Download - PLAAS

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Why the agri sa walkout at the summit shouldnot matterAgri SA walking out of the VulnerableWorker Summit was disappointing, butnot surprising to those of us who haveengaged them over time. The walkout wasmainly sparked by Agri SA taking offenceat farm workers’ repeated assertions at theSummit that they experience widespreadrights violations, contrary to the staple AgriSA line that farmers are by and large lawabiding,except for a ’few rotten apples‘.Agri SA missed the main point of thediscussion, which is not about whetherindividual farmers are ‘good’ or ‘bad’people, but rather a plea to urgentlytransform a production system that robsmost sector workers of any opportunity todream of or realise their constitutional rightto a life of dignity for themselves and theirchildren.Farm worker organisations have goneto great lengths over the years toprovide evidence (research on evictions,documentaries on pesticide poisoning,protest actions and media opinion piecessuch as these) to support the assertion thatSouth African farm workers in the twentyfirstcentury still live in a system of virtualslavery. But the onus should be on farmersto prove their claims that contradict popularfarm worker experience. Without proof toback the claims, Agri SA still maintains thatall is largely well on South African farms. Ifthis is indeed the case, they should be opento the repeated calls to set up open andtransparent farm worker rights monitoringand evaluation mechanisms, withrepresentation from legitimate farm workerorganisations, rather than the plethora offarmer-puppeteer farm worker structurescurrently mushrooming on farms.Agri SA insists it will deal with any rightsviolations reported to it. However, itrejects out of hand the extensive record ofwide-scale violations covered in the 2003South African Human Rights Commission’sinvestigation into conditions on farms;Agri SA has done nothing further to dealwith these abuses. Even if rights violationsare reported to the organisation, it isnot accountable to anyone. When Leeu-Gamka farmer Piet Botes was found guiltyof raping and murdering 13-year-oldElizabeth Martiens, the daughter of oneof his workers, Agri Western Cape did notmake public whether Botes was a memberor not. Similarly, Agri SA is silent about thespate of road accidents involving unsafetransportation of farm workers on the backof open vehicles, in violation of many trafficlaws. Agri SA has repeatedly resisted callsto make its membership list public so thatso-called ‘bad apples’ can be rooted out. So,how serious can the organisation be?The continuous refrain throughout theSummit was, ‘So what’s new?’ Havingattended the 2005 Land Summit and the2008 Consultative Conference on Agriculturein Polokwane, many resolutions did indeedsound very familiar. However, despite AgriSA’s walkout, the Summit nonethelessmade some potentially ground-breakingresolutions.In addition to affirming the resolutions ofthe 2005 Land Summit (including abandoningthe willing-buyer, willing-seller approachto land reform), the Summit alsoadopted a decision to establish agriculturalbargaining councils. Farmer unions have alwaysopposed this, without giving any reasonswhy commercial agriculture should beexempt from establishing a labour rightsmechanism – the norm in almost all othersectors. If realised, agricultural bargainingcouncils will be a significant step forward torealising farm worker rights. Currently, unionshave to embark on individual farm-byfarmnegotiations. With more than 40 000farms in South Africa (where workers earnlow minimum wages with correspondinglylow union subscription fees and resultantunder-resourced unions), a centralised agriculturalbargaining council would go a longway towards freeing union officials to undertakethe education and rights defencework so urgently needed by workers.The Summit also adopted a resolution todevelop a sector-wide comprehensive genderequity strategy. Systemic and historicdiscrimination against women workers hasdeepened due to increased casualisationand outsourcing through labour brokers.Even in 2010, a woman’s position on a farmis still largely determined by her relationshipto a male farm worker. Women areseen quite literally an extension of maleworkers and an auxiliary source of labourto be drawn on as needed in high seasons.This restricts women’s ability to engagein off-farm employment, as they must beavailable when the farm needs them.While such feudal labour practices arenot formally written in contracts, certain– mostly higher paying – positions arereserved for men. Their labour on the farmis valued less than that of men and usuallynot accorded high status in the farm workerhierarchy. With her perceived “nimblefingers”, the female worker is restricted tolower-status functions on a farm. Womenare thus discriminated against both in the2 January 2011 A bulletin tracking land reform in South Africa
