Land reform is necessary in South Africa, but that is about the only issue regarding land reform on which there is consensus. When we start unpacking why land reform is necessary, some people say it is because the majority of South Africans were disenfranchised and disempowered through years of colonial conquest, segregation and apartheid, while others will argue that it is to contribute to economic growth or to alleviate poverty and achieve greater income equality. Some even think it is to put agriculture on a more sustainable growth path.

Then the arguments start, because these objectives do not necessarily represent a positive sum game: we don’t all believe we can achieve one of these objectives without any detriment to the others.

What is clear, though, is that the more recent proposals on Expropriation without Compensation are a red herring, largely because they ignore the importance of property rights and their contribution to a stable financial and economic system.

In this regard, this monograph contains a collection of the essays that we have published in Business Day during the course of 2018, with the intention of shedding some light on these contested land reform issues in South Africa. The first four essays highlight the lessons learned with agricultural land reform internationally and also the expensive lessons we have learned here in South Africa over the 24 years of failed land reform. One of the critical lessons is that we have failed to implement the recommendations made in the early 1990s about the role of the State in the land reform process.

By Wandile Sihlobo and Johann Kirsten, Co-published by AgBIZ and Stellenbosch University