Rural Development and Agrarian Reform Service Delivery Highlights

Welcome to the Department of Rural Development and Agrarian Reform Service Delivery Highlights. This is one among the many platforms we employ to converse with you on service delivery matters. I hope the information contained in this issue will excite you.
One of the distinct features of this department, that I have the honour to lead, is its strict adherence to the values of openness, responsiveness and accountability. We are also a government that continues to place a high premium on evidence-based policy and decision-making.
It is in this context that on quarterly bases we are presenting these Service Delivery Highlights to the people of the Eastern Cape. We give these Highlights right after the presentation of the policy speech which was highlighting the departmental commitments going forward. Right in the arrival to this department, we committed to do significant work to undermine unemployment, poverty and inequality which most affect the people of our province. Without a doubt, greening our province with play a significant role in the changing the situation for the better.
Through these highlights, we give honest account of our work. We seek to hide nothing. We are honest about what has been achieved, working in partnership with the rest of society. We are equally honest about the challenges that lie
ahead. Whereas we give account, we equally have done further planning to provide a reliable basis upon which we have identified gaps and anchor future interventions to build a province of our dreams; a province that we can all be proud
to call “Home of Legends”.
Department of Rural Development and Agrarian Reform, which draws its mandate from the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, applicable policies, legislations, National and Provincial Development plans, ANC manifesto is mandated to implement progressive rural development, land reform and food security programmes. This is done through implementation of rural development focusing on meeting basic needs, land reform and rural enterprise development,
supported by localised markets, credit facilities and economic infrastructure. Critical to this mandate is the increase of investment in agricultural infrastructure in support of smallholder farmer development, prioritising former homeland communal areas, continue to improve the tenure security and administration of people living in communal areas with emphasis on women’s tenure security. The department will continue using its programmes to strengthen support for co-operatives in marketing and supply activities to enable small-scale producers to enter formal value chains and take advantage of economies of scale. This includes targeting public institutions as primary buyers of agricultural goods and support for small-scale producers’ access to municipal markets. At the heart of the programmes of the department
is to expand the Food for All programme as part of the national integrated food and nutrition policy for procuring and distributing affordable essential foodstuffs directly to poor communities to eradicate poverty.
In this term of government, the department will continue with the acceleration of the settlement of remaining land claims submitted before the cut-off date of 1998, re-opening of the period for the lodgment of claims for restitution of land for a
period of five years, which commenced in 2014, codifying the exceptions to the 1913 cut-off date for the descendants of the Khoi and San, and identifying affected heritage sites and historical landmarks, are a national competence that is driven
by the national Rural Development and Agrarian Reform department Programmes of the department are structured
into 8 main programmes named as follows:
Programme 1: Administration
Programme 2: Sustainable Resource Management
Programme 3: Farmer Support and Development
Programme 4: Veterinary Services
Programme 5: Research and Technology Development
Programme 6: Agricultural Economic Services
Programme 7: Structured Agricultural Education and Training
Programme 8: Rural Development
There is, therefore, reason to be optimistic about the future. Work has started to give meaning to our slogan that we are
“Home of Legends”. Right in the work of asserting ourselves as “Home of Legends”, the multi-dimensional activities incorporating economic, social and environmental dimensions to bear on achieving beneficial accelerated, shared and sustainable growth for our province will take shape.