‘I lost everything because there’s no water for my farm’

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By Doreen Mokgolo

  • Tebogo Nyathela left her office job to follow her farming dream but water problems are killing her business.
  • New laws could help farmers like her get better land with water but for now she’s struggling to keep her crops alive.

Scrolla Water Watch: With load shedding now a thing of the past, a nationwide water shortage is South Africa’s most urgent crisis. In this series of community-based reporting, we look at how this affects communities.

When Tebogo Nyathela quit her corporate job in 2016 to become a farmer, she had big dreams of feeding her community and creating jobs. 

But today, she watches helplessly as her crops die from lack of water.

“Last year I lost R15,000 worth of cabbages after our water pump broke. For two weeks, I couldn’t water my farm. It broke my heart to see all that food go to waste,” she told Scrolla.Africa at her farm in Kgomo Kgomo, North West.

Tebogo was given 20 hectares of land by the local tribunal office, but it came with no water connection. She had to spend R120,000 to drill a borehole. When that didn’t work, she paid another R120,000 for a second attempt.

Even with working boreholes, she can only farm on five hectares because the pumps keep breaking down.

“I’ve lost count of how much money I’ve spent fixing pipes,” she said.

All around her village, thousands of hectares of farmland lie dry and abandoned. In 2022, the Moretele municipality installed water taps, but not a drop has ever come out of them.

Despite her struggles, Tebogo’s farm employs 29 local people. She has trained over 80 villagers and gives practical experience to university students.

“We could do so much more if we had proper water,” she said. “We could create more jobs and help feed our community. But right now, we’re just trying to survive.”

Many of her neighbouring farmers have already given up, selling their livestock and moving to cities to find work.

“I want to employ and train more local people, but without water, it’s impossible,” she said.

The crisis comes as South Africa introduces the Expropriation Act. This new legislation allows government to take privately-owned land for public use, sometimes without paying for it. It aims to help fix the unfair land ownership left over from apartheid.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday he will stop giving money to South Africa because he thinks the government is taking people’s land unfairly.

Pictured above: Tebogo Nyathela.

Source: Supplied

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