Buyiswa “Steri” Ndyenga started picking citrus as a schoolgirl on a farm in the Sundays River Valley.
Tim Mossholder / Unsplash / Illustrative purposes only
Today, she runs four citrus farms that export hundreds of thousands of cartons around the world. But nearly two decades after the government bought the farms through its land reform programme, Ndyenga and the other beneficiaries are still waiting for the land to officially become theirs.
Ndyenga, 56, moved to Willowtree Farm with her family as a child. Her mother worked on the farm, and Ndyenga began working there during school holidays.
She returned after school, became a permanent worker in 1994 and steadily worked her way up. Today, she is the general manager of four farms belonging to the Sundays’ River Farming Trust.
The operation spans 421 hectares, with 378 hectares under citrus. In 2025, the farms exported 393,060 cartons to markets in the Far East, Middle East and Europe.
The success makes the unresolved ownership issue even harder to ignore. The state acquired Willowtree and three neighbouring farms in 2006 as part of land reform. The properties were leased to the Sundays’ River Farming Trust, but the title deeds remained with the state.
For Ndyenga, the delay has real consequences. Without secure ownership, accessing finance and expanding the farms is more difficult.
“The title deed opens doors for us as farmers,” she told Daily Maverick.
The department responsible for land reform says it is working to fast-track the outstanding land rights enquiry required before the properties can be transferred. But for farmers who have spent years building the business, the wait has already been long.
Ndyenga is also breaking ground in an industry where women, particularly black women, remain underrepresented. She is training two women on the farms and hopes her journey will show younger women that commercial farming is an option.
Her own journey is proof of that. She went from picking citrus on these farms to managing them. Now she wants the paperwork to catch up with the reality.
Source (Daily Maverick)
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