Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape
Abstract
In the global debates on the modes of farming,
including irrigated farming, that are viable for the
majority of rural people, three models prevail:
(i) smallholder family farming; (ii) farming led by
agribusiness’ capital, technologies, and forward
and backward linkages in an estate mode; and (iii)
agribusiness-led farming in an out-grower mode.
In South Africa, these three and more modes
of irrigated agriculture have been implemented.
In the colonial era, in most of the country, the
state supported a white-dominated estate mode of
farming based on wage labor. Smallholder family
farming remained confined to black people in the
former homelands. Smallholder irrigation schemes
in the former homelands were out-grower
schemes, managed by the colluding apartheid
state, white agribusiness and irrigation industry.
Since independence in 1994, the search for
viable modes of farming and irrigation is high on
the policy agenda. This is part of the envisaged
transition of the state into a tripartite constellation
of citizens, state and service providers that
delivers accountable, outcome-based services
