The Zimbabwean government has begun compensating white former commercial farmers whose land was acquired during the country’s Land Reform Programme.
Finance, Economic Development and Investment Promotion Minister Mthuli Ncube announced that the government has issued US$307.9 million in Treasury bonds and disbursed US$3.1 million in cash to 378 farmers, as part of the Global Compensation Deed (GCD).
The cash payment accounts for one percent of the total US$311 million earmarked for the first round of compensation.
So far, the Land Compensation Committee has approved 740 claims. According to Ncube, the remaining balance will be paid through a 10-year bond denominated in US dollars. Said Ncube:
On the matter of compensation, BIPPA (Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement) farmers, as you know in the budget we set aside $20 million equivalent for that compensation. That is going to begin in earnest in this last quarter of the year.
We have been going through a verification process and that process is now producing credible results. We know who they are, who they are not, so we will be able to begin the compensation process.
The Global Compensation Deed, signed in 2020, was a landmark agreement aimed at resolving a long-standing deadlock between the government and former white commercial farmers.
Under the terms of the GCD, the government committed to paying US$3.5 billion to the former farm owners as compensation for improvements made on the land—not for the land itself.
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