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Adding his voice to the big labour debate and the issue of food security, Fin24 user Ritchie Morris believes that a country’s wellbeing and that of its citizens revolves around environmental issues.
In his letter to Terry Bell, Morris writes that food security, job opportunities and competitiveness in the agricultural sector are all interrelated.
Dear Terry
I read your article on Fin24 on the findings of the ILO with interest.
The whole issue of a country’s wellbeing and that of its citizens ultimately revolves around environmental issues.
Society, through its policies and plans (eg NDP), forms its environment. However, without a decent environment, we would not have a healthy society. Food security, job opportunities and competitiveness in the agricultural sector are all interrelated – if we want a healthy society. And so is the financial viability of an agricultural holding related to the carrying capacity of the farm itself, influenced by the market within which the farmer trades.
I believe that there is a solution to our land redistribution, the need to ‘grow’ young farmers within previously disadvantaged communities, the migration of people to the urban areas, and ensuring food security within that sector of the poor who cannot afford the processed foods of the large retail chains.
We need a massive drive towards small-scale farming in close proximity of the urban markets. If the small agricultural allotments, which one sees when travelling by rail in England can work there, there is no reason why such on a small to medium scale cannot work in South Africa. One just has to consider the Philippi farming area, the small farms next to the old Durban airport at Prospecton and allotments in close proximity to Johannesburg – they have been there for many, many years.
Government efforts should be directed at ‘small scale urban farms’. These will require fencing, wheel-barrows, pipes, irrigation sprinklers, transport, etc, etc. So there is a whole set of sub-businesses that would evolve/exist around such.
Keep up the good writing and thinking.
Disclaimer: All articles and letters published on Fin24 have been independently written by members of the Fin24 community. The views of users published on Fin24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent those of Fin24.
