DA urges Government to keep its promise to farm flood victims

I will today be submitting questions to the Agriculture Portfolio Committee in Parliament to ask why the R131.8 million (promised to farms in the Northern Cape alone), has not yet been rolled out, and why the conditions attached are so severe.

The total flood damage in the Northern Cape has amounted to nearly R900 million thus far. The R131.8 million earmarked for farm relief has been exclusively targeted for the repair of weirs.

Further conditions are that commercial farms which benefit from a weir must carry 50% of the repair costs, with emerging farmers carrying 20% and subsistence farmers 10%. The DA finds these conditions dubitable at best given the immense damage sustained by so many farms.

Both farm workers and farmers are starting to give up hope that they will receive anything from government. It cannot be that in the wake of a hopeful state of the nation address, government would so blatantly leave the people affected by disasters without hope.

Nationwide damages from recent flooding look set to amount to more than R3.5 billion.

Farms have been particularly devastated by these disasters, jeopardising both jobs and national food security.

The Democratic Alliance therefore calls on Government to put its money where its mouth is. Government has promised much in the way of financial disaster relief for farms affected by flooding, but has yet to deliver.

Statement issued by Annette Steyn MP, DA Shadow Minister of Agriculture, Forestry & Fisheries, February 15 2012

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