Posted on August 31, 2011

SAfrica: Black Farmers Sell Farms Back to Whites

Forbes, August 31, 2011

South Africa’s minister of land reform says black farmers have resold nearly 30 percent of the white farmland bought for them by the government–often back to the previous white owners.

Minister Gugile Nkwinti announced the startling indicator of failure at Wednesday’s launch of a long-delayed government policy paper to revitalize plans to more equitably distribute agricultural land, redressing historical wrongs. Seventeen years after white minority rule ended, the vast majority of agricultural land remains in the hands of some 40,000 white commercial farmers.

Nkwinti said the government had bought 7 percent of the country’s commercial farmland since 1994. He said black farmers had resold about 2 percent.

Many black farmers have failed for lack of support.