Changing Forms of Wage Labour in Zimbabwe’s New Agrarian Structure

Abstract

This essay examines the changing nature of farm wage labour in the context of the extensive redistributive land reform since 2000. Using field research from two districts in Zimbabwe with contrasting agro-ecology and socio-economic patterns, it shows that agrarian wage labour is not the preserve of large-scale capitalist farms (LSCFs), which it is usually associated with. The new agrarian structure dominated by the peasantry not only employs an expanded base of unpaid family labourers, but also employs ‘informal’ wage labour whose character and conditions of employment are qualitatively different from the full and part-time labour of the past. Yet, there is continuation of the super-exploitation of agrarian wage labourers that is reflected by the payment of poor wages and differing degrees of the institution of the residential labour tenancy in both the old and new farm compounds. Landlessness and/or land shortage continues to be a key characteristic of farm wage labourers as in the past suggesting the persistence of the labour reserve dynamic.

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