Zambia’s peasants at risk of becoming squatters on their own land – UN expert warns
LUSAKA / GENEVA (12 May 2017) – The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Hilal Elver, today cautioned
that many Zambian peasants are at risk of becoming squatters on their own land as Zambia is turned into Southern
Africa’s food basket.
“The push to turn commercial large-scale agricultural into a driving engine of the Zambian economy, in a situation where
the protection of access to land is weak, can risk pushing small-holder farmers and peasants off their land and out of
production with severe impacts on the people’s right to food,” Ms. Elver said at the end of her first official visit to the country.
The expert drew special attention to the fact that in the Zambian dual-model of land tenure tenants on state land enjoy
the full protection of their property rights. “However,” she noted, “landholders under customary tenure, affecting
around 85% of the land, mostly in hands of peasants, are essentially occupants or users of land and their property and
land rights remain unprotected.”
“This situation is particularly alarming since small scale farmers represent 60% of Zambians and at the same time
produce 85% of the food for the population,” Ms. Elver pointed out. “These people are generally amongst the poorest of
the population, 40% of them live in rural areas and suffer from extreme poverty.”
“Many peasants are forced to work as contract farmers for the larger commercial industrial farms in adverse conditions,
or are obliged to sell their products at undervalued prices to monopoly type multinationals who buy farmers’ product for
export,” the expert explained.
The Special Rapporteur heard testimonies of comparatively successful small-scale farmers who were still forced to sell
their animals in order to pay for their children to go to school. Many small-scale farmers have their children working
from as early as the age of six to secure their families’ livelihood.
Ms. Elver noted that the growth in the agriculture sector in Zambia in the last decade has not been inclusive but
limited to large scale farmers, leaving the small scale farmers behind. “The agricultural sector has failed to make a
dent on poverty levels in the rural areas and as such the model for the strengthening of the agricultural sectors need
to be altered,” she said.
“It is imperative that national strategies incorporate human rights principles that include the protection of their
access to land and other productive resources in order to protect the county’s traditional food system, small holder
farmers and their livelihoods,” the Special Rapporteur urged.
Access to adequate and nutritious food continues to be a challenge across most of the country, with women and children
in the rural area faring worst. Many children and their families only eat only one meal of not necessarily nutritious
food per day.
A recent study has found that severe acute malnutrition in Zambia comes with a 40% mortality rate, five times the global
average due to lack in access to adequate health services as well as to therapeutic foods.
The expert was alarmed to find out that around 40% of children under five are stunted with this figure reaching above
50% in some of the rural provinces, and even higher in refugee camps and the most marginalized rural areas, while the
country was enjoying impressive economic growth rates of over 6 per cent per year.
“This is not tolerable since the effects of under-nutrition are irreversible, and lack of access to adequate and
nutritious food is having a detrimental effect on future generations and must be addressed as a matter of urgency,” she
stressed.
The country’s agricultural development model based on intensive commercial farming has increased rates of deforestation
and to bio-diversity loss. It has also increased the use of agro chemicals, including glyphosate, which have a
scientifically proven adverse impact on human health, in particular on children.
“It is vital that development plans and policies take into account the true cost of industrial farming methods primarily
for its people, but also on soil and water resources, as well as the social and economic impact on people rather than
focusing only on short term profitability and economic growth,” Ms. Elver said.
During her ten-day visit, the expert met, among others, senior Government officials, representatives from the UN system,
civil society members, traditional leaders and communities in various locations throughout the country.
The Special Rapporteur’s observations and recommendations will be reflected in her final report, which will be presented
to the UN Human Rights Council in March 2018.
ENDS