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PLAAS Webinar: The land of opportunity? The status of the government’s state land release promise

By November 6, 2020December 4th, 2020No Comments

Webinar: The land of opportunity? The status of the government’s state land release promise

Thursday 12 November 2020 from 13:00–14:00 (CAT)

PLAAS invites you to a webinar on “The land of opportunity? The status of the government’s state land release promise”.

The webinar will be chaired by PLAAS researcher Katlego Ramantsima, and will feature:

  • Alwyn Esterhuizen, GIS Specialist at the Seriti Institute
  • Siyabu Manona, Director for Land and Tenure Reform Policy and Implementation at Phuhlisani NPC
  • Dr Rosalie Kingwill, member of LandNNES and Research Associate at PLAAS
  • Thembakazi Matsheke, chair of Gwatyu Farmdwellers Communal Property Association

On 1 October 2020, the Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development, Thoko Didiza, announced that the state will release about 700,000 hectares of state land for redistribution. On 15 October 2020, the application process officially opened for farm beneficiaries who wish to obtain one of the 896 state farms located in the six provinces except Gauteng and the Western Cape. This announcement raises key questions on land administration, specifically concerns regarding the consideration of other key elements of land reform, namely tenure security, access to water and other resources and so forth. Since the announcement, it was found that not all farms to be redistributed are vacant. Thus, peoples rights and land rights have been infringed on by the sudden state land redistribution process. Is the government really reforming the agricultural sector and is this the type of land reform that the public would like to see?

The webinar will explore the significance of this land release gesture towards land reform in South Africa, and it aims to demonstrate what is at stake following the redistribution of state land in the former homelands. Panellists will discuss the following questions:

  1. Where is the released state land located?
  2. What is the current status of the land that is released?
  3. Who gets the land, who is evicted off the land and on what terms?
  4. What should have been considered by the government before proclaiming the release of state land?
  5. How should the government be approaching the issue of land redistribution and land reform in general?

Tune in on Thursday 12 November 2020 from:

  • 11:00 – 12:00 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)
  • 12:00 – 13:00 West Africa Time (WAT)
  • 13:00 – 14:00 Central Africa Time (CAT)
  • 14:00 – 15:00 East Africa Time (EAT)

Watch the webinar here: https://youtu.be/xnQIjKvtI8E Or click below to view it.