Developing The Tribal Trust Lands

Abstract

A Rhodesia Journal of Economics paper presented by a Rhodesia Finance Minister on the need for rural development in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Originally given as an address to the annual dinner conference of the Institute of Directors, Bulawayo, October 11, 1968. ; My subject is "The Tribal Trust Lands: Their Need for Development". Many people may wonder why the need for developing the Tribal Trust Lands is receiving such emphasis today; and they may well conclude that this much talked of development is a new concept. It is not. However, this development is now being approached with perhaps a little more co-ordination, vigour and purpose than in the past. Although the need for developing the Tribal Trust Lands I feel sure is obvious to all, it may be advantageous to set out the three main objectives that Government has in mind in promoting this development. These are, firstly, to provide land for settlement to cope with the increasing demand for land by tribesmen and to provide a livelihood for a growing African population which cannot be absorbed in industry and elsewhere; secondly, to provide employment on Tribal Trust Land for those who are without land or who have to supplement their agricultural earnings in order to subsist in times of drought or crop failure, and finally to assist, by means of settlement, in the control and eradication of tsetse fly thereby opening up production and at the same time protecting areas which are being farmed properly.