Siseko Njobeni

Trade and Industry Correspondent

WHITE farmers and companies stand to benefit from black economic empowerment in agriculture (AgriBEE), says a representative of the National African Farmers Union.

"AgriBEE is voluntary and incentive-driven. This will benefit farmers and companies that choose to help black farmers," said Bigman Maloa, the union representative on the government-appointed AgriBEE steering committee.

Maloa was speaking at the union’s national agricultural summit in Pretoria yesterday.

Government efforts to accelerate black economic empowerment in agriculture have been met with mixed feelings, with mainly black farmers applauding it, while white commercial farmers have expressed reservations about several of the targets.

Targets proposed in the AgriBEE framework document released last year by Agriculture Minister Thoko Didiza include the transfer of 30% of farmland to black owners by 2014.

"What Maloa says is consistent to what we are telling white commercial farmers," said Grain SA manager for strategic development and member of the steering committee John Purchase.

"There are benefits for all in black economic empowerment. That is why we embrace the policy. But what has been tricky has been how it is going to be implemented."

He said commercial farmers were anxious about the implications of black economic empowerment on their individual farms.

Purchase said most farms were run as small, medium and micro enterprises passed from one generation to the other.

"Most of them employ between five to 30 farmworkers. So they are worried about things such as equity.

"But we hope that the trade and industry department’s black economic empowerment codes of conduct will clarify these issues."

He said Grain SA had raised its concerns about black economic empowerment in the AgriBEE steering committee.

Meanwhile, union president Motsepe Matlala was yesterday quoted on a Johannesburg radio station as saying until government took black farmers more seriously, land reform would continue at a slow pace.

Matlala said union members were frustrated at being constantly overlooked in government’s transformation programmes.

"I think there is more that can be done to assist emerging black farmers in the area of agriculture. People must begin to understand that the black farmers have not been subsidised like the current commercial agriculture," he said.