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Poor white settlements springing up

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Not applicable
With settlements mushrooming there is going to be a bigger and bigger drain on the economy. It seems there is only one solution Have government land available in countries throughout the world for people to farm on for purposes of survival. Poor people should not have to buy the land, but could lease it or pay over part of their crops for rental.This idea is partly inspired by hearing that in Mozambique one can apply for land without having to buy it and that South Africans go there to farm.
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30 REPLIES 30
HateGauteng
Super Contributor
SA with 13% of the land arable is a k@K place to farm! Its one way of making the poor poorer. Agric has always been touted as a place to dump the unemployed but a lack of skills and inputs combined with beliefs that are perpetuated by unqualified people doing development work makes this the most unfeasible option. At the end of the day, its the environment that suffers the most.
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Not applicable
My suggestion is have crops that are easy to grow (eg industrial hemp) In Russia where ignorant peasants farmed the government used to tell them where to put produce to be collected. According to Reader's Digest when the Soviet Union collapsed food was left to rot on the ground. I people are told what crops to grow, crops are collected, etc, it seems it could work
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
Soviet agric is one of the worlds worst environmental disasters. Agric produce like everything else is determined by market forces not governments. Farming is for qualified people, just take a look next door at Zim and see what happened when unqualified people were dumped on the land.
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Not applicable
I have talked to some hobos in Port Elizabeth and some have told they know how to farm. They have described various farming solutions and I believe many would be successful
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
As I mentioned: Beliefs, everyone thinks they can farm until the first pest/disease outbreak, black frost, drought, price fluctuation, etc. I'm sure those guys could also design rockets, fly planes, etc if you asked them.
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Not applicable
Many of them have at some time helped out on farms
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
The first question to ask is: "What are the three major mineral nutrients, that is largely supplied by fertilisers, that a plant needs to grow?" (Organic is a belief!)
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Not applicable
They could be told about crop rotation, putting nitrogen back into the soil, letting ground lie fallow, getting earthworms to aerate the soil, what kills the worms (too much artificial fertilizer), etc
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
What they gonna eat in the meantime? All of that takes time and energy and most likely the hungry okes won't recover the energy they put into growing the crop from what they get out of it.
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Not applicable
Many have informed that one can survive with a small patch of land. Have some fowls, grow vegetables, etc. Many have survived on a small piece of land. I have heard that many Chinese do this
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SimonPB
Valued Contributor
an then drought comes and the crop fails .. then what ??
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grommet
Regular Contributor
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grommet
Regular Contributor
i am a farmer no drought still in the *****per
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Not applicable
Have heard that throughout the world the small family farm has been a comparatively good model. Chinese families have survived through the ages, many with only small pieces of land
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
Population growth doesn't make this feasible any more. As population grows, that little piece of land gets smaller and smaller and then BANG! A good example is Ruwanda and Burundi in the 90s.
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Not applicable
Population growth is certainly a big problem, but looking around there seems to be a lot of unused land. Population growth is an old problem and Genesis 36:7 says:Their possessions were too great for them to remain together;the land where they were staying could not support the because of their livestock. Growing plants to eat is more efficient than growing cows, sheep, etc.
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HateGauteng
Super Contributor
This depends on local conditions. If not enough water, soil depth or land too rocky, etc then better to produce livestock. Putting such areas under the plow leaves it more denuded and impoverished than before.
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fusion12321
Frequent Contributor
eddie i will give u a 5hectare plot in the karoo. u can keep some fowls and smoke some hemp. would u mind if we film it for a reality series ??
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Not applicable
There is only one key to all these problems - Education. We should have a 1000 free trade learning colleges in this country where you can learn anything from brick laying to plastering, from welding to iron work. The bulk of the people in SA have no savvy, BUT, they can work with their hands. Telkom, Spoornet, Eskom all use to teach you trades. That died as we know and because of this it increased the amount of workless people. If you want to fix this country, build centres where people can learn trades.
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