Patriarchy,Women,Land and Livelihoods on A1 farms in Zimbabwe

Introduction

In this article, we focus on patriarchy, women, land and livelihoods on redistributed farms in Zimbabwe which arose from the fast track land reform process beginning in the year 2000. Two resettlement models prevail under fast track, namely, an A1 model involving small plots mainly for subsistence farming and an A2 model consisting of larger lands for commercial purposes. In discussing specifically A1 farms, we show some of the key consequences of fast track land reform for patriarchy and women farmers. There is a growing literature on A1 farms, including a number of in-depth localised studies and broader comparative and longitudinal studies based on fieldwork in different districts of Zimbabwe (Moyo et al., 2009; Scoones et al., 2010; Matondi, 2012) but this literature – in many ways reminiscent of the pre-fast track literature on resettlement in Zimbabwe (Jacobs, 2000) – does not have a specific focus on gender-based processes.

We outline the contradictory effects of fast track land reform for women on A1 farms. At times, radical socio-spatial reorganisations such as fast track may significantly destabilise forms of domination such as patriarchy. But it seems clear that fast track did not do so in relation to gender, such that the programme is rightfully subject to serious criticism in terms of being ‘highly masculinized’ (Bhatasara, 2011: 1) and for not challenging the entrenched existence of patriarchy in Zimbabwe. At the same time, it is important to explore the openings which it may have provided for (at least some) women in terms of land and livelihoods.

Methodological approach

The paper utilises a methodological approach based on eliciting data from literature on gender and fast track but offering fresh fieldwork based on studies undertaken by two of the authors. The first four sections in the discussion below largely concentrate on national debates on women and land to provide a contextual background that helps understand the specific cases studies in Goromonzi and Mazowe. The issues raised in this section are not perculiar to the two cases but rather are symptomatic of the Fast Track Land Reform Programme. Chakona (2011) undertook fieldwork in Goromonzi district (in early 2011) and Chiweshe (2011) in Mazowe district (from 2009 to 2011), both of which are within 100 km of Harare, the capital city. Such an approach allowed us to contextualise the discussions from the two studies around the debates on women’s access and control over land in patriarchal spaces. The two studies were based on qualitative enquiry which sought to understand rural women’s voices and experiences post-fast track land reform.

Patriarchy and land

The prevailing literature on land as a gendered space in Africa (and Zimbabwe specifically) identifies and explains the multi-faceted ways in which patriarchy – as a system of structures, practices and discourses – oppresses and marginalizes women in terms of access to land and livelihood opportunities, in both colonial and post-colonial settings. Six interrelated points arising from this literature are of relevance to this article.

First, the patriarchal dimension to land relations has its own set of rationalities which is irreducible to other social fault-lines in African countries, including class domination and racial and ethnic hierarchies. Because of this, restructuring of land relations along class and racial lines often leaves patriarchal domination intact or only slightly altered. In this regard, the study of fast track in Mazowe district by Matondi (2012) has a chapter on gender titled ‘a revolution without change in women’s land rights.’

Second, patriarchy as a system of domination is invariably a negotiated system. As Mazhawidza and Manjengwa (2011: 7) argue about gender and fast track specifically, ‘old and new actors are negotiating the path, producing trade-offs, as the process unfolds’. For women, room to manoeuvre often exists within patriarchal domination and this manoeuvring may challenge aspects of the patriarchal system, albeit perhaps unintentionally (Goebel, 2005b). As well, such challenges at times may simply result in women re-positioning themselves within patriarchy, thereby leading to the re-inscribing of patriarchy in altered social forms (Kesby, 1999).

Third, patriarchy is to be understood not simply in structuralist and legalistic terms, such that greater access to socio-economic resources for women and reform to patriarchal legislation spell the end to patriarchy. Ultimately, patriarchy entails intense lived experiences and everyday relations between men and women through the ‘operation of local patriarchies’ (Goebel, 2005a: 164), and these often involve chieftainships and customary practices in Africa and Zimbabwe in particular.

Fourth, patriarchal domination – existing as a seemingly sutured system – consists of various threads of social relations in sites of economic production and social reproduction. These threads normally reinforce each other but, particularly during times of contestation and change, they may enter into tension with each other. As a result, at any one moment, one thread may hold fast while another one starts to unravel. Exploring the differential effects of fast track becomes important in this respect.

Fifth, patriarchy is not a uniform or static system but is contingent and open to spatial and temporal variations and change. For instance, in the case of the spatial dimension, there are important differences between former settler societies (such as Zimbabwe and South Africa) and other sub-Saharan African countries with regard to gender and land. Spatial variations also exist within particular countries.

Sixth, and lastly, ‘women’ is not a homogeneous category because all women are infused with a multitude of social identities and these identities position them differentially within a particular system of patriarchy; they hence experience patriarchy differently. Besides class, race and ethnicity, marital status and age are recognised as particularly crucial identities with regard to accessing land: hence land reform programmes normally have differential effects on different categories of women.

