Farm mentoring project reaps new success in the country
John Davids, reports allafrica.com, is a rare land reform success story in an equally uncommon partnership with white farmers among hundreds of failed government attempts to close the racial divide in commercial farming.
According to the allAfrica.com report, the stockman's brawny, reddish bull took top prize at an agricultural show for South Africa's new black farmers. "It was always my dream," said 53-year-old Davids, whose group farms 1500 hectares (3700 acres) in scenic hills of Napier, two hours east of Cape Town. "My life has really changed. In my wildest dreams that I dreamed, my life has completely changed. I cannot go back. I am a shareholder of two farms."
Unlike the violent seizures of white farms in neighbouring Zimbabwe, South Africa buys farms on the open market to hand to blacks to reverse one of apartheid's most visible and emotionally charged legacies.
According to the allAfrica.com report, the Agri Dwala project now has 29 beneficiaries, some of whom permanently farm six properties with a profit - but the new farmers here have no illusions about easy wealth...
For more:
- allAfrica.com: Farm Mentoring Project Reaps New Success in the Country
