Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T21:59:46.688Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Who Is Losing Out? Structural Adjustment, Gender, and the Agricultural Sector in Zambia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Extract

In Zambia's first multi-party elections for two decades, the Movement for Multiparty Democracy (M.M.D.) won a landslide victory over Kenneth Kaunda's United Independence Party (U.N.I.P) on 31 October 1991. Many observers believe that the sweeping 80 per cent majority gained by Frederick Chiluba and his M.M.D. in both urban and rural areas was to a large degree due to the increasing economic hardships most Zambians have been subjected to over the last years. The opposition's slogan ‘The Hour Has Come’ captured the mood of many who had lost patience with the gross economic mismanagement and wastefulness that characterised the Government.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Africa South (Harare), 10 1991, p. 20.Google Scholar

2 The Economist (London), 5 10 1991, p. 58.Google Scholar

3 Chongo, Rabbison, Minister of Finance, reported in Business Day (Johannesburg), 13 09 1991.Google Scholar

4 Young, Roger and Loxley, John, Zambia: an assessment of Zambia's structural adjustment experience (Ottawa, 1990);Google ScholarAndersson, Per-Åke and Kayizzi-Mugerwa, Steve, Zambia: macro-economic studies (Stockholm, 1989);Google Scholar and Andersson, Per-Åke, Zambia's Experience with Structural Adjustment in the 1980's (Gothenburg, 1990).Google Scholar

5 Gallaghy, T. M., ‘Lost between State and the Market’, in Nelson, J. M. (ed.), Economic Crisis and Policy Choice: the politics of adjustment in the Third World (Princeton, 1990), p. 301.Google Scholar

6 Republic of Zambia, Evaluation of the Performance of Zambia's Maize Sub-Sector (Lusaka, 1990), p. 15.Google Scholar

7 World Bank, World Development Report, 1991Google Scholar. The Challenge of Development (Washington, D.C., 1991), pp. 244 and 250.Google Scholar

8 Business Day, 13 September 1991Google Scholar, and The Star (Johannesburg), 25 09 1991.Google Scholar

9 The Star, 25 September 1991.

10 Africa South, October 1991, p. 24.

11 Zambia, New Economic Recovery Programme. Fourth National Development Plan, 1989–93 (Lusaka, 1989),Google Scholar and Zambia, Policy Framework Paper, 1989–93 (Lusaka, 1989).Google Scholar

12 World Bank, op. cit. p. 208.

13 Business Day, 2 November 1991.

14 Zambia/I.M.F., Economic and Financial Policy Framework, 1991–93 (Lusaka, 1991), p. 6.Google Scholar

15 The Economist, 5 October 1991.

16 Prices and Income Commission, ‘The Social Effects of Structural Adjustment Programmes on Vulnerable Groups’, Lusaka, 1990, Workshop Report.Google Scholar

17 Business Day, 9 Novembe1991.

18 Andersson, op. cit. p. 31.

19 Good, Kenneth, ‘Systemic Agricultural Mismanagement: the 1985 “bumper” harvest in Zambia’, in The Journal of Modern African Studies (Cambridge), 24, 1, 03 1986, p. 279.Google Scholar

20 Callaghy, loc. cit. p. 296.

21 Ibid. pp. 296 and 302.

22 Times of Zambia (Lusaka), 25 10 1991.Google Scholar

23 Zambia Daily Mail, 30 October 1991.

24 As explained by Bolt, Richard and Silawe, Mary, ‘Maize Production in Northern Province: a review of issues from farm level production to provincial policies’, Kasama, n.d., p. 15, the Northern Province Co-operative Union had only 19 of the 160 trucks needed to move the harvested crop during the 1987–9 season, and as a result almost half the maize was either wasted or remained in unsafe storage. According to Zambia Industrial and Mining Corporation/Zambia Co-operative Federation (ZIMCO/S.C.F.), A Report of Transport Development for the Cooperative Movement in Zambia (Lusaka, 1989), p. 51, the poor condition of most feeder roads meant that an 8-ton truck could only make one trip a day, covering on average a distance of no more than 50–70 kilometres.Google Scholar

