90% of Land Reform Projects in South Africa Have Failed, Says SAAI Executive
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Southern African Agri Initiative (SAAI) executive director Theo de Jager warns that a fundamental misunderstanding of commercial farming business models has led to the failure of at least 90% of South Africa's land reform projects.
A staggering 90% of land reform projects in South Africa have failed on a business level, according to Theo de Jager, executive director at the Southern African Agri Initiative (SAAI).
Speaking during a panel discussion at the Expropriation Conference in June 2026, De Jager emphasized that this high failure rate is actually a "best-case scenario," noting that truly successful, profitable land reform farms are exceptionally rare.
De Jager argued that the root cause of these failures is a political misunderstanding that confuses raw, unused land with operational commercial farms.
He stressed that a functioning farm requires far more than just land; it demands complex business plans, continuous capital investment, active management, and access to mainstream commercial markets.
When land reform beneficiaries are handed previously productive farms without a viable business model to maintain them, they lose connection to commercial markets and inevitably downgrade to subsistence or smallholder farming.
De Jager warned that dismantling commercial agriculture in this way destroys the primary economic assets, job creators, and foreign currency generators in South Africa's poorest rural areas.
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