Land reform on its own is not a cure for all rural economic development challenges. Land redistribution addresses the problem of land access – a key resource in generating farm-based employment and income – but, in addition, there is the need to create non-farm employment within
the new rural spaces. This is an issue of central importance for agricultural development policy: not
only because there are many people in rural areas who are landless or not involved in agricultural
production, and who, therefore, do not benefit directly from land reform provisions, but also because
large-scale agricultural investment projects, and increases in the productivity and efficiency of
agriculture, may lead to people being displaced from land. the impact of agricultural development decisions on non-farm employment is often disregarded by policy-makers, who assume that those not finding employment in agriculture can be absorbed into the economy in other ways.
