Emerging Black commercial farmers in Sakhisizwe local municipality area of South Africa: obstacles and opportunities

Recent political transformation in South Africa has laid the basis for significant socioeconomic change. This change has included the emergence of black commercial farmers. Through a case study of the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa (Elliot commercial farming areas), the obstacles and opportunities facing emerging Black commercial farmers were examined. The objective of the paper is to examine the prospects and challenges faced by emerging black commercial farmers in the municipality of Sakhisizwe. To this end, the paper considers the circumstances of the emerging Black commercial farmers who benefited from the local government support facility rolled out under the land reform programme. The land reform programme for agricultural development sought to build a class of Black commercial farmers in an attempt to deracialise the agricultural sector and also achieve more comprehensive agrarian reform in rural South Africa. The study established that emerging black commercial farmers in Elliot were engaged in both crop farming and livestock farming. As the paper illustrates, considerable problems confront the agricultural sector. Measures need to be put in place to enhance the existing base and, more importantly, to encourage the participation of this group of farmers given that they had hitherto long been denied access to this primary means of production. The challenges faced by the emerging Black commercial farmers include lack of marketing opportunities, limited government support and poor networking. KEYWORDS : Emerging, black farmers, commercial, South Africa, agrarian reform, land