25 Social Action Programme for 1990–93 (Lusaka, 1990), pp. 12 and 18.Google Scholar

26 ZIMCO/Z.C.F., op. cit. p. 39.

27 Times of Zambia, 10 October 1990.

28 Ibid. 14 December 1990.

29 Evaluation of Zambia's Maize Sub-Sector, p. 20.

30 According to ZIMCO/Z.C.F., op. cit. p. 52, private transporters were estimated in 1989 to be earning on average four times more on good than bad roads, not counting each vehicle's lower long-term cost of wear-and-tear.

31 Zambia Daily Mail, 27 October 1990.

32 Times of Zambia, 2 October 1990.

33 Ibid. 12 January 1991.

34 Fourth National Development Plan, 1989–93, p. 90.

35 According to the Evaluation of Zambia's Maize Sub-Sector, p. 164, the smuggling of this grain into Zaïre was estimated in 1990 to offer a 700 per cent mark-up compared to official Zambian prices.Google Scholar

36 For example, Scott, Guy, in an interview with Africa South, October 1991.Google Scholar

37 According to the Times of Zambia, 29 July 1991, Chief Mpezeni of the Eastern Province was reported to have been ‘only too willing to admit he has allowed his subjects to sell their maize to ADMARC in Malawi because ECU took long to pay’.Google Scholar

38 Evaluation of Zambia's Maize Sub-sector, p. 34.

39 Times of Zambia, 10 October 1990.

40 Ibid. 12 February 1991.

41 The Government issued a directive in August 1990 that ‘this year the farmer will get fertilizer as well as seed on a cash basis only as opposed to the twelve month credit which was allowed last year’ — Prices and Maize Marketing Arrangements for the 1990–91 Season (Lusaka, 1990), p. 1. Yet in October and November, farmers were busy applying for loans at their primary societies, some of which promised to give inputs to approved members on a basis of trust.Google Scholar

42 Times of Zambia, 14 December 1990.

43 Ibid. 12 January 1991.

44 Zambia Daily Mail, 31 October 1991.

45 Ibid. 2 October 1991.

46 Mwale, Haswell, reported in Times of Zambia, 30 October 1991.Google Scholar

47 Ibid. 1 November 1991.

48 Zambia Daily Mail, 30 October 1991.

49 Sunday Times of Zambia (Lusaka), 10 1991.Google Scholar

50 Times of Zambia, 30 October 1991.

51 Sunday Times of Zambia, October 1991.

52 United Nations Development Programme (U.N.D.P.), Human Development Report, 1990 (New York, 1990), p. 160.Google Scholar

53 Sunday Times of Zambia, 16 December 1990.

54 Weekly Post (Lusaka), 27 09–3 10 1991.Google Scholar

55 Cornia, Giovanni Andrea, Jolly, Richard, and Stewart, Frances (eds.), Adjustment with a Human Face, Vol. I, Protecting the Vulnerable and Promoting Growth, and Vol. 2, Country Case Studies (Oxford, 1987 and 1988).Google Scholar

56 World Bank, World Development Report, 1990. Poverty (Washington, D.C., 1990), p. 3.Google Scholar

57 World Development Report, 1991, pp. 204 and 206.

58 United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef), The State of the World's Children (Oxford, 1987), quoted in Andersson, op. cit. p. 26.Google Scholar

59 International Labour Office, Zambia. Basic Needs in an Economy under Pressure (Addis Ababa, 1981), p. xxi.Google Scholar

60 Human Development Report, 1990, p. 158.

61 Andersson and Kayizzi-Mugerwa, op. cit. p. 57.

62 ‘The Social Effects of [S.A.Ps] on Vulnerable Groups’, p. 15.

