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Case Studies from Muden, Dondotha, KwaDumisa and KwaNyuswa - June 2002
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Introduction and Objectives
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This report presents the findings of a preliminary study into the link between HIV/AIDS and land issues in customary tenure areas of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The term 'land issues' is understood broadly to include three main dimensions, namely land use, land rights and land administration. The report was commissioned by the Sub-Regional Office for Southern and Eastern Africa of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO) as part of a three-country study into the impact of HIV/AIDS on land issues.
The report focuses predominantly on presenting empirical evidence gathered in the four study sites within KwaZulu-Natal, thus far the province in the country hit hardest by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The objectives of the study, as stipulated by the FAO, were to evaluate:
- Possible changes in land tenure systems as a consequence of HIV/AIDS.
- The strategic options for survival among HIV/AIDS affected households in terms of land.
- The consequence of such survival strategies on security in access or rights to land.
- Changes in land tenure, access or rights to land among different categories of people, particularly widows and orphans, as a consequence of HIV/AIDS and how these are affecting agricultural productivity, food security and poverty.
- The possible implications for the future of the above on land tenure systems.
- The short- and the long-term implications for land administration.
- Relevant policy implications and recommendations.
For the purposes of this study, the inter-linked issues of land use, land rights, and land administration, are conceptualised through the lens of the household:
- In terms of land use, HIV/AIDS-affected households generally have less access to labour, less capital to invest in agriculture, and are less productive due to limited financial and human resources. Thus the issue of land use becomes extremely important as a result of the pandemic's impact on mortality, morbidity and resultant loss of skills, knowledge and the diversion of scarce resources. A range of multiple livelihood strategies, often involving land, has been directly affected as the pandemic compounds issues surrounding poverty. This has resulted in a number of changes to these strategies with a range of consequences for rural economies as rural households fight for survival in the context of HIV/AIDS.
- The focus on land rights considers the extent of the impact of HIV/AIDS on the terms and conditions in which households and individuals hold, use and transact land. This has particular resonance with women's and children's rights which, in the context of rural power relations that are themselves falling under increasing pressure from the pandemic, are especially vulnerable to being usurped. Another particular concern is that, quite apart from its other impoverishing effects, HIV/AIDS compels households to divest themselves of land resources, diminishing the resources the household has available to it to meet its needs. On the other hand, the research explores the possibility that under some circumstances land markets can function to the benefit of households that are affected by HIV/AIDS, e.g. by allowing households that have lost the labour power to make use of their land to earn some income from renting it out. As one would expect, the complex relationship between the pandemic and land rights is made more complex through the effects of other processes, such as increasing land pressure, commercialisation of agriculture, increased investment, and intensifying competition for residential sites.
- The dimension of land administration has two aspects. The one is the extent to which land administration systems - including community-level institutions such as traditional authorities and civil society, and various levels of government and the private sector - cope with the additional pressures on households' land rights issues imposed by the AIDS pandemic. The other is the direct impact of HIV/AIDS on the capacity of land administration systems, i.e. as HIV/AIDS affects people involved in the institutions that are involved in the administration of land. This latter aspect, though important, was not examined in detail in the course of this study.
As of 2000, KwaZulu-Natal reported an adult prevalence rate of HIV infections of 36.2%, the highest in the country. This was one reason for selecting KwaZulu-Natal as the focus of the study. Within KwaZulu-Natal, four study sites were chosen, of which three are within customary tenure areas, and one - an area recently resettled under the government's redistribution programme - has effectively been absorbed into a nearby tribal area. The sites were chosen for the fact that they differ from one another in important respects, notably the degree of land scarcity, the balance between agricultural and residential demand, the level of activity in the land market, and the effectiveness of control by traditional authorities.
The study involved 50 household interviews as well as two focus group interviews. Households were selected on the basis that they were known to be, or to have been, affected by a chronic illness, not necessarily AIDS. In many cases, the person interviewed confided to the interviewer that the illness was indeed AIDS. In many other cases, the symptoms indicated by the respondent suggest a high probability that the underlying illness is or was AIDS. In a handful of other cases, the illness appeared not to be AIDS-related, though given the chronic nature of the illness, many of the effects on the household and its relationship to land were much the same.
Thus far, HIV/AIDS does not figure in South Africa's official land policy, nor in any discernible manner in the Department of Land Affairs' approach to land reform. This appears to be typical of the Southern African region. Even countries that are currently engaged in writing or revising their land policies (e.g. Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, and Mozambique), HIV/AIDS does not figure as a distinct practical concern, though it does sometimes merit a passing mention. This study on the other hand gives a preliminary indication both of the practical implications of HIV/AIDS to land policy, including land reform.
The paper is organised as follows. The next section provides a number of contextual perspectives that help orient the reader for the purposes of the present study. Section 3 describes the methodological approach followed in the study. Section 4 relates the finds of the field research according to each of the four study sites. The fifth section syntheses these findings, and section 6 concludes with a presentation of policy recommendations.
Two appendices are attached which outline the questionnaire framework used for the field research and relevant maps detailing population densities and per capita incomes in each of the four study sites.
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