Posted on 07/03/2002 9:46:24 AM PDT by Clive
Johannesburg - Zimbabwe has a 75% "food gap" - one of the highest in the world, Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Tony Leon said upon his return from a fact-finding mission on Tuesday.
The gap is defined as a shortfall between the provision of the minimum nutrition required for the population and the food at hand.
"This famine will not contain itself within the borders of Zimbabwe," Leon told reporters in Johannesburg.
He said a United Nations World Food Programme official told him the 75% food gap was one of the highest recorded in world history.
The South African government needed to look ahead and put contingency plans in place because the food shortages would soon start impacting on South Africa.
"People are moving out of the urban areas somewhere else because there is no food there," Leon said.
"I think the impact on us is going to be immense ... If we continue with our policy on the one hand and their policy on the other, we are facing big, big problems."
Leon, DA land affairs spokesman Dan Maluleke, rural safety spokesperson Andries Botha, and Nick Clelland-Stokes embarked on a two-day fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe and met commercial and small farmers, South African property owners, the UN and farmworkers.
They also visited farms occupied by so-called war veterans in Mazoe Valley and in Bindura, north of Harare.
Leon said the South African government should protect South Africans who own farms and businesses in the neighbouring country.
"South Africa should stand up for the commercial and property rights of its own citizens."
Sixty-two percent of all commercial farms in Zimbabwe have been served with Section 8 Land Act notices, making farming activity on those farms a criminal offence on pain of imprisonment.
"There are 2 900 commercial farmers willing and ready to produce, but they are told to seize farming. At the same time, the Zimbabwean government is asking for international food aid. I really can't understand that," Maluleke said.
Leon said it was impossible for any importer of basic commodities to sell their products.
"The government sets prices at a level completely unrelated to market conditions but forces importers to bring their goods into Zimbabwe on a parallel rate.
"In the case of salt, the cost of importing it has gone up as much as 100% during the past two months while the controlled selling price has not risen."
Clelland-Stokes said it was an eye-opener to "actually be there and see for yourself" what was happening.
"There are orchids laden with fruit, but farmers will be criminally prosecuted if they pick the fruit from the trees. It's an entire waste."
Remember Whitey, the blood will be on your hands. It’s all the result of colonialism… somehow…
Owl_Eagle
”Guns Before Butter.”
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