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GAME INDUSTRY TRENDS ANALYSIS 2024
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Expropriation Bill Sparks Concerns On Land Reform, Food Security
Expropriation Bill sparks concerns on land reform, food security
By Octavia Avesca Spandiel | 24 January 2025 | 4:36 pm
The Expropriation Bill has reignited discussions on land reform and its potential impacts on food security, property rights, and agricultural productivity. This follows its signing into law by President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday, 23 January, concluding a two-decade-long effort to address historical land injustices.
The new law repeals the pre-democratic Expropriation Act of 1975 and sets out specific conditions and processes for expropriating land, including provisions for awarding nil compensation in certain circumstances.
While government has lauded the bill as a step forward in land reform, the agriculture sector and other stakeholders remain cautious about its implications.
Implementation and constitutional compliance
Speaking to Farmer’s Weekly, Annelize Crosby, head of legal intelligence at Agbiz, said that while the Expropriation Bill explicitly allowed for expropriation without compensation, it should still adhere to constitutional provisions, specifically the requirement for compensation to be just and equitable.
“This legislation needs to comply with the provisions of the Constitution and specifically the requirement that compensation must be just and equitable,” she said.
Crosby added expropriation should be a measure of last resort, with no compensation being offered only in exceptional circumstances that could be fully justified.
“If there are going to be attempts to now expropriate property, farming property, on a large scale with offers of no compensation, that will obviously send a negative [message to] the sector, which could have repercussions,” she said.
Food security concerns
Concerns over food security have also come to the fore. However, Crosby said it was premature to make any sort of conclusions on how the law would impact food security at this point in time. “We will need to wait and see how this gets implemented,” she added.
“I don’t think there are any particular measures in place to ensure that the land gets used productively,” Crosby said.
According to her, there was a need for proper financing mechanisms, blended financing programmes, and collaboration between the private sector and farmers to maintain agricultural output.
She explained that without such safeguards, the risk of losing productivity on expropriated land could undermine food security.
Misconceptions about the bill
Crosby addressed misconceptions about the scope of the Expropriation Bill: “It is important to note that the Expropriation Bill is only the tool through which the expropriation takes place.”
She added that the bill itself did not, in itself, grant the power to expropriate agricultural land for land reform purposes. Instead, such power was provided through other legislation, such as the Restitution of Land Rights Act (No. 22 of 1994) and the Labour Tenants Act (No. 3 of 1996), which require valid claims and adherence to specific conditions.
Litigation and compensation challenges
Wandile Sihlobo, chief economist at Agbiz, spoke about the importance of ensuring fairness in the application of the law. The cost of litigation for landowners who resisted expropriation remained a key concern. While mediation was part of the process, unresolved disputes often led to court battles.
“Although the new Expropriation Act now explicitly allows R nil compensation to be awarded in certain circumstances, the end result must be just and equitable,” Sihlobo said.
He added that ‘R nil compensation’ involved a careful calculation of all relevant factors to strike a balance between the public interest and the rights of affected landowners.
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