63 Weekly Post, 20–26 September 1991.

64 Social Action Programme for 1990–93, pp. 7ff.

65 Chipulu, Protasio, ‘North-Western Area Development Project. Nutrition’, Working Paper No. 6, Lusaka, 1990, pp. 3 and 5.Google Scholar

66 Social Action Programme for 1990–93, p. 5.

67 Fourth National Development Plan, 1989–93, pp. 324ff.

68 Social Action Programme for 1990–93, p. 9.

69 Quoted in Muntemba, Dorothy, ‘Position Paper Zambia’, Inter-Regional Meeting on Economic Distress, Structural Adjustment and Women, 13–14 June 1991, Lancaster House, London, 1991, p. 11.Google Scholar

70 Social Action Programme for 1990–93, p. 17, and Pearce, Richard, Food Consumption Subsidies in Zambia (Oxford, 1989), p. 31.Google Scholar

71 Pearce, op. cit. p

72 Elson, Diane, ‘The Impact of Structural Adjustment on Women: concepts and issues’, in Onimode, Bade (ed), The IMF, the World Bank and the African Debt, Vol. 2, The Social and Political Impact (London and New Jersey, 1989), p. 72.Google Scholar

73 Bolt, Richard, Silawe, Mary, and Bolt, Masami, ‘Food Availability and Consumption Patterns in Northern Province ARPT Trial Areas’, Kasama, 1988, Economic Studies No. 3, p. 15.Google Scholar

74 Social Action Programme for 1990–93, pp. 1, 3, and 22.

75 Sollis, Peter and Moser, Caroline, ‘A Methodological Framework for Analyzing the Social Costs of Adjustment at the Micro-Level: the case of Guayaquil, Ecuador’, in IDS Bulletin (Brighton), 22, 1, 01 1991, p. 23.Google Scholar

76 Elson, loc. cit. p

77 Sen, Amartya, Resources, Values, and Development (Cambridge, MA, 1984), pp. 374ff.Google Scholar

78 Elson, loc. cit. p

79 Elson, Diane, ‘Male Bias in Macro-Economics: the case of structural adjustment’, in Elson, Male Bias in the Development Process (Manchester, 1991), p. 165.Google Scholar

80 Elson, ‘The Impact of Structural Adjustment on Women’, p. 58.

81 Zambia/Swedish International Development Authority, Women's Development Programmes. Report to the 1981 GRZ/SIDA Mission on Agricultural Sector Support (Lusaka/Stockholm, 1981), p. 29.Google Scholar

82 Evans, ‘The Implications of Economic Reforms for Women in Zambia’. Also Gisela Geisler, ‘Women Do Not Grow Cash Crops, They Only Grow for the Family: gendered divisions of labour amongst the Toka of Zambia’, Bergen, 1990.

84 Skønsberg, Elsa, The Kefa Records: everyday life among women and men in a Zambian village (Oslo, 1981), pp. 48ff,Google Scholar and Kongstad, Per and Mönstedt, Mette, Family, Labour and Trade in Western Kenya (Uppsala, 1980), pp. 115ff.Google Scholar

85 Geisler, Gisela and Narrowe, Elizabeth, Not So Good, But Quite Ambitious: women and men coping with structural adjustment in rural Zambia (Stockholm, 1990), p. 36.Google Scholar

86 This is probably most evident by the fact that traditional cassava cultivation areas still lack both adequate storage and processing facilities for maize at the household level.

87 Information about the division of labour and incomes is somewhat contradictory. Bolt, Richard and Holdsworth, Ian, ‘Farming Systems Economy and Agricultural Commercialisation’, Kasama, 1987, p. 7, point out that ‘the responsibility for traditional crops increases for women with commercialization.Google Scholar According to Geisler, Gisela, Keller, Bonnie, and Chuzo, Pia, The Needs of Rural Women in Northern Province (Lusaka, 1985), p. 7, women in the area controlled incomes from the sale of beans. But this conclusion was modified by the findings of a 1986 O.D.A.–sponsored survey that women shared control with men;Google Scholar see Young, Kate and Evans, Alison, Gender Issues in Household Labour Allocation (London, n.d.), p. 67.Google Scholar

