Cape Town - The Democratic Alliance on Friday said more time was needed for public comment on the Agricultural Land Bill.
In a statement on Friday, DA MP Annette Steyn called upon the government to give the public more time to comment on the Bill on Preservation and Development of Agricultural Land Framework.
Steyn said she had written to the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Senzeni Zokwana, to urgently request that the deadline for public comment on the Bill was extended.
The deadline for public comment for the bill is May 30 and Steyn said the one-month period the public have had to provide their views was insufficient.
Steyn said that if passed into law without sufficient input from South Africans, the consequences could be far-reaching.
“It is a seriously problematic Bill that will cause further havoc in the agricultural sector,” Steyn said.
Highlighting what she termed problem areas, Steyn pointed to a part of the Bill which stated: “As the custodian of the nation’s agricultural land, the Department [of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries] may approve, reject, control, administer and manage any rezoning or subdivision of agricultural land.”
The Bill, she said, further stated that should the land not be used for agricultural means within a certain time-frame, the Minister could expropriate the land.
The bill states: “A farmer must - (a) actively use and develop the agricultural land concerned to its optimal agricultural potential, with due regard to the farming enterprise concerned, and if not used at all for agricultural purposes for 3 consecutive years, the Minister may consider the agricultural land concerned for expropriation at a lower price than would be paid for similar land in the same geographical area.”
Pointing to government’s “poor track record” of managing national resources, Steyn said “it cannot be in the interests of the emerging and commercial agricultural sectors for this Bill to be passed”.
“Government interference on this scale in the agricultural sector undermines the freedom of emerging and commercial farmers to actively pursue opportunities to develop their businesses in a stable economic environment,” Steyn said.
Given the gravity of what these clauses within the Bill signified, she added: “The public needs to be given more time to properly engage, comment and recommend alternatives to the proposals in this Bill.”
ANA