THE head of Zimbabwe’s central bank has suggested that white farmers be allowed back on the land taken from them and distributed among supporters of the Mugabe regime.

More than three quarters of Zimbabwe’s 4,500 white farmers have been driven off their land in the past five years. But with the country facing famine, Gideon Gono, governor of the central bank and a key adviser to President Mugabe, declared that white farmers were needed to boost production.

Mr Gono said that although some of the new black farmers were doing well on their farms he was disappointed at the performance of others, and suggested that the Government allow some of the white farmers to resume operations. “Horticulture remains a strategic agricultural area in the country’s economy, not only in terms of contribution to national productivity but also in terms of employment creation and foreign currency generation,” he said in a lengthy policy statement.

“In order to ensure maximum productivity levels, there is great scope for promoting and supporting joint ventures between the new farmers with progressive-minded former operators . . . as well as other new investors so as to hasten the skills transfer cycle.”

The new investors or former white farmers would be given special dispensation and guarantees of uninterrupted productive tenure of five to ten years, backed by government protection from any disruptions on the farms, he added.

The Zimbabwe economy has shrunk by more than 30 per cent in the past six years as agriculture, hit by drought and disruption of commercial farming, withered away. The land seizures resulted in a catastrophic drop in output, with tobacco, once the main foreign currency earner, down 70 per cent.

Before the recent parliamentary elections Mr Mugabe insisted that the country had a “bumper harvest” of maize and would be self-sufficient in food. But shortly after the poll, won by the ruling Zanu (PF) party with a huge majority amid allegations of ballot-rigging and the use of food as a political weapon, the Government said that it would have to import 1.2 million tons of maize.

This week Mr Mugabe agreed to meet James Morris, head of the UN’s World Food Programme, to discuss maize imports. Joaquim Chissano, the retired Mozambican president and special representative of Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, has arrived in Harare for talks with Mr Mugabe.

There have been reports of food riots in Zimbabwe. In Bulawayo two women with babies on their backs were injured on Wednesday when hundreds of shoppers stampeded for a limited supply of sugar, which has not been seen in stores for many weeks. Long queues also formed for bread, wheat flour and maize meal, the staple diet of Zimbabwe’s people.

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