Chairperson, Minister and Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Ministers and Deputy Ministers present especially from the economic cluster, colleagues, chiefs, acting director-general and the team from the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, chairpersons and chief executive officers from entities accounting to the department, Land Bank, whose work, though governed in the National Treasury, is part of the agriculture family, from its inception in 1912 until today, comrades, fellow countrymen and women, colleagues, I have observed all protocols.
We continue to be guided by that beacon of hope crafted 55 years ago, the Freedom Charter, which amongst other things, declared:
The land shall be shared among those who work it! It further continues to say:
Restrictions of land ownership on a racial basis shall be ended, and all the land redivided amongst those who work it to banish famine and land hunger;
The state shall help the peasants with implements, seed, tractors and dams to save the soil and assist the tillers ... People shall not be robbed of their cattle, and forced labour and farm prisons shall be abolished.
After 358 years of colonial rule and 62 years of apartheid rule, the legacies of which are ongoing and which will still be with us for some time, we are, however, making some progress on a number of fronts.
We are informed by the material conditions prevalent at the time with a clear vision of where our revolution is headed. The premier movement for change in South Africa, the ANC, has resolved that 2010 shall indeed be the year of working together to speed up effective service delivery to the people. Enjoined by the January 8 statement of 2010, Commander-in-Chief Jacob Zuma said the following:
We will also make sure that our government officials, who have the responsibility of rural development and agrarian reform, speed up the provision of services to these marginalised communities.
Yet, on the other hand, we have people, both in this Chamber and out there, who are opposed to this vision, to this noble goal of speeding up service delivery to and with the ordinary and marginalised communities. Anyway, what would you expect from organisations led by clumsy and ugly people. Whilst they are busy with policy formulations, who knows if those are not going to be far from the character of the custodians, that is clumsy and ugly.
In reiterating the words of the hon Minister of Defence, Lindiwe Sisulu, all sound-minded individuals are once again reminded to follow the hon Rev Dandala and leave the confusion to those power-hungry, ugly and clumsy ones, whose survival has and continues to be proven to be based on factionalism and divisions, whether in church, sport, in the UDF or in the unions. From time immemorial, the ANC has remained unshaken in its resolve of fighting to free black people in general and Africans in particular from, among other things, hunger and famine.
Agriculture, forestry and fisheries therefore are centres that bring about food to the South African nation first and foremost. With a new department in place and the introduction of an outcomes-based system of government, there has been a realignment of priorities such as leading, supporting and promoting agriculture, forestry and fisheries, resource management through policies, and strategies and programmes to enhance sustainable use; and achieving economic growth, job creation, food security, rural development and transformation.
Given the picture painted above, it becomes imperative that we raise the following facts in the real world we live in. Of the approximately one billion people who go to bed without food every day, 14 million of them are located on our shores in South Africa. Yet, our country's required 9 million tons of grain in this current season has since been surpassed by 4 to 5 million tons, leaving us with a surplus of about 4 million tons. That is capitalism for you at play.
Agriculture, forestry and fisheries contribute 4,4% towards the country's gross domestic product. Alone, agriculture accounts for 5% of the country's total employment figures. Had agriculture, forestry and fisheries been small-scale driven as opposed to a highly capital intensive and mechanised commercial sector, we would be closer to the situations in other developing nations.
Though we support Budget Vote 25, we must hasten to highlight the fact that the challenges mentioned above really need more resources than the R3,7 billion allocated in the financial year 2010-11, a figure that accounts for a mere 0,4% of the total R907 billion Budget.
South Africa was party to the 2003 African Union Maputo summit. Amongst other things, it committed to growing the agriculture budget to 10% of the total country's budget allocations by 2008. One of my colleagues will certainly deal with this matter. This budget is decreased by 11,5% in real terms compared to the R3,9 billion of the total combined budget of the three sectors in the financial year 2009-10. To further illustrate the above, this is worrisome state of affairs considering the fact that agriculture's budget declined in 2007-08 by 1%, to 0,3% in the current financial year. We must walk the talk. In other words, Minister, when we say, that we prioritise food security, amongst other things, the budget priorities must follow.
Build the African boer! In ensuring food security in our country, we must concentrate on building an African boer from a small-scale farmer to a viable commercial one. The African boer is loyal to South Africa and its people across class, colour and creed. The African boer must, of necessity, care for workers' rights. The African boer must care for the welfare and needs of the workers. That African boer does not have a skin colour. Therefore that African boer can be either an ET or a JM. [Laughter.]
We hold the view that says there is no one who will or must shoot anyone. That African boer must always proudly hoist our South African flag everywhere. In protecting these African boers, we all have the duty to defend innocent lives. Equally, as these African boers are being defended, they have a responsibility to defend and champion the rights of their workers. The welfare of these innocent workers needs to be defended at all costs by these African boers.
The education of these workers must be protected through partnerships between African boers and basic education. During election time, the African boer must, of necessity, allow the workers to exercise their hard- won democratic right of casting their votes as and when they choose. [Applause.] Do not make them work on voting days.
As part of our rural development strategy and also broadly of our developmental state agenda, working together with the Departments of Basic Education, Higher Education and Training, Labour, Rural Development and Land Reform, the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries must ensure that all schools in rural and farming community areas are provided with agricultural, forestry and fishery science subjects.
Also, through the Department of Labour, adult workers must be taught to understand their rights so as to protect themselves from further exploitation, oppression and abuse. Working together with higher education, co-ordination among colleges of agriculture and forestry must be effected as a matter of urgency. One of the major goals of these exercises must be about building the scarce skills required in the fields of agriculture, forestry and fisheries. This will go a long way in ensuring skills development in areas where agriculture, forestry and fisheries are a source of livelihood and for now they must be nurtured among these communities.
Fellow countrymen and women, in line with the hon Pravin Gordhan's Budget Speech, I quote:
Under the leadership of the Department of Labour, initiatives are in progress to improve information services to help young people access jobs and training opportunities. We propose to support these reforms through a subsidy to employers that will lower the cost of hiring young people without work experience. Under consideration is a cash reimbursement to employers for a two-year period.
The aim is to target 800 000 of these young people. Whilst we have programmes dedicated to the youth and women, the ANC is of the view that we need to do more in a targeted fashion in benchmarking our progress, so that when we say the added cash injection towards growing commercial farmers has to increase from R780 000 to R800 000 in 2010 to 2011, we need to know how many are young people, how many are women and how many are people living with disabilities. Partnerships with agencies, such as the National Youth Development Agency, for the youth through external bursary schemes, young professional development programmes, and experimental, experiential, internship and training programmes must be visible.
As we speak, these young people are still found wanting when accessing these opportunities. Rural development partnerships with the department will certainly benefit young and old women in agriculture.
The last point I want to make is regarding transformation. The above only addresses in part the transformation of the sector in our country. However, a lot still needs to be done in the critical areas of food security in our country. In agriculture alone, partnerships that are established through the Land Redistribution for Agricultural Development programmes only end up at the production level, with the experienced white farmers running the whole lucrative value chain of packaging, processing and marketing locally and internationally. In some instances, black farmers are locked into finance schemes or into having to sell only to the service provider, that is a white farmer who happens to be a white farmer with his or her own produce. The ANC supports this Budget Vote. Thank you. [Time expired.] [Applause.]