He said total unutilised land accounts for 45% of land available for agriculture, posing a threat to the country’s food security. He said there are vast areas of allocated agricultural land which is not wholly used or underutilised, adding that the ministry’s 2016/2017 performance report reflects that the total land available for arable agriculture is 920,000 hectares of which 420,000 is currently unutilised.
“The size of arable agricultural land belonging to Department of Agricultural Research (DAR) countrywide is 892.3 hectares in which about 143.3 hectares is undeveloped and not in use,” said Ralotsia. He said the department also has 26,865 hectares of land for livestock research in which 2,260 hectares is unused from 11 livestock research ranches.He said the current land allocation system especially tribal land areas encourages speculation and rent seeking behaviours, resulting in extensive idle and underutilised land and does not support access to land by the most productive farmers.
