Resource information
Agri SA supported orderly land reform – equitable land distribution is a prerequisite for rural stability and inclusive rural development. Agri-SA believed that expropriation should only be used as a last resort where negotiations fail. There needed to be a clear purpose for expropriation. Compensation should never be dependent on the state’s ability to pay. The land owner should always be afforded recourse to the courts to contest both the merits of the expropriation and the compensation amount. Claimants should as far as possible be placed in the same position as was the case before the expropriation. Some of Agri SA’s concerns were the wide definitions of “expropriating authority” and “public interest”. These broad definitions left a lot of room for uncertainty. The gathering of relevant data was crucial to the calculation of compensation which was just and equitable. No land owner should either unduly benefit or from land reform. be penalised. Agri SA acknowledged that market value was not the only consideration, however it still has a central role to play in the approach adopted by our courts. Landowners, whose land was earmarked for land reform purposes, must be placed in a position to continue farming elsewhere should they wish to do so.