terms of their employment and the type ofwork they are able to do.Because women’s work is seen as low-status‘unskilled’ labour, in monetary terms it isvalued well below men’s work. Farmersjustify this by claiming that women usuallyperform ‘unskilled’ work on the farm,but even when men and women workalongside each other fulfilling identicalwork functions, women still often earn lessthan their male counterparts.Female farm workers are also at adisadvantage in housing allocation, ashousing contracts have been historically tiedto permanent farm labour contracts, whichhistorically only men can access. So whenmen lose their jobs, the whole family can beleft homeless, and if a male worker dies oris retrenched, the whole family can be outon the streets. While laws introduced since1994 prohibit linking employment contractswith housing, the practice is still common.Since physical and emotional abuse ofwomen by male partners is rife (in partbecause of the legacy of the tot systemand pervasive alcohol dependence), thissystemic discrimination against womenfurther compromises their ability to leaveabusive relationships and underminestheir safety of that of their children. Giventhe known intersection of gender-basedviolence and HIV/AIDS infection rates, thisblatant discrimination against women haslife and death consequences for them andtheir children.So it is significant that DAFF has for the firsttime committed to going beyond slogansand developing a comprehensive strategyon women’s empowerment to combatthe pervasive discrimination against andmarginalisation of women in agriculture.The litmus test of success for the Summitis not participation by 600 hope-filledfarm workers, or addresses from PresidentZuma, Cosatu Secretary General Vavi oreven the disarming Northern Cape charmof Minister Joemat-Pettersson, who held usall in the palm of her hand in her closingaddress, but rather whether it delivers onits promises. Libraries can be filled withsummit resolutions, but the millions spenton delegates from across the country willcome to naught if the lofty goals are notimplemented.It is unfortunate that Agri SA walked outon an important opportunity to help shapeagricultural transformation, but we hopegovernment finally realises the truth thatwhite farmers have little commitment todoing right by those who built their wealth– the evidence is all around us. These farmers– prime beneficiaries of apartheid throughdirect subsidies, protectionist measures anda guaranteed steady cheap labour supplydue to influx controls and poor labour laws– still don’t grasp the magnanimity of farmworkers who continue to carry the industrydespite having nothing to show for over300 years of exploitation. Instead of againbending over backwards to accommodatethe whims and tantrums of commercialagriculture, let’s proceed in the hopefulspirit of the Summit.Fatima Shabodien, Women on Farms Project(WFP)Research updates’Threats Towards Attaining Food Securityand Food Sovereignty in the Eastern CapeProvince’Masifunde, Zingisa and the Trust forCommunity Outreach and Education(TCOE) will be launching their new study,’Threats Towards Attaining Food Securityand Food Sovereignty in the Eastern Cape(EC) Province’, at Rhodes University towardsthe end of May 2011. The study investigatesprojects initiated under: a) the Massive FoodProduction Programme (MFPP) funded bythe Eastern Cape Department of Agricultureand Rural Development (ECDoA), whichadopted a ‘green revolution’ strategy topromote genetically modified maize andsoya production; and b) private sectorinitiatedcash crop production projects.Research in four villages in communal areasin the Amathole District Municipality showsthat these projects do not serve the interestsof small-scale black farmers or promote foodsecurity in the region. Rather, they promotethe interests of agri-business while usingsmall-scale farmers as a testing ground forthe ‘green revolution’ in South Africa. Theprojects rely on intensive use of expensivechemical inputs, with potentially devastatingeffects on the health, environment andnatural resources (such as water) of localpopulations. These populations are alsoused as cheap labour and integrated intoformal value chains and markets underhighly exploitative conditions that extracttheir surplus, while leaving them to assumeall the risks of production. They use theirbest (consolidated) lands and scarce raindependentwater resources under collectivefinancial and production contracts that lacktransparency and accountability.Most projects in these villages have failedto fulfil their promise to increase foodsecurity, create jobs, alleviate poverty andenable small-scale black farmers to become‘successful commercial producers’. Failurehas translated into indebtedness linked to:• production failure due to lack ofwater and late delivery of inputs andservices;A bulletin tracking land reform in South Africa January 20113
Page 1: UmhlabaWethu11January 2011A bulleti
Page 5 and 6: PublicationsMunicipal Commonage -Ho
Page 7 and 8: and contributed to more inclusive,

Download - PLAAS

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?