William Wolmer

From Jambanja to Planning: The Reassertion of Technocracy in Land Reform in Southeastern Zimbabwe

This paper examines the land occupations and fast-track resettlement process in Chiredzi district in Zimbabwes southeast lowveld, and argues that their broad-brush representation as chaotic, violent and unplanned is misleading. In Zimbabwe the instruments and mechanisms of order assert themselves even in the midst of violent disorder. The on-going deployment of the formal and technical tools and discourses of land-use planning have been instrumental in securing the visibility and legitimacy of Zimbabwes new settlers. The speed and short cuts of the fast-track land reform process and vagueness of policies to date have in the short term opened up a certain amount of space for negotiation and a degree of leeway and flexibility in land-use planning and allocation. But the danger for the settlers is that, by deploying a discourse rooted in long-held and institutionally embedded Rhodesian traditions of planning and control, they have played into a process that – as so often in Zimbabwes history – will re-impose coercive land-use regulations that are at odds with their livelihood strategies and seek to vet settlers and so undermine populist claims of redressing inequalities and providing land to the landless and poor.

Wildlife Management and Land Reform in Southeastern Zimbabwe: A Compatible Pairing or a Contradiction in Terms?

Abstract This paper examines the melding of two discourses in southeastern Zimbabwe: land reform and wildlife management. The former seeks to redistribute large, ‘under-utilized’ landholdings to smallholders whilst the latter needs extensive land holdings to be viable. These two discourses are rooted in very different models of development. The land reform exercise emphasizes direct redistribution, equity and land for crops; whilst the wildlife management discourse tends to stress maximizing foreign exchange earnings, encouraging public–private partnerships and trickle down. Yet there has been a recent flurry of interest in the development of ‘wildlife models’ for land reform which would combine the two. This paper investigates whether the competing discourses about land for smallholders and wildlife-based land reform are compatible or can be successfully reconciled. It traces the ways they have come together in Zimbabwe’s southeast lowveld and examines the ‘science’ and politics underlying their melding. Finally it explores the potential implications for rural people’s livelihoods of this development. It concludes that land reform and wildlife management can be reconciled, but probably not in a particularly equitable way: it is more likely to provide an opening for an equitable land reform agenda to be usurped by local and non-local elites with wildlife interests.

Foot-and-mouth disease and market access: challenges for the beef industry in southern Africa

Focusing on the case of foot and mouth disease (FMD) in southern Africa – and specifi cally Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe – this paper explores the economic, social and political trade-offs arising from different scenarios for gaining market access and managing and controlling FMD in support of beef production in southern Africa. A central question is: does the current approach, premised on the ability to separate a ‘disease free’ commercial sector from areas at high risk of FMD outbreaks because of the presence or proximity of wildlife (African buffalo particularly) through strictly enforced protection (formerly known as ‘buffer’) zones and movement control, make sense given new contexts and challenges? Are there other alternatives that benefi t a wider group of producers, ensure food-safe trade, and are easier to implement, yet maintain access to important export markets and so foreign exchange revenues? Following an examination of the new contexts of disease dynamics and livestock trade in southern Africa, the paper explores a series of scenarios for market access including: trade with the European Union; direct exports to large retailers; export to emerging markets, particularly Asia; regional trade in southern Africa and domestic urban and rural markets. Given this assessment, the paper then asks: what makes most sense for the control and management of FMD in southern Africa?

Land, landscapes and disease: the case of foot and mouth in southern Zimbabwe

This article explores the relationships between FMD and landscape in three broad periods. In each period assumptions about what constitutes the (normatively) right land use have driven FMD control policies. As discussed below, these assumptions are rooted in social, economic and political criteria, in interaction with veterinary science. Given these broader criteria, the article concludes by asking what next for Zimbabwes livestock sector?