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This study was undertaken at a smallholder irrigation scheme in the previously disadvantaged rural area of Mamuhohi in the Limpopo Province. Like other smallholder irrigation schemes in South Africa, Mamuhohi Irrigation Scheme has not performed particularly well. The expectations of interveners like politicians, development agencies and planners have not been realised in smallholder irrigation schemes. Constraints faced by smallholder farmers include a history of dependency; the high costs of mechanisation; the absence of credit, inputs, and output markets; insecure land tenure; “hedgehog behaviour” among smallholders; lack of funding; and poor management and maintenance of infrastructure. The White Paper on Agriculture (NDA, 1995) clearly set out government‘s intention to withdraw subsidies previously enjoyed by farmers and to ensure that the real costs of natural resources are reflected in the pricing of resources in order to discourage abuse. This resulted in the enacting of laws like the new National Water Act of 1998 (DWAF, 1998), aimed at sustainable water management. This included the rehabilitation of infrastructure prior to transfer, and the establishment of water users’ associations amongst farmers, which were to take over ownership and collective management of the schemes. The overall objective of the study was therefore to assess the sustainability and, more specifically, the economic viability of smallholder irrigation schemes in South Africa in the context of irrigation transfer. Hypothesis to be tested: <ul> The behaviour of smallholder farmers is diverse and is reflected in the way in which they view farming and engage in agricultural practices. </ul> The study also sought to indicate the existence of diversity in the smallholder irrigation scheme, by exposing different types of smallholder farmers within the scheme. This information should be of great importance in assisting smallholder farmers regarding issues of their own development. The findings will also help to curb the generalisation of developers’ perceptions regarding smallholder irrigation farmers. Smallholder irrigation farmers are feeling the full impact of the withdrawal of government assistance from the irrigation schemes, which have deteriorated to a state of partial collapse. A great need among farmers remains the rehabilitation of irrigation infrastructure, which would enable them to farm their land. As indicated earlier, the study found that diverse types of smallholder farmers exist within the irrigation scheme. This indicates that appropriate information in this regard is important for government in the formulation of policies aimed at the development of such farmers. Through this study, four types of smallholder farmers were identified within the same irrigation scheme. The methodology applied in achieving the aforementioned outputs pursued a specific sequence, starting with the formulation of questions. The particular study area was chosen due to the likelihood of the presence of different types of farmers that could be identified through the study. A list of the names of smallholders and other key information was provided by the local agricultural office. This assisted with the identification of people to be interviewed. The preliminary interviews were conducted with a sample size of 25 farmers and were aimed at gaining a better understanding of the people within the study area. The questionnaire used during these interviews contained open-ended questions that allowed respondents to express their views and make suggestions. This led to the development of a questionnaire consisting of closed-ended questions, aimed at eliciting responses that were relevant to the purpose of the survey. The questions were also as simple as possible to ensure that they would be clearly understood by both the interviewer and the respondents. About four weeks were spent in trying to understand the real setup of the study area and the lifestyle of the local community. The second step in the methodological sequence was the collection of data from 60 farmers. These interviews were conducted with the assistance of two extension officers. It was not possible to interview all the farmers at once, and it took about two weeks to interview all 60 farmers. Fortunately, the farmers were extremely co-operative throughout the entire interview process. The third step in the methodological sequence was the processing of the data collected during the interviews. The typology here was developed by means of qualitative analysis and had to be refined over a period of time to ensure a valid typology of farmers. This necessitated the use of other data analysis tools, which ultimately contributed towards the classification of farmers according to different types. Four types of farmers were eventually identified, namely: Highly intensive maize growers; Vegetable growers; Diversified maize growers; and Intensive diversified growers. Lastly, the conclusion that can be drawn from the research is that any attempt to develop smallholder irrigation farmers requires an understanding of their diversity – hence this study’s intention to identify, in a scientific manner, the existence of such diversity. Understanding diversity amongst farmers also requires an understanding of the different strategies that farmers employ to ensure their livelihood. This means that both the socio-economic and institutional setting of such farmers must be understood. / Dissertation (MInstAgrar)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Agricultural Economics, Extension and Rural Development / unrestricted

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The problem of food insecurity in developing countries is an enormous challenge. In rural communities, it is a perennial problem that requires undivided attention to ensure household food security. This paper seeks to define the role of rural participation in providing household and community food security with a particular focus on Lower Gweru irrigation project in Zimbabwe. The research comes in light of increased food deficit in Zimbabwe that has been compounded by failed politics, climate change and weather extreme events. Data was gathered using self-administered questionnaires, direct observation and literature review. Data was analysed using the Microsoft Excel 365 ToolPak and Health24 Web Calculator. This paper highlights the importance of rural irrigation schemes in addressing community and household food security and ensuring health nutrition uptake by irrigators and surrounding communities. Rural irrigation systems enable farmers to become net food sellers allowing them to benefit from food price volatility. It also highlights the resultant development and makes recommendations for future irrigation developments

