2.3 Causes of Zimbabwe’s Indigenisation Agenda: The Historical Perspective
2.3.1 Rhodesia from World War II to the 1970s: Few Opportunities for African
The increase demand for tobacco during the Second World War came as a boost for the Rhodesian farmers who realised a boom, and there was greater commitment to capitalist agriculture. Unfortunately, this led to a shift from maize production by farmers as they pursued the higher gains from the lucrative tobacco crop. This reduced food production and undermined the country’s food self-sufficiency. The war also led to the rapid growth of secondary and tertiary industries as part of the war strategy of import substitution. This effort required the motivation of an African workforce.
In the early 1940s the government commissioned a study to determine the effects and ways to encourage the absorption of rural African people into the liberal market economy by stimulating African capitalism, but without allowing the blacks to encroach into their economic areas of interest and dominance. The findings of this study by the Native Production and Trade Commission in 1944 observed that without incentives from government the Africans were not at that time capable of investing in large enterprises in any sector of the country’s economy, hence
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the whites would prevail. There were only a few African traders who had shown potential, especially in the milling industry (Nicholas 1994:98). The white colonial state noticed that if the trend continued to show a decline in the production of food then to reverse the situation, there was need for steps to be taken to encourage peasant agriculture production and to recognise its importance. This led to the rationalisation programme aimed at improving food production in the native reserves.
Upon realising that the native Africans had large stocks of cattle and relied on them as strategic reserve stock, the first programme the government pursued was destocking. The programme which gave low prices for stock worked like a forced de-capitalisation of the African rural people. The whites at this stage acquired cattle at low market prices and this helped the whites to increase their herds on their large farms. The second programme the government attempted to implement was the Native Land Husbandry Act (NLHA) whose aim was to increase food productivity in the reserves. In their programme they motivated the African farmers by giving security of tenure to the successful ones. In this programme they expected that the non-economic land units of African famers would be given up to more productive ones who would then consolidate their land holding and increase production. Those who would have given up their land were expected to migrate to urban centres to provide cheap labour to the growing industry.
Nicholas (1994:98) took the view that perhaps the white colonial government expected the remaining successful African farmers in the reserves to become a stable middle class which would halt the decline in food production. This was the strategic aim of the Kenyan Swynnerton Plan from which NLHA was developed. It could have been a way of decongesting the rural areas and stimulating high food productivity while at the same time relocated surplus human capital to provide cheap industrial labour. Unfortunately, the farm sizes in the reserves were too small to be used for commercial agriculture, especially in a market that still had discriminatory prices. In this model no meaningful commercial agriculture could take place allowing for significant wealth accumulation. Though NLHA was a strategy by government to promote agriculture productivity, the same government maintained the other measures which prevented African farmers from threatening the whites’ superiority in the agriculture industry (Nicholas, 1994:98).
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Destocking led to the liquidation of the black peasants and partial monetisation of large African capital that was held in cattle stocks. Those who were affected looked for alternative ways to use their money. As a result, there was an increase in demand for trading sites in the rural areas.
From 1950 to 1975 there was a notable increase in the leased rural trading sites. The most sought after and easiest way of getting into business was though acquiring the general dealer’s licence.
Though the numbers showed an increase in the African business sites, the businesses in which the people were involved were of low value as most of the people were barely able to make a living from these businesses. Most of the businesses were restricted to specific sites in the African townships. Generally, Africans were allowed to own only one modest business, though it was observed that there were attempts by way of applications by Africans to enlarge their businesses into departmental stores or wholesalers. Over the period 1960 to 1970, African businesses expanded into other areas, especially in the services industry, to meet the increasing demand of the growing urban population. The most attractive sector was transport and a few grew to own fleets of taxis and buses. It was these few men who became the nucleus of the pre- independent African capitalists. These small African petty-bourgeoisie or potential bourgeoisie faced many challenges such as undercapitalisation because they did not have free hold land titles and could not get loans from banks. Many were left with insufficient capital to buy stock. Most of the African business owners lacked managerial skills and experience. In response to the growing numbers of African entrepreneurs, the government imposed a range of regulations which determined issues such as location of businesses and the distances between stores owned by one trader. This again suppressed the growth of African Capitalism. This was achieved in a systematic way. Some of the laws and regulations which were put in place over the period 1889- 1979 were similar in their spirit to those used in South Africa as listed below:
1. Charter of the British South Africa Company (BSAC), 29 October 1889.
Backbone of colonialism and black disempowerment.
2. Land Apportionment Act of 1930. Appropriated land in favour of the white minority. Indigenous people were moved from fertile land to give way to white farmers.
3. Companies Act No. 47 of 1951. Stringent company registration measures designed to exclude indigenous entrepreneurs.
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4. Factory Act No. 20 1948. Designed with stringent conditions for registration to exclude blacks.
5. Public Health Act No. 19 of 1924 [Chapter 328]. Designed to protect the established white businesses, while black small businesses were subject to harassment for failure to meet the standards required.
(New Africa, 2013:np).
The discussion above demonstrates clearly the importance of a state in shaping economic forces.
The African farmers initially had the advantage over the whites because of their farming experience. The advantage was eliminated in a systematic manner by the white colonial government which wanted European led development. Nicholas (1994:100) noted that: “The severe control of the expansion of African capitalism and the redirection of African rural surpluses into the European agricultural sector helped to create a strong European bourgeoisie and a small very weak indigenous capitalist class.”
Nicholas’ (1994) assertion summarises the past colonial injustices and discrimination which formed the basis of the current indigenisation drive in Zimbabwe. Allowing the indigenous African capitalist to start competing openly in a neo-liberal national or global economy may not yield the desired results without the deliberate government intervention measures as was called for by President Lyndon Johnson of the United State of America.
The focus now moves to the Namibian historical case which is similar to the Zimbabwean experience.