88 Geisler and Narrowe, op. cit. p. 21.

89 Agri-Link (Kasama), 6, 3, n.d.Google Scholar

90 Times of Zambia, 1 October 1990.

91 Constantina Safilios-Rothchild, The Policy Implications of the Roles of Women in Agriculture in Zambia (Lusaka, 1985), p. 34, Ministry of Agriculture Planning Division Studies No. 20.Google Scholar

92 Geisler and Narrowe, op. cit. p. 41.

93 In some areas of the Eastern Province, close to the provincial capital, Chipata, farmers drastically increased their production of vegetables, which until the crucial 1989 season had been a minor source of cash. Unfortunately, the restricted urban market became oversupplied, and as a result prices were depressed and the marketing of these highly perishable crops often became uneconomical. Yet farmers did not appear to either reduce production or branch out to more ‘storage friendly’ varieties.

94 Geisler and Narrowe, op. cit. p. 30.

95 As reported in the Daily Express, 13 September 1991, p. 24, the equivalent value of up to 8 bags of maize was by then needed to buy a pair of leather shoes.Google Scholar

96 Dwyer and Bruce, quoted in Elson (ed.), op. cit. p. 184.

97 Evans, op. cit. p. 42.

98 Richards, Audrey I., Land, Labour and Diet in Northern Rhodesia: an economic study of the Bemba tribe (London, 1939), p. 145.Google Scholar

99 I.L.O., op. cit. p. 23.

100 Geisler, Keller, and Chuzo, op. cit. p. 17.

101 United Nations, Branch for the Advancement of Women, ‘Possible Social Consequences of the Economic Crisis: increased violence in the family and society’, Vienna, 1988, p. 5.

102 Elson, ‘Male Bias in Macro-Economics’, p. 185.

103 Commonwealth Secretariat, Engendering Adjustment for the 1990's. Report of a Commonwealth Expert Group on Women and Structural Adjustment (London, 1990), p. 7.Google Scholar

104 Fourth National Development Plan, 1989–93, p. 90.

105 Ndalemei, Likolo, ‘Pricing Policy of Agricultural Produce in Zambia’, Uppsala, 1989, International Rural Development Centre, Working Paper No. 110.Google Scholar

106 Good, loc. cit. pp. 287ff.

107 Fourth National Development Plan, 1989–95, p. 91.

108 Good, loc. cit. p. 4

109 Times of Zambia, 25 October 1991.

110 Bernstein, Hilda, Crow, Ben, Mackintosh, Maureen, and Martin, Charlotte (eds.), The Food Question: profits versus people? (London, 1990), p. 4.Google Scholar

111 Loxley, John, Structural Adjustment and Rural Markets in Zambia (Geneva, 1990), pp. 82ff.Google Scholar

112 Bernstein, Hilda, ‘Agricultural Modernisation and the Era of Structural Adjustment: observations on sub-Saharan Africa’, in the Journal of Peasant Studies (London), 18, 1, 1990, p. 22.Google Scholar

113 Pankhurst, Donna and Jacobs, Susie, ‘Land Tenure, Gender Relations, and Agricultural Production: the case of Zimbabwe's peasantry’, in Davison, Jean (ed.), Agriculture, Women, and the Land: the African experience (Boulder, 1988), p. 212.Google Scholar

114 Evans, op. cit. p. 7.

115 Elson, ‘The Impact of Structural Adjustment on Women’, p. 71.

116 Bernstein, ‘Agricultural Modernisation and the Era of Structural Adjustment’, p. 23.

117 Bernstein, Crow, Macintosh, and Martin (eds.), op. cit. p. 4.

118 Hellinger, Doug, ‘The Art of Creating Poverty’, in New Internationalist (Oxford), 12 1990, p. 21.Google Scholar

119 Times of Zambia, 14 December 1991.

120 Zambia, , Speech. Ceremonial State Opening of Parliament of the First Session of the Seventh National Assembly by The President Mr Frederick J. T. Chiluba. 29th November, 1991 (Lusaka, 1991).Google Scholar