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| Title: | The State and agribusiness in Zimbabwe: plantations and contract farming |
| Author: | Sachikonye, Lloyd M. |
| Year: | 1989 |
| Issue: | 13 |
| Pages: | 40 |
| Language: | English |
| Series: | Leeds Southern African Studies |
| City of publisher: | Leeds |
| Publisher: | University of Leeds, African Studies Unit/Department of Politics |
| Geographic term: | Zimbabwe |
| Subjects: | political economy contract farming plantations |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the political economy of agribusiness in Zimbabwe with particular reference to contract farming. It assesses the production structure and social relations in outgrower sugar and tea schemes which are integral sectors of plantation estates in Zimbabwe. The author analyses the nature of the labour process in tea and sugar production, its regulation by estates and the conflicts engendered by that regulation. The argument is that contract farming is a crucial mechanism in the subsumption of growers to agribusiness capital which profits from avoiding their reproduction costs. Although plantation control over the labour process is considerable, it should not be necessarily inferred that outgrowers are 'disguised proletarians', 'wage-labour equivalents' or 'rentiers'. In addition, the author shows that outgrowers are not a homogeneous class and that the process of embourgeoisement and proletarianization are still partial and uneven. The role of the State in underwriting outgrower schemes, particularly through credit, is crucial; it further contributes to the differentiation process and the social contradictions thus engendered. |