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TheZimbabwean | 11 November 2010 FEATURE ON THURSDAY 17

BY IAN SCOONES

One o the recurrent mythsabout Zimbabwes landreorm is that invest-

ment has been insignifcantin the new resettlements: theland lies idle, people are notcommitted to arming andinrastructure is destroyed,neglected or non-existent.

Perceptions o a lack oorder and poor tenure secu-rity have urther contributedto this view. Our studies inMasvingo province haveshown this is ar rom thecase. Certainly, unstable mac-roeconomic actors until 2009undermined opportunities orcapital investment, but impres-sive strides have been made inclearing the land, in purchas-ing livestock, equipment andtransport and in building newsettlements.

Starting fromscratch

In developing their arms,most new armers have hadto start rom scratch. For themost part the Masvingo studysites were ranches: largeexpanses o bush grazing,

with limited inrastructure.There were scattered home-

steads, a ew workers cot-tages, the odd dip tank, smalldam and irrigation plot, butnot much else. When groupso land invaders took the landthey established base camps,under the leadership o warveteran commanders. Surveyso soil types and water sourceswere undertaken by the landinvaders.

The new settlers then peggedfelds and marked out areas orsettlement. Soon, once the of-cial Fast Track Land ReormProgramme was launched,

ofcials rom the governmentarrived and imposed an of-cial plan, based on land useplanning regulations, as wellas much pressure to accom-modate more people. Somehad to move their shelters and

clear felds anew. But within a

remarkably short time, peoplebegan to invest in earnest.

There was an urgency:felds had to be prepared orplanting, structures had to be

built or cattle to be kraaledin, granaries had to be erectedor the harvests to be stored,and homes had to be put upor growing numbers o peo-ple to live in.

A peopled landscape ohouses, felds, paths androads soon emerged. Humanpopulation densities increasedsignifcantly and livestockpopulations grew. Stockingdensities on bee ranches wererecommended to be aroundone animal per 10 hectares;now much larger livestockpopulations exist, combin-ing cattle with goats, sheep,donkeys, pigs and poultry.Investment in stock has beensignifcant, with cattle popu-

lations in particular growingrapidly, especially in the A1sites.

One o the major tasks acingnew settlers has been clearingland. In A1 village sites, onaverage each household had

cleared 6.8ha by 2008-09,

while in A1 sel-contained andA2 sites an average o 13.3haand 23.7ha had been cleared.In the A1 sites most o thiswas being cultivated. In addi-tion, people have constructednumerous gardens, all owhich have required invest-ment in encing. In addition,people have dug wells, builtsmall dams, planted trees anddug soil conservation works.Investment in felds was com-plemented by investment inarm equipment, with ploughs,cultivators and scotch cartspurchased in numbers.

Building has also been

extensive in the new reset-tlements. Some structuresremain built o pole and mud,however, ater a year or two,when peoples sense o tenuresecurity had increased, build-ings using bricks, cement andtin/asbestos roofng increased.Some very elaborate homeshave been built with the very

best materials imported romSouth Arica.

Transport has been a majorconstraint on the new resettle-ments. With no roads and poorconnections to urban areas,there were oten no orms opublic transport available.This was compounded bythe economic crisis, as manyoperators closed down routes.

This had a severe impact.Lack o access to services shops, schools, clinics andmarkets meant that peoplesuered. Investing in a meanso transport was oten a majorpriority. Bicycles in particularwere bought in large num-

bers, but also cars, pick-upsand trucks.

Investing in the landWhat is the value o all thisinvestment? A simple set ocalculations which computethe cost o labour and mate-rials used or the replacementcost o the particular itemshow that, on average, eachhousehold had invested overUS$2000 in a variety o itemsin the period rom settlement

to 2008-09.This is o course only a small

subset o the total. In additionsuch private investment doesnot account or investments atthe community level. Acrossour sites, churches have beenestablished, schools have been

built, roads cut and areas orshops carved out as part ocommunity eorts. Labourand materials have beenmobilised without any exter-nal help.

In the A1 sites in particu-lar this highly-motivated andwell-organised pattern o sel-help has dominated. Whilethe state has been present, ithas not always been helpul.The re-planning o village

and feld sites was resented by

many, as the land use planningmodels dating rom the 1930swere re-imposed, with feldsremoved rom near rivers andstreams and villages placedon the ridges ar rom watersources. Planning laws werealso invoked in the destruc-tion o nascent businesscentres as part o OperationMurambatsvina.

Extension workers are ew-and-ar-between and veteri-nary care almost non-existent.Instead, people have usedtheir own knowledge, skillsand connections in develop-ing their agriculture, oten

relying on those with MasterFarmer qualifcations whichthey had gained in their or-mer homes in the communalareas. Without dipping, theexplosion o tick-borne animaldiseases has been devastating,

but many armers have pur-chased spray-on chemicals,oten organising themselves ingroups to tackle the problem.

External support isnecessarySo without the state, andwithout the projects o donorsand NGOs, the new set-tlers have invested at scale.Extrapolating the results romour sample and or the limitedset o items assessed to the

whole province this adds upto an investment o US$91macross all new resettlements;

a substantial amount by anycalculation.

But is this an argumentthat people can just do it ontheir own, and should belet to their own devices?Emphatically: no. There areplenty o things that need to

be done, and where externalsupport is necessary. In orderto get arming moving in thenew resettlements a signifcantinvestment in inrastructure roads, wells, dams, dips andso on will be needed.

This is unlikely to comerom individual and commu-nity contributions, althoughthe considerable entrepre-neurial initiative and deepcommitment to investmentin the new resettlements is aantastic platorm on which to

build.In the next article we ask if

there is a smallholder agri-

cultural revolution in the

making on the new resettle-

ments and discuss what

needs to be done to get agri-

culture moving.

Zimbabwes land reform: myths and realities

In developing their farms, most new farmers have had to start from scratch.

When peoples sense of tenure security had increased,

buildings using bricks, cement and tin/asbestos roofng

increased.

During the past decade, Zimbabwe has undergone a tumultuous process of land redistribution. The way

forward on the land issue is a challenge facing us all. In an attempt to stimulate constructive national

debate on this vital topic, we are pleased to publish this new series on livelihoods after land reform,

based on a comprehensive 10-year study of the situation on the ground in Masvingo province. This is the

fourth article in the series.

A peopled land-

scape o houses, felds,paths and roads soonemerged

The new settlershave invested atscale

Zimbabwes Land Reform: Myths andRealities published in November 2010 byWeaver Press in Zimbabwe (http://www.weaverpresszimbabwe.com/), Jacana Mediain South Arica (http://www.jacana.co.za/)and James Currey in the rest o the world(http://www.jamescurrey.co.uk/store/viewI-tem.asp?idProduct=13498) (by Ian Scoones,Nelson Marongwe, Blasio Mavedzenge, FelixMurimbarimba, Jacob Mahenehene and

Chrispen Sukume)

Focus of

investmentAverage value of investment per household (US$)

Land clearance $385Housing/buildings $631

Cattle $612

Farm equipment $198

Transport $150

Toilets $77

Garden fencing $29

Wells $79

Total $2161

The value of investment