medium of decisions made for others, with others and for oneself. It is concluded that negotiation provides the most appropriate basis for calibration since it reconciles the contradictions within and among decisions made for others, with others and for oneself.
Different realities and narrow responses in a shifting agricultural system
(PLAAS, 2013-09) PLAAS
Protests by farm workers in De Doorns in the Hex River Valley of the Western Cape in November 2012 – and the subsequent responses by organised agriculture, as well as attempts by unions to support the workers –illustrate the complexities of a defective agricultural sector with little effective state attention given to its inequities. The protests, sparked by frustrations over wages as low as R69 per day, also emphasised the uneasy history of labour relations in the agricultural sector and brought to light different versions of realities, which were subsequently hotly contested by both labour and large scale commercial agriculture. The agricultural industry as a whole went through major shifts since the marketing of agricultural goods was deregulated and markets were liberalised in the 1990s. Further changes in the fiscal treatment of agriculture led to the substantial reduction in the direct budgetary expenditure. Research (Barrientos and Visser, 2012) indicates that these shifts had a differentiated impact and, for export orientated farmers, the playing field was not level and it manifested with varying consequences, which allowed some farmers to remain competitive while others struggle to survive or have been forced out of agriculture – the ‘winners’ and ‘losers’. The progressive deepening of inequalities between (white) producers and (black) workers is as intricate in these shifts as it is a legacy prior to these shifts. Despite progressive labour legislation and regulations in the 1990s for wider and stronger rights for farm workers, as well as expectations of protected tenure and employment rights, it had little impact in the light of the state’s failure to enforce these regulations and in a context of job shedding and mechanisation.
Evaluating land and agrarian reform in South Africa : Farm tenure
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2003) Hall, Ruth
Farm dwellers are among the poorest South Africans. Most have access to residential land only. A minority has access to grazing land for their livestock or to arable land for cultivation, in return for which they may be required to provide their labour. Farm dwellers’ access to land is precarious – until recently farm owners had unrestricted rights to evict farm dwellers – and is often very limited in its extent. It was in response to these conditions that the Department of Land Affairs (DLA) developed, as part of the national land reform programme, policies to secure the tenure rights of farm dwellers. This report investigates to what extent these policies have succeeded in securing the existing tenure of farm dwellers or providing them with long-term secure rights to alternative land. The report describes the intentions of these policies, the mechanisms created to give effect to them, and the experience in enforcing these new rights. Also discussed are the special rights accorded to labour tenants and the application processes available to labour tenants who want to become owners of the land they use. The report assesses the extent to which the outcomes and impacts of these policies have met their objectives and have realised the rights enshrined in the Constitution. Finally, the report reflects on future challenges and extracts lessons from experience that need to inform future approaches to securing farm dwellers’ rights.
Evaluating land and agrarian reform in South Africa : Final Report
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2003) Hall, Ruth; Jacobs, Peter; Lahiff, Edward
Land dispossession was a key feature of racism under colonial rule and apartheid in South Africa. More than 3.5 million people were forcibly removed in the period 1960 to 1983 alone, through homeland consolidation, removals from ‘black spots’ and the Group Areas Act. One result of massive dispossession is the concentration of poverty in South Africa’s rural areas, where about 70% of the population lives below the poverty line (May 1998). The prospect of democracy in the 1990s raised expectations that the dispossessed would be able to return to their land, but the terms on which political transition was negotiated constrained how this could happen. Despite calls for a radical restructuring of social relations in the countryside, the constitutional negotiations on the protection of property rights, and on the economy more broadly, ensured that land reform would be pursued within the framework of a market-led land reform model, as advocated by the World Bank and implemented in countries such as Brazil, Colombia and Zimbabwe.
Evaluating land and agrarian reform in South Africa : Joint ventures
(Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2003) Mayson, David
Joint ventures (JVs) are an increasingly common feature of the process of land and agrarian reform in South Africa. They involve black people who currently have land rights or who are land reform beneficiaries and will be receiving a government subsidy on the one hand, and white commercial farmers, corporate entities or sectors of government on the other, engaging in joint agricultural or other land-related production. The partners enter into JVs for different reasons, but the schemes generally give land reform beneficiaries access to capital and land, lock in the expertise of white commercial farmers or companies, and empower land reform beneficiaries.

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