Analysis - South African smallholders are abandoning farming. The decline in field cultivation is a problem, since many of these smallholder households struggle to make ends meet. If people were able to produce more of their own food this would improve their lives.
farming. The decline in field cultivation is a problem, since many of these smallholder households struggle to make ends meet. If people were able to produce more of their own food this would improve their lives.
In addition, two key events had a negative impact on farming in the villages I studied:"betterment" and cattle deaths. The simultaneous loss of cattle and urban jobs caused a downturn in farming and made it impossible for most households to purchase new animals. Government-sponsored programmes in the past 20 years have aimed to reverse the decline in agricultural engagement, mainly by subsidising fertilisers and genetically modified or hybrid maize seeds. The assumption is that these inputs are the key to increased agricultural production. But the new seeds cannot be replanted or legally shared, so people must buy them every year. This undermines the way households help each other with seeds.
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