Farmers benefit from R134m infrastructure programme

The borehole will bring great change. Now we will no longer cart water from the tanks, we will just connect a pipe to the borehole. There will be better production than before

The Eastern Cape department of rural development and agrarian reform has injected R134m into an agriculture infrastructure programme benefiting scores of farmers in the province as part of efforts to enable economic growth.

This was announced early in the new financial year by MEC Nonkqubela Pieters during the tabling of the department’s policy speech.

Linda Sam, from Kariega in Nelson Mandela Bay, rears cattle, goats, pigs and chickens, and also grows crops.

She is one of the farmers who have benefited from the infrastructure programme, with the department sinking a borehole and installing a water system on her farm.

“Lack of water was affecting my operations because pigs love water; cattle need lots of water; goats and sheep need water. I also need water for irrigation.

“The borehole will bring great change. Now we will no longer cart water from the tanks, we will just connect a pipe to the borehole. There will be better production than before,”

Sam said. Sam began farming in her community with just four pigs in Joe Slovo township in Kariega. She increased her number of animals tenfold, and did not give up even when all 40 pigs were stolen.

Sam is a beneficiary of the government’s land reform programme.

With regards to her poultry business, she buys one-day-old chicks and sells them after six weeks to residents of Bloza location. She also keeps freerange chickens which lay eggs that she then sells to local households.

“I was constantly visiting the office of the department of rural development and agrarian reform, where I voiced my challenge of having to buy water if there was no rain.

“The department responded positively with this [borehole] investment,” she said.