Western Cape agriculture counts cost

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The Western Cape agricultural sector is in dire straits due to the crippling drought, exacerbated by fires that have destroyed thousands of hectares of grazing land and ravaged wine farms.

A portfolio committee meeting of Economic Opportunities, Tourism and Agriculture yesterday revealed that the government needs R80-million to pay for livestock feed in areas on the West Coast and in the Central Karoo district.

The provincial department of agriculture's André Roux said in his presentation to the committee that the province had needed to make ex-gratia payments to farmers.

The support is aimed at black farmers who benefited from land reform.

"The government spent a lot of money getting them established and now we can't let them fail. The criteria we are using is that they must have lost 50% of their crop [due to drought]," said Roux.

He said 15000 hectares on 42 farms in the province had been destroyed by fires.