In terms of the last two points, it is important to reiterate that the specific focus of this article is women as farmers on redistributed A1 farms under fast track. Other gendered spatial sites and other categories of women are the subject of studies in contemporary Zimbabwe, including still-existing resettlement farms dating back to the 1980s (Goebel, 2007), long-established communal areas (Steen, 2011; Paradza, 2011), new A2 fast track farms (Marongwe, 2008), and women in farm worker families remaining on white farms or displaced from these farms due to fast track (Hartnack, 2007; Magaramombe, 2010; Rutherford, 2008). Additionally, on a significant number of A1 farms, there remain farm worker families (often unemployed) as well as new workers (Hanlon et al., 2013). Our article focuses on women on A1 farms who received land through the fast track resettlement programme, normally through their husbands as we discuss later.

Women and pre-fast track land reform in Zimbabwe

The linkages between land, space and culture in Zimbabwe are profoundly about the construction and reconstruction of masculinity and femininity. In patrilineal societies, such as among the Shona (both Goromonzi and Mazowe are largely dominated by Shona speaking groups) in Zimbabwe (at least as reconfigured under decades of colonialism), women’s access to land has been mediated by their relationship to men. In communal (or customary) areas, where land is traced back to male ancestors, married women have for instance been viewed as outsiders with only secondary rights to land. In terms of inheritance, land is normally passed down through men from generation to generation. Under colonial conditions, the civil statutory legal framework reinforced customary law and practice based on patriarchy. Hence, rural women’s lack of at least formal land rights was historically underpinned by the definition of their legal status as minors (Stewart, 1992; Maboreke, 1991; Gaidzanwa, 1994).

At independence, in 1980, the post-colonial government led by the ruling party – Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) – had ‘no clear agenda for gendered social transformation’ (Ranchod-Nilsson, 2008: 645) although there was isolated policy, institutional and programmatic attempts to address gender discrimination. For example, the provisions of the Legal Age of Majority Act (1982) meant that women – like men – now enjoyed majority status at eighteen years of age. This was successfully challenged though, at least with reference to inheritance, in the Magaya vs Magaya Supreme Court case in 1999, which once again reduced women to ‘junior males’ without full inheritance rights. With regard to this and similar subsequent reversals, Ranchod-Nilsson (2006: 50) talks of a ‘full backward swing of a pendulum of gender social transformation’; in other words, early post-colonial efforts at gender levelling did not seriously challenge patriarchy.

This had a particular significance for rural women in that colonial-style customary law and practice continued to prevail in communal areas, notably given the reinvigorated political alliance which the ruling party soon sought with chiefs in customary spaces. This occurred even though a parallel system of elected local government (district councils) was also initiated and implemented by the central state in communal settings, with some control over land affairs. Married women therefore continued to be allocated land through their husband and not in their own right (Zimbabwe Women’s Resource Network, 1994). This is true despite the justifiable claim made by Pasuru (2010: 449), in examining land reform in Zimbabwe, that a distinction should be drawn between official customary law and local customary practice, with the latter involving processes of negotiation and ‘to a certain extent’ empowering women. Local exceptions in fact tended to confirm the abiding dominance of some form of patriarchy in communal spaces.

A similar scenario existed in the early resettlement programme from 1980 onwards, because occupation permits for plots on the redistributed farms were assigned to married couples in the husband’s name only (Chenaux-Repond, 1993; Goebel, 1999; Jacobs, 2003). In the case of resettlement farms, however, there was some scope for undercutting dimensions of patriarchal structures because these gendered spaces – which were by no means devoid of patriarchal discourses and practices – were not formally dominated and disciplined by the chieftainship system and customary law. Indeed, resettlement policies and processes during the 1980s and 1990s opened up tactical opportunities for some women, especially widows, to improve their access to arable land (Goebel, 2005a: 152). On the death of her husband, a resettlement widow in many cases was able to retain control of the homestead and fields, and to have the name on the resettlement permit changed from her husband’s (in whose name exclusively the permit was originally held) to her own. Married women also reported that their families’ access to large arable fields in resettlement areas improved their ability to grow crops under their own control, even when they were not apportioned small fields to plant their own crops as regularly took place in customary areas.

However, as a general trajectory in relation to the pre-2000 land redistribution programme, the following is undoubtedly true: ‘Unfortunately, debates about imminent land … reform are constructed around issues of race and economic efficiency, leaving those related to gender as a largely unanalysed set of assumptions’ (Kesby, 1999: 38). In resettlement farms during this time period a specific variant of patriarchy existed, no matter how different it may have been from customary areas, from which many resettlement families came. In this context, the Women and Land Lobby Group (WLLG), now Women and Land in Zimbabwe (WLZ), was formed in 1998 by women activists to bring about gender-sensitive land reform (Chingarande, 2008). In the late 1990s it lobbied the Zimbabwean government constantly to include women’s concerns and interests in the design and implementation of land reform, and it (along with other groups) made some inroads in improving women’s formal rights to land as stated at least in certain policy documents from the early 2000s. A good example of this is the 20% land quota for women under the fast track land reform programme.

