This is according to Wendy de la Fargue of the Valuation Consortium (Valcon), a key body that has been involved in compiling the database of affected farms, as well as negotiating compensation values between government and farmers, and administering the claims process.
”It is going well thus far. [There are] good working relationships between all stakeholders,” she told Farmer’s Weekly.
Zimbabwe’s government said in a statement on 9 April that it had begun fulfilling commitments to compensate FFOs with a first round of claims amounting to US$3,1 million (about R58,6 million).
Minister of Finance, Economic Development, and Investment Promotion, Prof Mthuli Ncube, said 740 farms had been processed so far. This initial payment had been disbursed for the first batch of 378 processed farms and was compensation for improvements that the farmers had made on the farms, and not for the land itself.
“This amount is 1% of the total compensation claim value of US$311 million (about R5,88 billion),” he stated.
According to De La Fargue, this first payment was the result of a new deal agreed with the government in 2024 to replace the Global Compensation Deed (GCD) signed into agreement in 2020.
She said the new Farmers Compensation Agreement (FCA) was devised and signed by Ncube in 2024. The total compensation amount of US$3,5 billion had been retained, but the deal has been restructured from one that would have been a cash transaction to a mixed payment of cash and US dollar denominated treasury bonds.
De La Fargue said that while it was not ideal to only receive a small portion in cash, it was the best that the government could do at the time.
“This is being done within the national budget at this time with no international assistance to the government of Zimbabwe. There is a long way to go, but efforts are being made, which is something pretty historic within a nation’s budget capacity,” De La Fargue said.
Ncube said the country was committed to reforms that would clear arrears and get them out of debt.
“The payments will continue; we are very serious about this. By settling our arrears, we can tap into the long-term capital, which is essential for infrastructure and other significant investments,” he said.
De La Fargue said the Valcon work was ongoing, with new compensation applications being accepted, and efforts to further identify those affected continuing. She confirmed there were in excess of 4 600 farms recorded on the Valcon database, which had been the basis for the compensation calculation of US$3,5 billion in the initial GCD agreement.
At the time of publishing, the Commercial Farmers’ Union of Zimbabwe had not responded to Farmer’s Weekly’s request for comment.
