L Xingwana: Address to Gauteng Legislature

19 November 2006

Honourable MEC Khabisi Mosunkutu
Members of the Legislature
Distinguished guests
AboMama
Ladies and gentlemen

For me your invitation to an occasion such as this could not have come at a
better time. It comes when we have just commemorated World Food Day in October.
This year's theme "Investing in agriculture for food security," highlights the
vital role of agriculture in ensuring that all people have sustainable access
to sufficient food of a wide variety to lead active and healthy lives.

Many wage-earning households in this country also engage in supplementary
subsistence production. Agriculture therefore plays a critical role in the
development of the rural and urban areas as well as in improving the
livelihoods of all South Africans. As we speak, worldwide there are 852 million
people who are food insecure. Regrettably, of this number, 14 million are in
this country.

According to the Chief Executive of the New Partnership for Africa's
Development (NEPAD) Secretariat, Professor Firmino Mucavele, in Africa there
has been an increase of the hungry from 176 million to 210 million in the past
two years. This is attributed to the population growing faster than the rate of
increase in food production and availability.

In the light of the importance of food security in the nation's development,
and the overall goal of improved welfare of the population, this Government
places high priority on several national and local policies and programmes
which outline a coherent ultimate goal to raise the nutritional levels of the
population, particularly the more vulnerable members of our society.

Owing to all these interventions, prioritisation of the role of women in
Agriculture is recognised as a viable option for direct economic growth in the
rural areas. This is all the more reason why we recently launched the Women in
Agriculture and Rural Development (WARD) initiative in East London. This will
culminate in an international conference for women in April next year in
Durban. We are already in the planning stages for this conference to ensure its
success. Some of the ethos of this body is to see to it that in each and every
district:

* Women take a lead to participate in agricultural production, value-adding
processing, marketing and business development.
* Youth and people with disabilities are enabled to participate in local
economic development. This involves providing facilities and funding for their
projects and programmes.
* Rural communities are organised to work in groups or co-operatives so that
they can enjoy the associated benefits such as bulk-buying discounts,
co-ordinated marketing and so on.
* Practically focused sustainable projects and programmes that improve the
quality of life of our rural communities. This must lead to job creation and
poverty alleviation.

Ladies and gentlemen, in this way we will be able to stop wholesale urban
migration because there are no jobs in these areas. This is evidenced by the
growing number of squatters in our towns, where our people remain unemployed
and mired in poverty. WARD must be a mass movement that galvanises our rural
people for socio-economic freedom. It must be a vehicle for socioeconomic
empowerment, capacity-building, training and equipping our people. To ensure
that this comes to fruition, we recently held a Lekgotla in Benoni where top
management from Land Affairs and Agriculture, Land Claims Commissioners and
Chief Executive Officers of state-owned enterprises such as the Land Bank,
Agricultural Research Council, National Agricultural Marketing Council and
Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) agreed that there is a need to work
cohesively.

This, in turn, would lead to accelerated service delivery in areas of
agricultural research, agricultural funding and development. It was at this
very same Lekgotla where we launched the Ilima / Letsema campaign. The ethos of
this campaign is working together to liberate ourselves from the oppression of
poverty; working together to produce food; to build a house thereby providing
shelter for the family; working together to obtain firewood for energy; working
together to guide our children as they grow; and working together to defend our
freedom and working together to build this nation. What is important about
Letsema is the spirit that it embodies.

The spirit of togetherness

The cardinal rule of the Letsema campaign is that no land shall ever be left
to lie fallow!

Ladies and gentlemen, the Letsema campaign cannot be implemented in
isolation. That is why the past couple of months have been hectic for me and my
department. Without trying to reinvent the wheel so to speak, we had to put
greater emphasis on service delivery, especially in the empowerment of women in
general.

In this regard, we have handed back land to its rightful owners in the
Northern Cape, the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, North West, Mpumalanga
and Gauteng. The department has also developed detailed business plans for
identified Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (AsgiSA)
projects.

These include five key areas: livestock development, establishment of new
and rehabilitation of existing irrigation schemes, bio-fuels, land
rehabilitation and the development of agricultural development corridors.

For the first time I also recently met with the Agri-Black Economic
Empowerment (BEE) Steering Committee. The process of finalising the Charter is
on track. As we speak, this Charter is with the Portfolio Committee. As soon as
they have gone through it, I will hand it over to the Minister of Trade and
Industry for gazzetting. Rest assured that this process is also being
fast-tracked.

Ladies and gentlemen, government is in the process of eliminating the
injustices of the past to make it as easy as possible for new entrants to
participate as equals in this sector. We have introduced farmer development
programmes, land and agrarian reform, agricultural finance through
Micro-Agricultural Finance Scheme of South Africa (Mafisa) and the Land Bank,
as well as marketing and trade opportunities through negotiations with the
World Trade Organisation (WTO), the European Union (EU), Mercado Comun Del Sur
(MERCOSUR), South African Customs Union (SACU) and so on.

Fellow women, when an opportunity presents itself, you grab it with both
hands. Government is doing all it can for all of us. It is incumbent upon us to
take advantage of all these opportunities. As J G Holland said, "God gives
every bird its food, but He does not throw it into its nest."

Ladies and gentlemen, on a more sombre note, it is again that period of the
year when we remind South Africans of all persuasions that the scourge of
violence against women and children is an abomination.

According to Health 24, one thing that South Africans cannot boast about is
their alarming statistics of a quarter of all children have or will be sexually
abused before the age of eighteen and that as many as one in every four women
in this country is abused by her husband. In a normal society this would be
disturbing. But in this country we seem to accept it even if we do not condone
it.

Again, Health 24 says South Africa is one of the countries with the highest
incidence of sexual abuse in the world. However, the exact number of cases is
hard to pinpoint as sexual abuse goes largely unreported.

People against Women Abuse states, "We all experience trauma, stress, anger
and fear, but an abusive man chooses to abuse as a way of dealing with his pain
or problems. He uses excuses to avoid taking responsibility for his behaviour.
Frequently, he tries to blame the woman for the abuse by saying she is a bad
partner, a bad mother, that she provokes him or asks for it. Because it is hard
to live with him, he tries to make her feel that she would not survive without
him. He can control his violence but he chooses to control her instead." Does
this sound familiar?

Perhaps what is more disturbing are reports indicating that social crimes or
abuses are committed among people known to each other. What is even more
disturbing is the increase in family killings where a father wipes out an
entire household for one reason or the other.

What is also alarming is to read about a man who has abused children of ages
ranging from five to fourteen over a number of years and got away with a
suspended sentence. What does this say to paedophiles and other such monsters?
Let us say no to abuse. Let us pledge our support for this campaign and help to
stamp out the rampant scourge of rape and abuse of women and children.

I thank you.

Issued by: Department of Agriculture
19 November 2006
Source: Department of Agriculture (http://www.nda.agric.za/)