Land occupations and plot access

While this article focuses on fast track A1 farms as already established, it is important to touch briefly upon the land occupations which led to the state’s fast track land reform programme, particularly insofar as gender is concerned and how women’s involvement in the occupations may have had an effect on access to plots on A1 farms. The term jambanja (a Shona term literally meaning chaos or disorder) has been regularly used to depict the land occupations which emerged in the early months of the year 2000 and – for the many critics of fast track (Hammar et al., 2003) – this is seen as a fitting and full description. Undoubtedly, the occupations were marked in many instances by significant forms of violence and intimidation by occupiers (and also by farmers defending their lands), and indeed the pattern of occupations seemed unplanned and haphazard. But there is considerable evidence which suggests a ‘method to the madness’.

Though the occupations were marked by substantial district-level and local farm-level specificities, informal arrangements existed and formal structures were regularly put in place to coordinate the activities of occupiers (Chaumba et al., 2003, Sadomba, 2011), including the formation of Committees of Seven on each farm. The committees, which emerged as a form of local authority on the occupied farms, included a women’s representative, though the critical position of chief of security on farms was rarely a woman. Coordination of occupations took place at farm level and across farms and involved land occupiers, district-level war veteran groups, local state structures, ruling party personnel and sometimes farm workers. Nevertheless, insofar as the occupations were framed in terms of (and indeed did entail) some sort of militarised engagement, as expressed most vividly in the notion of the Third Chimurenga (or war of liberation), the land occupations took on pronounced masculinised identities.

This is not to deny that women from customary areas played important functions in the occupations and at times even took up leadership roles. Researches in both Mazowe and Goromonzi show that women were active participants often cooking and offering domestic services as well as being at the forefront of occupations. However, their roles mostly reflected the assumption of women being mainly domestic bound. In relation to Masvingo, Scoones et al. (2010: 55) noted that:

Women were able to join the land occupations freely, and were warmly welcomed. … [T]hey often took on highly gendered roles in the base camps (including cooking, collecting firewood and water), and were rarely in top leadership positions … For other women, gendered domestic obligations in the communal area home – notably looking after the home and children – meant that they could not join the land occupations.

In her study of Merrivale Farm in Mwenezi district in Masvingo province, Mutopo (2011a) reiterates the point that women were not able to engage fully in occupying the farm because of family responsibilities in the nearby customary areas, but she stresses that many single, divorced and widowed women did occupy farms. Other cases highlight a more significant role of women from communal lands in occupations, including effectively taking the lead. The study by Chingarande (2010) of ‘ordinary’ women now living in Nyambamba resettlement area in Chinanimani district is a good illustration of this, though their key involvement in large part arose because most men in the nearby customary areas were employed elsewhere at the time of the nation-wide occupation movement. At times, women as war veterans or with important political party affiliations spurred on the occupations, such as in Mazowe district (Chiweshe, 2011; Sadomba, 2011).

Overall, the role of women in occupations was not translated into direct access to plots on A1 farms, at least in the case of married women. Married women on A1 farms, as discussed below, normally had their presence formalised by the state in and through their husband, and this simply reproduced the conditions prevailing in customary areas. The position of unmarried women – divorced, widowed or single – is particularly important. Many unmarried women from customary areas took advantage of the widespread movements onto commercial farms during jambanja in seeking to gain access to land which was not available to them (or which they had lost) in customary areas because of their unmarried status; and, in certain cases, their status as occupiers was formalised by the state under fast track. In this regard, it is quite common for widows and divorcees in customary areas to be accused of witchcraft and causing the death of husbands by in-laws (particularly in HIV and AIDS cases), and they are frequently even chased away by their in-laws (Chaumba et al., 2003). Hence, for some women, the ‘emancipatory potentials of joining a new community’ (Scoones et al., 2010: 52) were embedded in the occupations .

Land tenure

One of the most controversial topics in relation to fast track is the question of land tenure on resettled farms – both tenure per se and the gendered character of it. Across the country, occupants, if their occupation was not ratified on the particular farm occupied, were often reallocated a plot on another farm; either way, their presence had to be formalised through an offer letter. Others not involved in the occupations could make formal applications for A1 plots under the fast track programme and receive offer letters on this basis. A1 farms, like customary areas, are state lands without freehold title (and A1 plots officially cannot be sold or leased to others, or mortgaged). The Zimbabwean government took a significant amount of time shaping and finalising the form of document (eventually a permit) to be granted to A1 farmers.