Among the core concerns with the extraordinary proliferation of land deals in Africa - often referred to as "land grabs" - is that the signing of contracts between host states and foreign companies and/or other states for large swaths of territory and associated agribusinesses could represent an erosion of the host state's sovereignty powers. This concern reveals a double characterisation of the state, as weak in its sovereignty and, yet, as very able to negotiate and implement deals. Host states have been shown to be able to exercise sovereignty in those deals, what type of sovereignty - and whose -, however, remains in dispute. This thesis seeks to address this issue through a case study that focuses on the question how sovereignties are shaping and being shaped by land deals in Mozambique's Limpopo Valley. It specifically investigates the rice and sugar projects in areas of the Chokwe and Xai-Xai regadios. It considers land deals as a set of processes for international-domestic negotiation of goals and funding, followed by processes in the areas of decision-making, policy-making, and project implementation. Based on critical reappraisals of the concept of sovereignty, the thesis understands sovereignty as a set of powers that a state effectively has, beyond mere legal sovereignty, rather than an a priori attribute that a state does or does not possess, in zero-sum terms. As such it is an outcome of relational, inter-subjective processes and, thus, dynamic and historically contingent. Consequently, rather than absolute power over its territory and population, sovereignty is considered in terms of degrees of two types of political power practices, "command" power and "infrastructural" power, according to multiple and not always congruent state functions. To this, the thesis brings a notion of socially constructed state such that it is never neutral because a part of society and, thus socially embedded and produced. This allows me to move past the assumption of 'common good' and the moralist discussions of 'elite capture' and corruption. Based on this theoretical and analytical framework, the thesis posits irrigated agriculture and the state schemes hosting foreign projects as "sites" where actors' interests and powers are shaped relationally: the state (in different capacities), other states and their development agencies, foreign private sector actors and multiple domestic groups. The processes are studied at two levels. The first concerns how state "command" power is used to harness and/or defend against different international developments, negotiating international narratives and domestic needs, resulting in agricultural and water regulations, with ODA dependence for budgets. A subset of regulatory activity is the revisions to by-laws of management irrigation-scheme companies, as new representatives of central power locally. At the second level, the research focuses on interaction with Western equity and Chinese cooperation projects, two of the main types of investors, which come with different foreign management and funding models. Further, processes are embedded in historical trajectories of elite groups' moving away from agriculture since the 1980s, yet holding on to land entitlements, and of producers' displacement. This analytical framework allows research to effectively go beyond the notion of the state as either weak or able, considering it as polymorphous and acting in specific dimensions that no longer seem contradictory. Further, it illuminates the mutually constitutive nature of (sub)national and international dimensions of sovereignty, which tend to be exiled from each other in mainstream approaches to the notion, as well as the inextricability of political and economic powers in the 'sovereignty frontier' of post-conditionality states.

Thesis (M.Dev.) --University of Limpopo, 2011 / Agricultural development programs under the former apartheid homeland system which was dissolved in 1994 could not successfully achieve their objectives. The current democratic government reviewed the policies and programs put in place during apartheid era which eventually led to the implementation of the Revitalisation of Smallholder irrigation Schemes (RESIS) in line with the Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) and Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) programs. It was anticipated that RESIS would among others improve agricultural productivity, play a role in local economic development, improve food security, provide improved benefits and the livelihoods of the rural communities where the schemes are situated. The aim of the study is to assess whether the RESIS program has had an impact so as to make recommendations for future similar programs. The objective of the study is to assess the impact of RESIS program on the livelihoods of the participants and to shed light on whether such programs can be used for poverty reduction, which is a key objective in the programs of LDA. Tšwelopele irrigation scheme in Greater Tubatse Municipality within Sekhukhune District Municipality was selected as the area at which the study was conducted. A random sample of 50 beneficiaries was selected from a total of 75 RESIS beneficiaries and divided into two strata, namely, full-time farmers (both male and female) and part-time farmers (male and female) farmers. Interviews were conducted through completion of questionnaires responded to by the selected participants and key informants in the scheme. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used to obtain the responses from the scheme participants and the data processed using SPSS. Based on the analysis of respondents‟ perceptions of the farmers, the study concludes that RESIS is perceived to have had a positive impact on the livelihoods of the beneficiaries. Gross margin analysis supports the farmers‟ perceptions.

