By Richard Tate
Cape Town - Dear Mr President, Land reform is such a complex subject, beware of the pitfalls.
Surprise – you have yet another report on land reform soon to be presented to your Cabinet. There are many issues relevant to this very difficult subject.
But education, input, food security, and land availability are the cornerstones to going forward.
Education is a subject in which South Africans have no real support. Illiterate folk are everywhere, and until your government spends real money in the budget on this issue, South Africa will remain a backwater with high unemployment and the gap between rich and poor will widen.
The example of success and “voters remember” are just north of you in Zimbabwe. The partnership of private companies in providing education and input from farmers has supplied world record quantities of crops for export, a real success story.
You continue to persist in ignoring practical knowledge from farmers’ unions, and in place offer 200-page Cabinet reports from various important writers associated with agriculture.
You can ignore land reform at your peril. It will continue to provide South Africa with a bleak future destination.
Cape Times
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