In terms of gender, the nation-wide land audit of fast track undertaken by the Utete Commission (2003) indicates that 18% of A1 plot-holders were women in their own right, and this is only two percentage points below the target set by government. More recent statistics do not offer a substantially different picture (Matondi, 2012). Quite often, these plot-holders were unmarried women (divorced, widowed or single), while married women regularly accessed land through their husbands as the plot holders. The tendency for district and provincial land committees to be male-dominated (including representation of traditional authorities from customary areas) tended to reinforce gender biases in the land allocation and registration processes (Gaidzanwa, 2011).

Moyo et al. (2009) argue that the form of land tenure on A1 farms is different from that in customary areas and that, if only very partially, this difference compensates for (but certainly does not justify) the skewed formal access which is advantageous to men. They thus argue that ‘the land rights being bestowed in the newly resettled areas are qualitatively different from the prevailing tenure system in communal areas … [The A1 permits] confer significantly more rights for women … than in the communal areas’ (Moyo et al., 2009: 26). They make reference specifically to the fact that the permit, in the case of married couples, is supposed to be registered in the names of both spouses and that if the permit is to be disposed of (with the intent of leaving the A1 farm permanently), this requires the consent of both spouses.

However, this official joint registration of husband and wife was only enacted in 2005, and it was not applied retrospectively; that is, it did not apply to offer letters or permits granted prior to the enactment (Matondi, 2012). Further, as Moyo et al. (2009) themselves note, the government cannot (or at least will not) force joint registration – even after 2005 –and it is not inclined to prevent reversal of joint registration to husband-only registration. Indeed, the government has claimed that the name or names appearing on permits is a private affair which needs to be decided upon within the domestic sphere. At times married women, whose name originally appeared on the offer letter, have been pressurised by their husband to have their name removed and women have sometimes bowed to this pressure in order to maintain cordial relations with their husband. One women who had land registered in her name stated that ‘there was no peace in the home and my husband complained all the time about me having land in my own name and even threatened to divorce me’ (Mazhawidza and Manjengwa, 2011: 30). Even in the case of the Nyambamba resettlement area (which was occupied and cleared of wattle by women), the names of the husbands of the female occupiers appeared on the offer letters as plot-holders because ‘their husbands processed all the paper work’ (Chingarande, 2010: 4).

The Goromonzi case highlighted such challenges for married women and illustrates the fact that patriarchal discourses and practices, from national to household level, reduce female interests to male interests in a unitary household seemingly devoid of all power relations regard to gender, with masculinity being presented as the primary if not exclusive signifier and embodiment of land. To some extent, any move towards joint registration tends to loosen the grip between land and patriarchy. At the same time, there is also negotiation taking place at household level concerning land tenure registration, with considerable give-and-take bargaining taking place which has a wider impact on lives and livelihoods. Thus not all A1 men insist on sole registration. Even more intriguing is the fact that not all women express regret about sole (male) registration. Hence there are women who have been able to offset certain disadvantages arising from the absence of formal land access as they manoeuvre within the patriarchal system to obtain ‘good working relationships with their husbands, and as part of differentiated production and livelihood activities focused on different activities’ (Scoones et al., 2010: 207).

Moyo et al. (2009) note that for married women already occupying A1 plots the prospect of divorce or death of the husband raises troublesome concerns in terms of on-going land access and security, particularly if joint registration has not taken place. In certain cases, the husband may remove his wife from the plot if they divorce or surviving relatives of the dead husband may claim the plot as their own. The loss by some women of access to A1 plots further to divorce has been noted, for example in Vungu-Gweru district in Midlands Province and Goromonzi district in Mashonaland East Province (Mazhawidza and Manjengwa, 2011). In the case of death, a 62-year old widowed woman on Nuanetsi Ranch in Masvingo Province, whose husband died in 2004, exclaimed: ‘I am afraid of going to Maranda [the communal area where she is from] because people there want the property that my husband left [and] the cattle, donkeys and other assets. I know they still want to grab this property forgetting that I am alive’ (Mutopo, 2011a: 19).

Existing evidence suggests that the prevailing practice is for widowed women to remain on the plot (and to ensure formal registration in her name if not done previously), though it may be that more elderly women are less likely to suffer loss of land (Mutopo, 2011a). Again, what happens in specific instances – of both widows and divorcees – is highly contested and is normally the result of local level negotiations. Overall, a patriarchal mode of organisation prevails on the A1 farms and this has impacted on questions of land tenure and access to the disadvantage of women. This has been reinforced over the past few years by the implanting of male-dominated chieftainship systems from the customary areas and into the A1 farms (Chiweshe, 2011; Murisa, 2010). Backing this up is the on-going significance given to customary law by the Zimbabwean state with regard to questions about marriage, divorce and inheritance. As a general trend, then, fast track ‘has perpetuated the customary property rights in favour of men’ (Matondi, 2012: 201).

