Kubatana - Archive - Vision For Agriculture - Zimbabwe Institute

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Background
The Riddell Commission (1981) signalled the beginning of land use reorganisation in the communal areas and the acquisition of commercial farms for resettlement. When the resettlement programme faltered in the late 1980s, the government passed the Land Acquisition Act (1992) to enable it to acquire commercial farms more readily in better farming areas. The government then appointed a Land Tenure Commission (1994) to inform its land reform policy. However, the Commission’s recommendation were not implemented and progress on land resettlement stagnated throughout the 1990s. With the assistance of the international community, a Land Conference was held in September 1998 to resuscitate the land reform and resettlement programme. This initiative soon lost momentum, and the resettlement programme once again lay dormant.

‘Fast Track’ Resettlement
The spark that ignited the government-sponsored land invasions – and that anticipated government’s fast-track resettlement programme – was the rejection of its draft constitution in a referendum of February 2000. Since then, white commercial farmers and their workers have been under siege by war veterans, ruling party supporters and, more recently, by the ruling party elite. The law has been ignored or selectively applied. The police have failed to act against lawlessness or protect victims of violence. They, the army, and even judges, have themselves acted unlawfully by taking possession of farms, equipment and property to which they had no right. This impunity was buttressed by a series of laws and edicts of dubious constitutionality to dispossess farmers without compensation. Today, most white commercial farmers have been driven from their farms, commercial agricultural production has collapsed, workers have lost their livelihoods and their access to basic social services. Nearly half of the country’s population remains dependent on food aid.

The Bhuka Report
The government’s own interim Land Audit Report (2003) by Flora Bhuka, the Minister of State for the Land Reform Programme, criticised: i) the displacement of newly resettled farmers by powerful political elites; ii) multiple ownership of farms by these elites; and iii) huge swathes of highly productive farmland that has not been allocated and that is lying idle.

Restoration of the Rule Of Law
Vision for Agriculture believes that agricultural recovery can only proceed once an internationally recognised transitional government restores the rule of law and rescinds those laws that deny citizens their constitutional and human rights. Agricultural recovery is therefore dependent upon:

A return to constitutionality and the full adherence to internationally accepted human rights enshrined in Zimbabwe’s constitution that entitles every person, whatever his race or political persuasion, to freedom of expression and association and the right to the protection of the law of their person, home and other property.
Re-establishing the independence of the judiciary, abiding by ruling by competent courts, enforcing the law without fear or favour, and protecting every person and their property.

Building Trust through Dialogue
In anticipation of the establishment of the transitional government and a restoration of the rule of law, Vision for Agriculture has initiated a process of dialogue to build trust and reach consensus on the precepts, principles and policies that will support the full and sustainable recovery of agriculture in Zimbabwe. Its aim has been to encourage farmers to maintain agricultural production and to sustain its infrastructure; support a fair, transparent and effective land reform and redistribution programme; and facilitate the adoption of land tenure systems that offer security of tenure to all farmers to promote agricultural investment and productivity.

The dialogue process
Vision for Agriculture is as much a process as it is an organisation. It is a process that attempts to reach across boundaries that have divided Zimbabweans for too long. The most obvious is the racial divide that has beset the whole land debate. But it is also the gender divide that restricts women’s right to land in the communal areas. It is the divide between people who farm small parcels of land side-by-side with those who own much larger farms. We intend to initiate a process that brings together Zimbabwean farmers and their organisations to work through the contradictions of our respective value systems, and find solutions that give substance to our collective hopes and endeavours. Being part of this process is to belong to the vision for agriculture.

Rules of engagement
Like any process, there are rules of engagement. The first prerequisite is participating in good faith, in a spirit of compromise, and with a commitment to see all Zimbabwean farmers benefit from the growth in productivity that agricultural recovery and reform promise. We intend to begin by seeking points of agreement where co-operation, confidence and trust can be built. The foundations of a benevolent society, we believe, lie in a democratic process; in a policy of inclusiveness of various stakeholders; in a respect for the rights and welfare of citizens; and by the application of certain basic economic principles in the way countries are managed.

The second prerequisite is an agreed framework for dialogue that allows the building of consensus and which defines the rules and the arena to contest differences in approach on the way forward. We believe that this framework is best constructed by finding common ground on a basic set of precepts and principles.

Goodwill and a sound framework for discussion are essential. But we also need ‘content’, i.e. the issues to be discussed. The third prerequisite, then, is to review the literature, evaluate our experience and commission new studies, whose conclusions and recommendations can form the basis for further debate and an informed policy decision-making process. Throughout this exercise the need for intellectual integrity and a respect for rigorous methods of inquiry remains paramount. We not only need to learn from the lessons of our own experience, but those of other countries that have succeeded.

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