Farming Households' Livelihood Strategies In Ndabakazi Villages, Eastern Cape: What Are The Implications To Extension Services?

Abstract

Using a retrospective and circumspective approach, this paper looks at how livelihood strategies have changed during pre and post-democratic eras in rural former Transkei of the Eastern Cape, and identifies present livelihood strategies in Ndabakazi. The focus of the research was Ndabakazi, a cluster of rural villages in the former Transkei. A survey of 80 household heads was conducted using semi-structured questionnaires, complemented by focus group discussions. The findings show that farming and wage labour have been declining over time as major sources of income, while social grants have become increasingly important. Field crop cultivation has been completely abandoned and garden cultivation is declining. The overall findings show that livelihood strategies have continued to change from land based livelihoods to non-farm and later non-labour. The paper argues the importance of understanding a farm household in the perspective of household economics theory and to incorporate the diverse portfolio of livelihood strategies in farming households into the extension advisory service in order to render relevant and appropriate service.

Abandoned Croplands: Drivers and Secondary Succession Trajectories under Livestock Grazing in Communal Areas of South Africa

“…Rangelands are normally interspersed between homesteads and cropping fields. The former Transkei part of the present Eastern Cape Province of South Africa has large tracts of abandoned agricultural land which were once cropping fields of some of the households [13] and most of them are no longer cultivated [14]. Andrews and Fox [15] and Connor and Mtwana [16] argue that abandonment of the fields is not a complete cessation of cropping but is a shift towards intensification where farmers use gardens adjacent to their homesteads to intercrop maize with other food crops.…”

A review of possibilities for using animal tracking devices to mitigate stock theft in smallholder livestock farming systems in rural South Africa

“…For example, in a more generic approach that captures small-scale farming households, Pienaar and von Fintel ( 2014) reported that small-scale farming households depend on social grants. In a more specific analysis of subsistence-oriented smallscale farming households, Zantsi and Bester (2019b) reported similar findings that small-scale farming households depend on combining social grants and farming, whereby farming contributes a very small portion to the total household income.…”

“…One of the functions of agricultural extension and education is that of disseminating information and technology to farmers and reporting the responses to researchers to improve the service (Worth, 2006). The important goal in this respect is to help farmers use the existing information to make better decisions and achieve their own goals (Anderson & Feder, 2004;Zantsi & Bester, 2019b). Lyne et al (2018) quantified the impact of agricultural extension on smallholder farmers and found impressive benefits such as increased farm and net incomes.…”

Why do agricultural co-operatives fail to attract youth and create rural employment? Evidence from a case study of Zanokhanyo in Butterworth, Eastern Cape

“…However, there is a significant amount of arable land, although it is unevenly distributed (Zantsi, 2016). There is a growing trend of declining arable field cultivation currently taking place in many parts of the Eastern Cape (Blair et al, 2018), including Ndabakazi (see Zantsi & Bester, 2019). The Department of Social Development initiated the project ZFSC, through which it negotiated with the owners of fields to sign an agreement stating that their fallow fields may be used by the project to produce crops, poultry and piggery.…”