Special Hearings — Business Hearings — 1997-11-13

MR ERINBURGH: Thank you.  If I may kick off then, the Land Bank is a specialised financial institution.  We serve the agricultural sector.  We operate within the confines of the Land Bank Act.  We are autonomous.  We report to the Minister of Agriculture, which was previously the Minister of Finance.
 Our main object is to promote farming in the Republic of South Africa.  At the time under consideration the Land Bank was legally limited to farmers inside the borders of the RSA and we did not include any farms active in the TBVC states.
 In '59 the Land Bank Act was amended, allowed us to trade on the money and capital market in order to raise our capital.  As a result the land - the rates charged by the Land Bank increased.  External investors became a very important group of stake holders who've taken active interest in the Land Bank's functions.
 Favourable credit ratings have become an important factor for Land Bank in maintaining prices of its market instruments.  We are governed by a board of no more than ten members that traditionally enjoyed great influence over every detailed level of decision making in the past.
 In recent years this has changed to allow management greater discretion, but during the years under consideration the board could be regarded as the prime decision making structure.
 During the '60's the State came to recognise the importance of agricultural finance and developed a clearer market segmentation which saw the Land Bank become responsible for a very specific group of farmers in the agricultural producers and the organisations who were viable but who could not afford commercial credit.  That was the called the category two farmer.
 The State assumed the responsibility for financing the small - early riskier and smaller farmers which was the category three farmer.  This policy only changed in 1995 when the Land Bank agreed to make - to meet the needs of the whole agricultural sector.
 We provide a whole range of financial products, long term, medium term and short term financing.  Historically we also served as a channel for the delivery of Government funds to particular groups as a result of disasters, drought and other causes.
 The Land Bank's involvement in these schemes was to provide the provision of - was limited and the provision of technical services was not one of our fields.  
 If I may hand over to Andre Jansen on this point, please.

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, while the bank is very proud of its status as successful financier, the bank cannot deny that it also has reason to regret certain aspects of its past.
 In the submission to this Committee, the bank admits that its capital spending in the past was not applied to be directly be beneficial to Black people.  The power of the State was used to allocate resources, such as credit along racial line and the bank was indirectly instrumental in preventing Black people to compete in the market for farm land.
 The bank therefore admits, Mr Chairman, that it contributed in creating hardship to the landless Black people.  We recognised today that much could have been done by the bank to support these people.
 The bank acknowledges that it implicated a more direct form of human rights abuses as more fully discussed in the bank's submission to this Committee.
 Mr Chairman, the bank unconditionally apologises for its past inability to alleviate the hardship of the landless Black people.
 Mr Chairman, the bank's personnel policy was previously also discriminatory in terms of race and sex.  The policy was copied from the civil service, using the same type of job creation, remuneration and promotion systems.  
 This led to a personnel corpse consisting mainly of White males in the executive posts with women in a different post and salary structure making up the supportive role and non-White staff filling unskilled or service posts.
 The bank admits that it participated in denying equal opportunities for women and non-White people.  They were committed - accommodated in separate structures with very limited scope for promotions.  In retrospective, Mr Chairman, the bank admits its contribution to the enormous hard done in depriving these people of the opportunities to fully compete in the labour market.
 For these injustices the bank wishes to apologise.