Sir, William Rees-Mogg muddles farm economics (“South Africa’s bitter harvest”, Sept 11). Land repatriation is unacceptable for solid ethical reasons, but to argue that South Africa’s farms need to be owned and managed by one race (whites) because black people are unable to do so has a tinge of racial prejudice.
His claims for modern farming are similar to the reasons for the enclosures, which ended in a massive movement of land from peasant to peer. Yet big is not always best nor beautiful. Would he apply the same logic to retailing, and force the closure of small shops for their inefficiency and lack of systems?
In most countries, small farms are more productive per acre than larger ones. Go to the Netherlands and see how every scrap of land is cultivated; see how many people are working in the fields in Brittany. Agribusiness uses land efficiently by employing a minimal number of people and by using diesel and chemicals instead of labour.
I agree with Rees-Mogg that the forced takeover of white farms is wrong — but on ethical, not agricultural, grounds.
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MIKE DONOVAN
Editor, Practical Farm Ideas
Carmarthen
Sir, The ideology-driven, over-hasty land reform programme by the governing ANC will probably lead to catastrophe for the very poor. The beneficiaries of this policy have no formal agricultural or business training and the Government has consistently refused to make this a prerequisite for farm takeovers.
A recent all-party report to the South African Parliament has indicated that not even 5per cent of formerly white-owned farms in the country were functioning properly after two years. A drop in production would lead to dearer imported foods, which would have the largest impact on the poor.
According to the latest South Africa Survey the number of people living on less than $1 per day has increased from 1.9 million in 1996 to 4.3 million in 2004 (from 4.5 per cent of the population to 9.1 per cent). About 60 per cent of black South Africans were still classified as poor in 2004, after ten years of ANC government.
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PIETER DE LANGE
Borden, Kent