Magister Philosophiae (Land and Agrarian Studies) - MPhil(LAS) / This study explored the production and livelihoods of smallholder farmers in irrigation schemes in South Africa. The particular focus has been on the farming styles of smallholder farmers, the impact of irrigation scheme production on their income and livelihoods, and the issue of smallholder social differentiation. The New Forest irrigation scheme located in Bushbuckridge Local Municipality was used as a case study. The research methodology utilized a combination of extensive and intensive research designs. The farming style approach was compared with the livelihood strategies approach to determine the relationship between the farmers’ approach to farming and their livelihood development trajectory. The underlying assumption is that small-scale irrigation has the potential to make a positive contribution to the livelihoods of farmers. New Forest irrigation farmers face a number of challenges at the irrigation scheme such as neglect by government, inadequate irrigation water, and access to affordable crops inputs. The farmers were not organised to be able to purchase inputs, engage in co-operative marketing, and manage the irrigation scheme. The notion of investing in smallholder irrigation schemes in order to convert smallholders into commercial farmers is unrealistic. Those that were classified as ‘food farmers’, benefit from irrigation development and participation through meeting their household consumption needs. Those classified as ‘employers’, obtained negative gross margins per plot and hired most farm labour. Diversification by employers into other less risky livelihood activities on-farm and off-farm is an option. The ‘profit makers’, make high returns from crop production, and obtained the highest gross margins per plot. This thesis argues that support to farmers in smallholder irrigation schemes should be provided in the context of their farming objectives, and livelihood aspirations which are not only varied but evolve across time and individual circumstances.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This thesis examines livelihoods in the wake of agricultural commercialization under the Revitalization of Smallholder Irrigation Schemes (RESIS) Programme and similar revitalization initiatives within the Olifants River Basin in Limpopo Province. The focus is on contractual joint ventures and strategic partnerships implemented within selected smallholder irrigation schemes. The thesis is based primarily on in-depth empirical studies conducted between October 2003 and March 2009 in three sites located in two Integrated Sustainable Rural Development Programme (ISRDP) poverty nodes namely, Greater Sekhukhune and Vhembe Districts. To a lesser extent, the thesis draws on findings from rapid appraisals of five additional study sites in Greater Sekhukhune District. Research findings showed that the performance of joint ventures and strategic partnerships had so far largely fallen short of expectations. With the exception of a minority of smallholders involved in RESIS-Recharge strategic partnerships, the promise of higher incomes and improved livelihoods had often remained elusive, while debts and potential losses of often meagre household assets loomed large, threatening to erode existing livelihoods and undermine government interventions. This was mainly because ‘viability’ in both the RESIS and RESIS-Recharge phases was narrowly seen in economic and technical terms, such that reduction of transaction costs often entailed the divesting of responsibilities to address issues of rural poverty and inequality. Subsistence production had largely given way to commercially-orientated farming, and weak monitoring of contract formulation and implementation meant that voices of marginalized poor and vulnerable people, particularly women and the elderly, were not being heard. Research findings further revealed that while RESIS-Recharge strategic partnerships increased incomes for a minority of smallholders, such arrangements did not meaningfully improve the productive, managerial and marketing skills of smallholders to ensure their effective participation in agriculture. Rather, strategic partnerships were creating a small class of black ‘arm-chair’ farmers, who played little or no active role and obtained few or no skills in commercial farming but perpetually depended upon and drew incomes from agribusiness initiatives run by externally-based agents. Adjunct to questions of sustainability for these farmers’ ability to participate in commercial farming, the thesis raises the question: What is the rationale for joint ventures and strategic partnerships in the context of South Africa’s Agricultural Sector Strategy objectives for support to black farmers? Contracts lacked mechanisms for equitable distribution of costs and benefits between contracted private partners and targeted smallholders, on the one hand, and the rest of members of local communities, on the other hand. Contracts also lacked provisions for postproject recapitalization of infrastructure and rehabilitation of degraded land. This raised questions about the longer term sustainability of productivity, natural resource base and livelihood security in smallholder irrigation schemes. The conclusion of this thesis is that the challenge of reducing rural poverty and inequality in smallholder irrigation schemes might not be resolved through existing institutional approaches to agricultural commercialization.

Magister Artium - MA / The subject of rural development has been at the forefront of South Africa’s government discourse and policy. In post-apartheid South African rural development policy has paid significant attention to poverty alleviation, job creation and food security by attempting to commercialize agriculture in the former ‘homelands’. This has been mainly encouraged through agricultural programmes such as Masibambisane Rural Development Initiative (MRDI) and the Massive Food Production Programme (MFPP). To support these agricultural development programmes, the South African government has directed a significant amount of its public budget towards their development. However, literature suggests that to a large extent these agricultural programmes have not succeeded in improving the agricultural situation as well as livelihoods of rural dwellers in the former ‘homelands’. Despite the efforts made by the South African government, agriculture and field cultivation in rural areas continue to show a decline. Furthermore, many agricultural projects that have been initiated to improve the lives of rural people have been abandoned. This thesis investigates the interface between the actors that are involved in agricultural development projects in Mnquma Local Municipality in the former homeland of Transkei, Eastern Cape. Two irrigation schemes in Mnquma Local Municipality are interrogated, namely Ntuzenyandu Irrigation Scheme and Mirlees Masibambisane Irrigation Scheme, as case studies for this study. The main objective is to investigate the causes of dissonances between the actors that are involved in these agricultural projects, as well as how these dissonances influence the outcomes of agricultural projects in Mnquma Local Municipality. It is the micro-politics of development at the interface between the various actors that must be studied in order to gain a full and nuanced picture of why the irrigation schemes have faced challenges. This study uses the actor-oriented and social interface approach. The study identifies community politics, struggles over state allocated resources, power relations between the actors, lack of community involvement and a ‘discourse of blaming’ between the actors as key challenges that are hindering the success of these agricultural projects. It is hoped that this study can shed some important insights for policy makers on how to improve and implement state-funded agricultural projects that will be able to achieve government objectives and expectations of the rural people.