Hunger for farmland among female farmers in Limpopo Province: bodies, violence and land

abstract

This article explores intersections between women’s bodies, violence and land amongst female farmers in Limpopo Province, South Africa. We explore how female farmers negotiate access to land through their own agency and resistance on a daily basis by analysing their narratives and experiences in their quest to access and use land for farming. Based largely on ethnographic interviews and observations the article argues that women’s involvement in farming should be considered not only as an economic survival strategy, but also as an indication of how the female farmers express resistance and agency in their pursuit to acquire land for farming. This article contributes to the body of literature that explores the relationship between women’s bodies, violence and access to land but does so by focusing on land redistribution and some of the challenges it poses to women of different backgrounds and degrees of social power and influence. The paper make four recommendations about how the government can improve its focus on female farmers and get to grips with gender mainstreaming and needs.

keywords:

• Land redistribution
• farming
• gender mainstreaming
• women’s bodies
• Limpopo Province

ORCID

Esther Makhetha http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5143-4963

Tim Hart http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0463-9947

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the financial support of the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform (DRDLR) and the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) who supported the Land Use Needs Assessment and the Land Hunger project from which this research draws its evidence and conclusions. We acknowledge the contributions of colleagues in the Economic Performance Development unit and fieldworkers who worked on the project or helped with our thinking about the article, in particular the project leader Leslie Bank. We also acknowledge the valuable insights of Jeanne Prinsloo, Songca Prinsloo and Maureen Tong and two anonymous peer reviewers. This is our own original work and the views expressed do not reflect those of any other party.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Esther Makhetha

ESTHER MAKHETHA is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Graduate School of Business Leadership, University of South Africa (UNISA). She holds the following qualifications: Baccalaureus degree in Consumer Science (University of Pretoria, South Africa), MSc Research, Agricultural and Food Economics (University of Reading, United Kingdom), and PhD (University of Pretoria, South Africa). Her research interests include mining: artisanal and small-scale mining, commercial mining, gender, land needs and land use. Email: [email protected]

Tim Hart

TIM HART is a Senior Research Project Manager at the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) in Pretoria and a Doctoral candidate at the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Stellenbosch University, South Africa. His areas of interest and research include social and cultural dynamics of rural development, food security, agriculture along with gender dynamics, identity and culture in the conceptualisation, design and implementation of development policy. Email: [email protected]