SA Canegrowers has welcomed the signing of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the sugar industry and the Commission on Restitution of Land Rights (CRLR); however, it highlights that gazetting claims that take a year to settle will lead to uncertainty and disinvestment in the industry.

“Unsettled land claims cast a cloud of uncertainty over claimed properties which can discourage land owners from investing in the land, constrain the land market, threaten the sustainability of sugar mills, create a fertile climate for community conflicts, delay an opportunity to provide skills to claimants and also delay mentorship, business support and forging of beneficial partnerships,” said SA Canegrowers, which currently represented about 23 000 sugarcane farmers that on average jointly produced 20-million tons of sugarcane a season.

In a statement on Thursday the organisation advised that the first phase of land restitution process saw about 50% of the freehold commercial agricultural land under sugarcane being claimed. This phase was closed in 1998 and, ever since, the process of settling lodged claims had been slow and uncoordinated.

“As at 2015, 38% of the freehold land in the sugar industry is still under land claims yet to be settled,” SA Canegrowers stated.

It noted that it looked forward to a more organised approach to the re-opening of the restitution process and trusted that the CRLR would invest more resources during the research of claims and investigate existing and future claims working with experts and institutions.

It also emphasised the need for adequate funding for the programme and hoped that the commission would honour the commitments contained in the MoU and ensure that the gazetting of claims took place after proper research and validation had been undertaken.

SA Canegrowers noted that it would provide business and financial advisory support to the land restitution process, adding that business plans would be compiled and attached to the Section 42 (d) dossier to be signed by Chief Land Claims Commissioner Nomfundo Gobodo as part of the land transfer process.

Gobodo, who had emphasised the importance of making restitution businesses sustainable, signed the MoU on April 17. It was intended to encourage close collaboration between the sugar industry and the CRLR to expedite the settling of land claims, jointly explore alternative ways to fund the restitution programme and provide comprehensive support to both exiting land owners and communities which had or would be receiving claimed land.

As such, the MoU was expected to facilitate a land restitution process that was structured, well coordinated, involved all stakeholders, took into account the cane growing and harvesting cycle and had minimal impact on the cash flow of transferred properties. It was also projected to ensure a smooth handover, allow claimants to decide how to structure their business and identify the type of skills and support needed to ensure the sustainable settlement of land claims.

Sugarcane farmers provided employment to rural populations in the cane growing regions of KwaZulu-Natal and the Mpumalanga Lowveld that would otherwise find it difficult to find employment, said SA Canegrowers.

“The existence of the sugarcane farming sector also provides opportunities to upstream and downstream businesses in the sugar value chain, including the input suppliers, logistics contractors, financial institutions which lend to these businesses, as well as the providers of feedstock to sugar millers which are partners in the sugar sector in terms of the Sugar Industry Agreement. A thriving sugarcane sector, therefore, keeps a lot of other players in the sugar value chain sustainable,” stressed the organisation.

Restitution was a rights-based component of the land reform programme, which derived its mandate from the Constitution.

SA Canegrowers, together with the SA Sugar Millers' Association, funded the South African Sugar Association, which managed the industry's land reform programme supported by land reform initiatives implemented by SA Canegrowers and all milling companies.

“SA Canegrowers will continue to work with industry partners and government to support a sustainable land restitution programme,” the organisation concluded.