Agricultural production and livelihood activities

On A1 fast track farms, women are a mixture of plot-holders, wives of plot-holders, ‘small houses’ (this is the term used for women in extramarital affairs with farmers and living on the farm while the wife of the plot-holder is resident elsewhere and does not know of this other woman at the farm), and daughters and relatives of plot-holders (along with new and old farm workers). Despite the diversity of women (for instance, of different marital statuses and ages), the organisation of production and livelihood activities on A1 farms is gendered in many ways with regard to both relations of production and the division of labour. Quite clearly, for instance, women provide most of the agricultural labour – as well as being farmers in their own right and care-givers.

In terms of plot-holding, female-headed households on A1 farms generally employ workers whereas households headed by men, who at times may be absent from the farm, use their wives and family labour as farm labourers. However, the subservient position of married women does not necessarily translate into lack of access to land and agricultural produce. Women are often allocated pieces of land by their husbands to grow their own crops, such as groundnuts and round nuts, from which they earn some independent income. This is based on the traditional practice in communal areas of providing women access to tseu (loosely translated this means ‘women’s field’). Such access is not guaranteed because it is sometimes contingent on the wife bearing one or two children. These small fields lead to the distinction in production between men’s and women’s crops. Men’s crops, such as maize and cotton, are often cash crops, have a larger market and offer bigger returns. These crops dominate production and everyone in the household labours for their production. Women’s crops provide minimal income because they are practised on a smaller scale (Mutopo, 2011a; Chingarande, 2010).

The increased size of the fields in fast track farms (and their greater yields as compared to communal lands) has meant that A1 farmers are able to grow a greater range of crops with distinct advantages for women, as many of these crops are ‘women’s crops’. In more than 65% of A1 farms at Buena Vista and Dunstan (in Goromonzi) women have been allocated a field or fields by their husbands. Men who did not allocate fields to their wives referred to customary law and practice as preventing subdivision of land, and that the fields were therefore meant for their use only; though at times women’s crops could be grown interspersed amongst men’s crops. This gendered division is also at times reflected in animal husbandry, with women pursuing the raising of chickens and goats and men focusing on cattle production (Scoones et al., 2010).

Overall, women at A1 farms make the point, as articulated by one woman in Goromonzi, that ‘here we have got enough land to grow our crops, crops for mother and father’. Their lives have improved compared to past experiences in customary areas, though this is regularly mediated through marriage in the case of couples. They are better able to meet their goal of, for example, providing nutritious foods for their families, as well as sometimes producing a small surplus for sale which provides them with cash over which, generally, they exert exclusive control. The testimony from one woman who came with her family from Gwaze communal lands to Dunstan Farm is revealing. She notes:

We came from a polygamous family so when the father of my husband died the eldest son took over the place. We were left with no place to till so we decided to join the invaders. The agricultural situation is good compared to Gwaze. Our yields have improved very much from where we were with a household producing an average of 3–4 tonnes of maize and 8–10 bales of cotton. The soils we now till do not demand as much fertilizer compared to where we came from. The agricultural situation is good basing on what we have seen so far because there are rich soils and good yields.

At Dunstan and Buena Vista, there is abundant pasture for grazing (as well as wild game), which the A1 farmers said they never imagined as feasible prior to fast track reform.

One woman claimed that those few A1 farmers who were complaining were lazy because her life had been transformed since coming onto the farm. She went on to say:

We are producing enough to consume and sell annually. In the reserves [customary areas] I never reached a tonne of maize despite working very hard. Now I can afford to produce about 5 tonnes annually which is very different from where I came from. Now I have my own piece of land which no one has control over; it is only for me and my family.

This woman is from one of the households considered the poorest in their former customary areas; such households had come to the A1 farm with minimal property but had managed to obtain a plot of their own and to acquire livestock and other moveable assets.

Women on A1 farms may earn considerable income as well from horticulture. At Dunstan, for instance, they do this by relying upon water from open dams, swamps and the river. For those few households on A1 farms with wells for water, there is evidence of small gardens for minor crops grown behind homesteads. As a livelihood strategy, women are highly involved in this. A1 women farmers grow and sell tomatoes, onions, cabbages and vegetables to nearby customary areas as a way of raising income. Women are also involved in a range of other (and often) non-agricultural based livelihood activities. In this regard, fast track has opened access to new spaces and resources to engage in a variety of such activities. For our study areas of Goromonzi and Mazowe, it is possible to distinguish between two main interrelated endeavours: natural resource extraction and trading-based income-generating activities. Both men and women are involved in extraction of natural resources (often for sale), which includes honey-gathering, gold-panning and collecting grass, firewood, poles and pit sand. However these activities are gender-based with, for example, men pursuing brick-making from the sand collected as well as gold-panning.

