From: wsargeant@IGC.ORG (Winslow L. Sargeant)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african
Subject: IPS:Mozambique, battle for land takes n'
Date: 12 Apr 92 21:37:16 GMT

/* Written  1:56 pm  Apr 12, 1992 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.englibrary */
/* ---------- "MOZAMBIQUE: BATTLE FOR LAND TAKES N" ---------- */
Copyright Inter Press Service 1992, all rights reserved.  Permission to re-
print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'.

Reference: Agriculture
Title: MOZAMBIQUE: BATTLE FOR LAND TAKES NEW FORM


an inter press service feature

by rachel waterhouse

maputo, apr 9 (ips) -- eduardo sumbane farmed a one-hectare plot
on the outskirts of this mozambican capital until january when
someone put a fence round his land, saying it was part of a
private farm and that he should go away.

with no legal documents to prove his right to the land,
sumbane had to leave.

for sumbane and thousands of other mozambican peasants (87
percent of the estimated 15 million population), the battle over
land in their country is taking on a subtle new form.

already driven from vast areas of the countryside by 16 years
of war waged by renamo rebels, peasant farmers now face a new
contest: to keep their land rights in the face of privatisation.

mozambique won independence from portugal in 1975, thanks
largely to peasants' struggle for the right to its resource,
rich and fertile terrain, which includes over 200,000 sq. kms of
prime agricultural land.

''history demands we take the land back from foreign
exploitation and a handful of private owners, and give it to the
mozambican people,'' said the ruling frelimo party's socialist
government when it nationalised all land after independence.

however, frelimo's early policies failed, mainly because of
paying lip-service to cooperative farming while pouring most
resources into huge state-run farms and ignoring the peasant
''family sector'', which was reponsible for almost 70 percent
of marketed agricultural production in 1987.

the state farms have proved a disaster, according to ministry
of agriculture officials. they are under-resourced, badly
managed and too big to run efficiently. one early scheme, called
the ''400,000-ha project'', for example, was meant to stretch
across three northern provinces.

most of the 100 state-run farms are now staggering under debt
and producing at a fraction of capacity.

many peasants also bitterly resented being forced onto
cooperative farms in ''communal villages'', organised by frelimo
-- one factor helping the rebel mozambique national resistance
movement's war to spread throughout the country, sociologists
here say.

due to failed economic policies, combined with war and
drought, mozambique today depends on foreign donations for 80
percent of its food needs. (more/ips)


mozambique: battle (2)

under its structural adjustment programme launched in 1987,
the government plans to ''restructure'' all state farms, turning
the land over to private use, or to joint-venture enterprise.

the new policy has caused ugly scenes. in the lower limpopo
region of gaza province (in the south), peasants have
demonstrated against private farmers moving in.

in maputo province (also in the south), peasants claimed they
were being forced off their land by ''lomaco'' a joint-venture,
between the state and british multinational ''lonrho''.

''peasant farmers can't understand why the land they were
kicked from in colonial times, and were kept off, because of the
state farms, is now being given over to private individuals and
foreign companies,'' explains simeao cambaco, agro-economist of
the national lands registration department.

state farms were initially formed from land abandoned by
colonial owners after independence, and then expanded, pushing
peasants further off the best land.

the government now has a two-pronged strategy to redistribute
state-run land, with the aim of increasing production, according
to pedro chaves, an agro-economist with the ministry of
agriculture.

land suitable for annual crops, like maize, should be used to
encourage emergence of a national class of private farmers,
while long-term and exoprt crops, like tea, tobacco and coconut,
should be offered to large-scale investors.

peasant rights are meant to be protected under a 1987 law
which says all users of the land (still owned by the state) need
a ''land-use title deed''.

peasant farmers (employing only unpaid, family labour on no
more than 1.2 ha each) have automatic right to a title deed. all
they need is two witnesses to prove they always farmed on the
land, and the right is theirs for life.

private farmers must apply for ''empty'' land and they can
get a land use concession for up to 50 years. all unregistered
land is considered empty, even if peasants are living there.

about 1,037 land use titles have been issued to peasant
farmers for less than 300,000 ha of land, while 69 private
farmers had laid claim to over 900,000 ha.

thousands of peasants have already lost the chance to claim
''their'' land. war has displaced some 4.5 million people from
their homes, leaving the land empty and wide open to private
interest. (end/ips/rw/apc/ar/92)


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