Govt intensifies land redistribution programme

Xingwana says more skills expertise are needed in agriculture

The government plans to redistribute an additional five-million hectares of land in the next two years.

Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Lulu Xingwana, said this while launching the Land and Agrarian Reform Project at Rawsonville near Worcester in the Boland.

She says most of the farming land is still in white hands and government plans to increase the number of black entrepreneurs in the agricultural sector by 10% by 2009.

She has also announced that a special fund will be established to assist farm dwellers and to set up a register of all farmers.

Farm workers in the area, Non governmental organisations (NGO's) and a small group of white farmers are attending the launching.