Women on A1 farms also pursue a range of informal trading activities (besides selling vegetables). Many are involved in making and selling peanut butter to nearby communal areas, or in brewing beer, and some women have opened tuck shops where various groceries and snacks are sold. In Goromonzi, tailoring and selling clothes are both undertaken by a large proportion of females. In fact, 60% of women indicated that they were involved in selling new and second-hand clothing (commonly known as mabhero) as a way of generating income to buy salt, relish and other domestic commodities. For A1 women generally, this may entail cross-border trading on a regular basis into South Africa, Botswana and Mozambique where items such as pumpkin leaves, groundnuts, woven products (such as baskets, hats and mats) and mopane worms are sold (Mutopo, 2011a).

Women and social reproduction

The movement into the former commercial farming areas was, for most A1 farmers, a promising step towards better livelihoods. What most had not envisaged was that an opportunity to change their lives for the better at times became, at least initially, a difficult everyday struggle in terms of social reproduction. The large-scale movement led to an increased demand on the existing farm infrastructure which was created in the first place to support a limited number of people only. The challenges faced by new A1 farmers in terms of social reproduction should also be understood in the context of Zimbabwe’s economic and political crisis which led to state incapacity at many levels. Resettlement ideally should go hand-in-hand with adequate state support in terms of infrastructure and social amenities, but post-settlement interventions of this kind have not been vigorously pursued under fast track.

In the year 2000, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs stated: ‘We cannot hide the fact that the Fast Track Programme has room for improvements.’ For example, the settlers require access roads, water supplies, schools, clinics, dip tanks, draught power, initial seeds and fertilizers, extension services, training and many more which the government was unable to provide. The government did not have the funds or the capacity to intervene in social reproduction support and, despite some progress being made, broadly speaking this has been the case since 2000. This had led to particular burdens on women specifically, as noted by Chingarande (2008:287): ‘[T]he paucity of basic social facilities in the resettlement areas would impact on women specifically because they are the caregivers of children (schools), the sick (clinics) and families (water and other necessities)’.

In the case of the increased demand for health services, the Mazowe District Council (and other district councils) reacted by setting up various satellite clinics in the district. These clinics were set up by converting former farm houses into patient treating rooms. However the clinics are under-equipped, under-staffed and do not meet the minimum required standards outlined by the World Health Organisation. For example, the architectural design of the houses was intended to meet residential needs and not for medical purposes. For instance, in all of the clinics there are no drug rooms as per the standard requirement. Staff members on site at some of these clinics are not qualified to provide proper health care. In the case of Mazowe, though, the facilities nevertheless ensure that some 81% of all A1 farmers in the district walk need to walk less than two kilometres to get to a clinic.

The limited number of health facilities complicates the lives of women because they are generally responsible for collecting medicine for household members. In addition, in relation to maternity, this limitation places women at serious risk during pregnancy. In Goromonzi, at both Dunstan and Buena Vista farms, there are no clinics; as a result, women walk close to 25 km to the town of Goromonzi in search of medical treatment or medication. One woman at Dunstan testified that she delivered her baby girl while on her way to Goromonzi Clinic (in town) and that she had also been working in the fields that very day.

Patriarchal practices continue to shape care work on A1 farms with women being primary care-givers. Women are thus also involved in emotional and palliative care of the sick especially those infected and affected by HIV and AIDS. Studies by Buve et al. (2002) and Ritcher and Sherr (2008) indicate that movement of people as a result of migration or displacement enhances susceptibility to HIV infection, as household structures and relationships change. Access to HIV and AIDS treatment is generally difficult in Zimbabwe. However, in Mazowe, the Tariro Clinic at Howard Hospital offers programmes for tuberculosis treatment and HIV and AIDS antiretroviral therapy for free. It also runs a home-based care programme throughout the whole district. With regard to Goromonzi, access to antiretroviral therapy is through inadequately-funded government programmes and this means that many people have difficulties in accessing medication.

Our experiences in the field also highlight the ways in which women in particular are stigmatised when infected with HIV. The considerable stigma prevalent in the fast track areas makes it very difficult for women to openly declare their status. HIV is couched with many negative connotations, such as promiscuity, and those suspected of being ill are ridiculed through sayings such as ‘akarohwa nematsotsi’(was beaten by thieves) or ‘aka crossa red robot’ (‘crossed a red traffic light’, which is synonymous with an irreversible death situation).

With regard to health-related problems, inadequate sanitation is a major cause of concern for A1 farmers. There are very few facilities for sanitation, notably toilets, on A1 farms. In Village 2 at Dunstan farm in Goromonzi, only two people have proper toilet facilities while the rest rely on ‘bush’ toilets (which are a potential health hazard for the entire community). In Mazowe, the majority of farmers have access to safe drinking water from boreholes, protected wells and piped water. A small percentage of farmers still use unsafe sources of drinking such as dams, rivers and unprotected wells.

