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Albert Zinhanga examines part of the vegetable crop on the 1 500-hectare farm he and his partners are leasing in Malmesbury, Cape Town.

Zimbabweans have a reputation for hard work.  

That is why their skills are in demand worldwide. Some of our best brains are helping drive economies in Sadc, Africa and further afield as engineers, medical doctors, lawyers, journalists, academics, company executives and so on. Guided by the principle that anything worth doing must be done well, some of our compatriots are in less intellectually-demanding, menial jobs, but are excelling.

South Africa is probably the country hosting the largest population of Zimbabweans abroad. It is in that country that five Zimbabweans have reasserted their country’s reputation, their success story on a formerly abandoned piece of land in Malmesbury, Western Cape making international news. After incurring losses of more than R1 million trying to grow crops on the land, its owner, N7 Meat, gave up on it and decided to focus on animal husbandry elsewhere on the property.

Zimbabwean academics Albert Zinhanga, Batsirai Magunje, Walter Khumalo, Masimba Paradza and Ignatius Matimati saw the fallow land and asked why that was so. N7 Meat explained why. About R300,000 was needed to make the soil fertile enough to yield any crop. The land owner was not prepared to spend that much. He offered the land to the quintet to farm for free for a year, use his equipment and only pay for electricity and bet them they would not succeed.

However, the five minds had a winning plan.  Through simple methods — using only cow dung to enrich the soil instead of expensive fertiliser and watering the farm continuously prior to planting —they worked three acres. Their work immediately showed and soon they expanded to 15 acres. Now the “unprofitable” piece of land is profitable, so N7 Meat and the five agreed on a rental of R1,200 per hectare.

This is an inspiring story which has earned plaudits from one of Africa’s greatest minds, former South African President, Thabo Mbeki.

He, as we do, sees the success by Zinhanga, Magunje, Khumalo, Paradza and Matimati as representative of Zimbabweans’ enduring work ethic and affinity to the soil.

“The story of farmers who are highly productive at Malmesbury is a good tale to tell,” said Cde Mbeki.

“It’s a good story to tell not just because it’s Africans, but it’s Zimbabweans. It’s not any South African who went to the farmer to say ‘can I use your farm,’ but Zimbabweans did. It’s because Zimbabweans have got a very different attitude to land.”

The good words are not just on the five successful farmers in his country but generally for all Zimbabweans. He contrasted that positive attribute among Zimbabweans to what obtains in South Africa where blacks apparently see no value in land as presenting massive     potential.

“If you look at the records of the land claims that have been settled over the last 22 years,” Cde Mbeki said, “you’ll find that in the majority of cases, the people who win the claims prefer to take the money rather than keep the land and work the land. That’s the reality of South Africa. The Zimbabweans have got a very different attitude towards land from what our people have.”

Cde Mbeki is an influential African thinker. If he praises you, you deserve it and if he rebukes you, you deserve it. Therefore, we are pleased with his positive assessment not only on the five Malmesbury farmers, but all of us as well.

This, at the same time, is a challenge for the 380,000 indigenous farmers who benefited under the land reform programme.

The  compelling message from Cde Mbeki and the achievement of the five is that even if the odds look insurmountable as is the case now amid the prevailing economic challenges, there is always a way to success.

Economic sanctions are making it difficult for new farmers to access critical inputs like machinery and finance from abroad. Local financial institutions also appear reluctant to support them.  In a number of cases, production has not reached the desirable level yet because of these factors. But a never-say-die attitude such as that which made the five transform an “unproductive” piece of land into a productive enterprise should motivate the new landowners to believe.

While some in South Africa are prepared to take money and be merry for a short period of time, as Cde Mbeki highlights, Zimbabweans go for that which is fundamental and more permanent — the land. The country and Zanu-PF has been ostracised because of the land reform exercise andpunished for that, but the people should not be discouraged.

This brings us to yet another important issue about Zimbabwe. Whereas some people and their governments in Africa are content with securing jobs, here the government and its people want much more than that — ownership of the   economy.

The government is implementing one of the world’s most radical and broad-based indigenisation and economic empowerment policies that asserts that Zimbabwe’s natural resources belong to indigenous Zimbabweans. It is only they who are entitled to owning more of it —the minerals, the land, vegetation, wildlife and the like — while foreigners take minority ownership.