Minister's racist view underpins agricultural policy

Government will make R1bn available for support to emerging farmers, the SABC reported on Wednesday. (from News24)

Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson said 2 000 land reform beneficiaries and 1 000 extension officers would be trained. She said broad-based black economic empowerment would also be monitored.

"We have, with the industry stakeholders launched the Agri BEE charter council to monitor and report on BBBEE initiatives.

"Not enough has been done to monitor BBBEE in agriculture and this will be intensified and monitored with scrutiny."

The government wanted to tap into the goodwill that existed among white commercial farmers to help grow the black farming sector, she said.

Speaking at the end of debate in the National Assembly on her department's budget vote, she warned it was wrong to label white commercial farmers as "the enemy". (Too late, she's already let it slip?)

"We must work together to do more. We will listen to all stakeholders. We will listen to those who have competence and skills. We do not have the luxury of time to reinvest in these.

"There are historically advantaged commercial farmers who have the knowledge and who have the know-how. And there is goodwill among white commercial farmers. There is goodwill; they want to help.

"It is tapping into that goodwill that is important, and not to always blame and label white commercial farmers as the enemy. There are patriotic white South Africans who want to help this country," she told MPs.

Government would work together with farmers who believed their collective future lay in South Africa, but not with those who were "condescending, patronising and racist" in nature.

"We are going to need... [farmers who] will share the risk of failure. If a farm collapses, it is going to be the responsibility of both white and black white farmers to address the failure," she said

The goodwill the minister crows about was all dribbled into the dry dusty earth by one Lulu Xingwana. It will take more than just saying that "they are not the enemy" to get that trust back. Does it matters to you what the colour of the skin of the person growing your food is? It matters to the minister. That is the racist foundation of the minister's approach. I will see you as black and white, but will not work with anyone who is "condescending and racist"? The minister just turned her back on South African farmers investing in the rest of Africa in a "condescending, patronising and rascist manner". These are farmers heading INTO Africa, so how does that make them rascist? To see a hypocrit the minister need only look in a mirror.