Women are in the main affected by water shortages because in rural communities it is their duty to collect water. The problems experienced by women are vividly portrayed in the following comment from a woman at Dunstan:

As women we always bear the burden of walking long distances in search of water… We don’t have rest. If we are to wash clothes then we have to dedicate the whole day to that particular activity since the [distance to the] place is long…This also takes part of our productive time when we should be in the fields.

Only 25% of the households at the Goromonzi farms studied had wells, with the balance of the households sometimes relying on water from the river which runs through the farms. At other times, women without access to wells collect water at the house of the agricultural extension officer located on the farm, or they fetch water from shallow and open wells or other unprotected sources (this occurs notably during summer after heavy rains and it may entail the use of sources from which cattle drink). At times Goromonzi women walk long distances in search of clean water, as far as 12 km to nearby Seke communal lands. Families without adequate sources of water of their own allocate about two hours every day for water-fetching (by women).

Intra-household relations

In marriage, Shona culture contains a clearly gendered construction of property ownership. The most valuable household property, such as agricultural implements, furniture, cattle and the buildings on the homestead, are regarded as belonging to the husband. The wife is said to own the kitchen utensils, which is property she has worked for and is over and above the duties to her husband’s land and domestic work. This is property given to her as a result of her status as a mother. This is known as ‘umai’ property, that is, property a woman has obtained through marriage or the pregnancy of a daughter.

Fast track households, like Zimbabwean households more broadly, have a pronounced gendered and patriarchal character. On the one hand, women work in the domestic sphere, grow women’s crops or engage in trading activities associated with feminine attributes; on the other hand, men are involved in activities embodying masculinity (such as in major crop production), in the marketing of produce (reflecting the male presence in the public sphere) and in household decision-making. Within households, women and girls are generally responsible for domestic duties which include cooking, washing, caring for children, and fetching water and firewood. In this regard, in both Mazowe and Goromonzi, A1 farmers use firewood as their key source of energy with electricity only available in the main farm houses. Discussions with men in Mazowe highlight that men would not be involved in domestic work unless they were subject to akadyiswa (‘cuckooed’), the belief that women at times make traditional concoctions to ensure that their husbands obey them.

Despite sometimes having space to manoeuvre, as a general tendency married women on A1 farms have restricted influence in decision-making over production, marketing and use of proceeds from agriculture. In Mazowe, women at farms allege that some men undertake off-farm marketing alone so that they can spend the money on beer and women. There are many cases at A1 farms of men controlling money and using it on their girlfriends. Decision-making ultimately resides in the father and this has consequences for food security in male-headed households. Resources are not always distributed equally within households and the food and other needs of women and children are sometimes sacrificed because of this. And men are often found to be in the forefront in controlling women’s crops. As one woman in Goromonzi argues:

The household setup is not fair, as men have full control of cash crops and as we women … are responsible for crops that are mainly for family consumption for example round nuts. The unfair part of it is, even if as women we sell surplus ‘women crops’, men’s hands will be seen when monies get on the table. That is the reason why we also engage ourselves in other non-agricultural income-generating activities in a bid to widen our income base.

Married women try to use their involvement in income-generating activities such as small-scale trading as a basis for facilitating a degree of autonomy and independence from their husbands, though – depending on the type of relationship existing between husband and wife – some money from sales may be surrendered to the husband with the wife openly or secretly withholding the balance (Chingarande, 2010). Mutopo (2011a) highlights the significance of women’s involvement in trading activities and argues that this is redefining gender relations. Husbands of these women, notably those involved in cross border trading, are now involved in domestic chores and caring for children when their wives travel and women are thereby gaining more control over household income. In this way, women ‘can have remarkable bargaining power in certain domains’ (Mutopo, 2011a: 1033) A similar situation may arise with respect specifically to growing and marketing vegetables, or women’s crops more generally. Chingarande (2008: 8), in the case of Nyambamba, therefore argues that, ‘Women actually felt empowered to have their own crops for which they make independent decisions. They even boasted that they issue out money to their husbands at times they did not have money’. However, there is considerable variation across A1 farms, households and marriages with regard to the involvement of women in household decision-making about production, marketing and consumption, such that bold statements are difficult to make. There is some evidence of a shift in the intra-household balance of gender-based power, albeit within patriarchy, on A1 farms.

An important trend on A1 farms is the presence of split households or the maintenance of dual homes. Most new farmers maintain two separate households as they try to cope with the uncertainty of fast track life. There are many reasons for these split households, but they appear to be a coping mechanism for protecting their land rights through maintaining their communal homes. Some farmers still farm on the communal plot while others have left their children or relatives on the land in case they ever need to return to their communal land. Others from urban areas have a house in the city which they maintain in addition to the farm. Split households mean that at any given time these farmers are trying to invest in and maintain both homes. However, such households have led to many social problems; for example, some men now have two wives (one in town or the communal area and the other one on the A1 farm). In other cases, as noted earlier, men are placing their ‘small houses’ (girlfriends) on the A1 farms.

