Hon Chairperson, hon Ministers, hon Deputy Ministers who are present here, hon members, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the Inkatha Freedom Party I am proud to stand in this House and deliver this speech on Budget Vote No 26.
The Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries is tasked with the responsibility of ensuring food security in South Africa. It is tasked with the solemn obligation of keeping our population well fed.
On the note of food security, we further advise that we are totally against any kind of genetically modified food crops in South Africa. We call for the immediate banning of same from our soil. Eight national governments in the European Union have already banned the cultivation of Monsanto's MON810 maize and other forms of genetically modified organisms in their countries. There is clearly something wrong with genetically modified foods. Why do we continue to allow their proliferation in South Africa?
In addition, the department must ensure that we have surplus food products to export to our less fortunate neighbours on the continent and around the world. The department is performing its task admirably, but there are still many challenges.
Job losses due to failure of farms that were restored to emerging farmers is one such challenge. In this regard we call for additional departmental intervention in the form of training at these farms in order to ensure their future success.
The promise of providing rural communities with tractors in order to plough their fields is not meeting the current demand. The method of distribution of these tractors also remains questionable. Challenges remain in the distribution, management, servicing and monitoring of this equipment.
In KwaZulu-Natal we have witnessed many cases of tractors and equipment standing idle in the fields or at the department's regional offices as they have broken down. They have stood in this state of disrepair for such a long time that the grass has already covered them. We have seen and heard of the same thing in the Free State. Tractors are in such a state of disrepair that they are left in these departmental fields, and this results in far greater damage than just gathering dust.
Our subsistence farmers miss their ploughing seasons. In my constituency there are farms that are lying fallow. These are state farms that were providing employment to 500 workers and supporting about 5 000 dependants. These farms should have been leased to competent farmers so as to stabilise production and provide jobs to the surrounding communities.
In Makhathini Flats the entire investment in farming by the department was wasted. The infrastructure of the irrigation scheme is no longer operational. The promise of job opportunities in these areas was a dream to local communities, but now they are a recurring nightmare. The money spent was like pouring water down the drain.
I also wish to raise an issue that has recently been reported in our local and international media, namely the use of the meat of various animals that were found in the fridges our retail shops, improperly labelled and/or unlabelled. Sausages and boerewors have been found to contain meat from horses, donkeys and other animals. I am not mentioning this because I look down upon those foodstuffs, but because customers are entitled to know what they are paying for and eating.
Cross-border poaching continues to erode our livestock. Additionally, the cheap imports of chickens from Brazil, Australia and China are destroying our poultry industry and resulting in domestic job losses. Although we are a co-operative government, it seems there is no co-ordination between or oversight by national and provincial government. As such, national government is unable effectively to follow up on how funds they have allocated to provinces are spent.
Our biggest problem as the portfolio committee is that the Minister never attends our meetings. [Applause.] This limits our oversight to the administrative section only. One wonders whether the Minister has an attitude problem towards Parliament. [Applause.] Our porous borders have a negative impact on our livestock. Firstly, cross- border stock theft happens with impunity because, once the livestock cross the border into Mozambique or Lesotho, our police can no longer recover it. Secondly, livestock animals from neighbouring countries, especially those which are infected by diseases such as foot-and-mouth, are brought across our borders and they spread these diseases locally. In spite of all that I have said, the IFP would like to support the Budget Vote. [Time expired.] [Applause.]