These novel types of households are bringing with them a range of social phenomena such as absentee parenting, extramarital affairs and, often, personal and social traumas; and they may have long-term effects on gender relations within households in the fast track areas. A similar situation affecting intra-household relations arises with respect to farm workers. Female farm workers are largely despised by women among the A1 farmers, who accuse them of stealing their husbands especially during marketing seasons. Informal discussions with female farm workers at Ballyhooly Farm in Mazowe painted a picture in which, by day, A1 male farmers were accusing workers for being immoral, but by night these same farmers were busy visiting women in the worker compounds.

Women, traditional leadership and land governance

Women’s lack of access to decision-making affects their access to communal productive resources such as irrigation pipes, boreholes and farm equipment. Post-fast track farms in Zimbabwe are highly gendered as roles between men and women are based on patriarchal values. Such values determine where women are located within social systems and what assets they have at their disposal. Governance at farm level remains male dominated and this leaves women (especially single women) with little access to decision making. Rural Zimbabwe in fact continues to be dominated by traditional and customary authority steeped in patriarchal discourses, practices and norms. In this regard, the Zimbabwean government instituted measures in 1980 to legally empower women; but Alexander (1993: 160) argues that ‘the re-emergence of the traditional leadership was perhaps the most surprising development in rural politics after the war’ in Zimbabwe, thus questioning the extent to which patriarchal power was undermined during the war. On A1 farms a new form of quasi-traditional authority has been established through the imposition of headmen by traditional chiefs. These sabhuku/headmen are handpicked by the traditional chief and their duty includes safeguarding patriarchal traditional mores. The study in Goromonzi shows that customary rule is one way in which patriarchy was smuggled into the fast track farms.

The institution of sabhuku in its traditional sense is known as a hereditary position through male lineage. In the case of the new resettlement areas, where the institution has been adopted and modified, it has opened an opportunity for women to be part and parcel of a new traditionalism. Traditional chiefs, as the vanguard of Shona patriarchal customs, were at the forefront in Mazowe in appointing women to positions they knew were always male dominated. The ushering in of new traditions in this way provided space for women to gain access to positions that previously were not open to them. The number of female sabhuku however remains very low when compared to their male counterparts. This presence of women as sabhuku has not however translated into more (let alone equal) attention at farm level to issues that concern women. Meetings and decisions are made in a gender-blind manner without any regard for the specific challenges facing women. One female sabhuku at a farm complained that some farmers were disrespecting her because she was a woman. In the Committee of Seven, which is the most important decision-making body at farm level, women are mostly absent. In both Goromonzi and Mazowe there is one woman on each committee who was responsible strictly for women’s affairs. although the presence of this female member is generally no more than window-dressing, to make it appear that women’s issues are important. However, there areexamples in Mazowe of women gaining influential positions in farm level institutions. One notable example is the all-female Committee of Seven at Selby Farm (which, however, was not part of our case studies).

Contradictory effects for women on A1 farms

The arguments from this article indicate that the fast track resettlement programme has had contradictory effects on women’s lives and livelihoods on A1 farms. On the one hand, there has been an improvement in their socio-economic livelihoods. Agricultural production at fast track farms is considerably higher than in customary areas and this had a positive effect on women’s lives. The fast track farms have also offered women the opportunity to engage in a range of non-agricultural activities, sometimes offering them an independent source of income which, for married women, was not directly controlled by their husbands. On the other hand, women continue to carry specific duties and responsibilities, which have negative implications for their lives. For instance, a woman’s role as a caregiver makes their life arduous, given the inadequacies of the infrastructure and amenities on A1 farms. In addition, the gendered relations of production still shape the division of labour, such that women continue to be under the overall command of their husbands when it comes to decision-making about crop production and income.

Any improvement in women’s livelihoods is not due to any intentional or direct relaxation of patriarchy for and on A1 farms. Hence, though in large part insensitive to the land needs and rights of women, in some ways fast track nevertheless improved – albeit inadvertently – the lives of A1 women. In other words, just as colonial dispossession along racial lines led to the further subordination of women, fast track – in de-racialising land in contemporary Zimbabwe – has given scope to women to enhance their livelihoods. In this regard, women on A1 farms have not stood idly by but have shown evidence of agency in the fluctuating and fluid conditions of fast track. Despite the prevalence of patriarchy as an intertwined system of structures and practices, women have sought to identify and open up gaps and pursue new activities as they manoeuvre their way within (but not seemingly against) this system. In doing so, they soften the burden of patriarchy and ‘make the best out of a bad situation’. Women do not necessarily pursue these activities as a conscious effort to undercut patriarchy, though this may be an unintended consequence in the longer-term. As a general conclusion, it would seem that patriarchal structures and practices continue to prevail on A1 farms, that they are changing in certain ways and taking on new forms, and that the agency of women in seeking to redefine gender relations are occurring largely within the confines of these mutating forms.