Doug Taylor-Freeme has been unanimously elected as President of the Commercial Farmers' Union of Zimbabwe by members of the full Council of the Union. Mr Taylor-Freeme's was the only nomination received for the position, following the expiry of out-going President Colin Cloete's two-year term. The election took place at the post-congress meeting of Council on Thursday 7th August.

Mr Stoff Hawgood, formerly chairman of the National Association of Dairy Farmers, was elected as Vice-President, Commodities. The election of a Vice-President, Regions, was postponed.

Regrettably two Matabele members of Council, Mac Crawford (Vice-President, Regions) and Gavin Conolly (President of Matabeleland region), withdrew from Council. Mr Taylor-Freeme said he hoped that these differences could be resolved, and said he had already approached the Matabeleland contingent with regard to finding a positive way forward. He added that Matabele representation on Council was vital as membership of the Union from that province was significant.

The Union's annual congress, held over Wednesday 6th and Thursday 7th August, was a positive event. The open session on Wednesday was attended by 200 delegates and invited guests who heard presentations from the out-going Vice-Presidents for Commodities and Regions, Doug Taylor-Freeme and Mac Crawford. There was a motivational session with Claude Moller from South Africa, a well-known friend to members. The official opening during the afternoon session was performed by expert climatologist Professor Mark Jury from the University of Zululand in South Africa.

This was then followed by presentation of the 2003 Farming Oscar to Dr Japie Jackson.

The closed session of Congress on Thursday covered Union business, including the appointment of auditors (Ernst & Young), legal representation (Honey & Blanckenberg), the adoption of the Union's accounts, the President's Council report, and the proposed members' licence fee structure for the coming year.

In Mr Taylor-Freeme's speech to Congress on Wednesday, he said: "The full downstream effects of the ill-considered and badly implemented land reform process have become very apparent this year. Production in the commercial farm subsector during the 2002/2003 season was less than half of normal, and the whole economy is reeling from a situation of increased food insecurity and reduced foreign exchange earnings. Despite this, disruption of commercial farming operations continues unabated, and farm invasions, farmer evictions, human rights abuses, and the theft of property still occur."

On matters dealt with by the Union's leadership in the past year, Mr Taylor Freeme said:

"More than 90% of our time has been spent dealing with issues that are not related to actual production on the ground. The continuous stream of people and the many phone calls received both in and out of the office were mainly from farmers in distress. The Union is often criticised for only dealing with farmers who are farming. However, our offices have spent countless hours dealing with non-farming members and, I might add, non-members, as well as business people, who need assistance and advice. Issues tackled here have included farmers being evicted, those needing security assistance and legal advice, farmers wanting to return to their farms, compensation issues, regional investment, medical assistance, economic and financial advice, advice on removal and sale of equipment, ALB, and many more."

He said:

"I must remind members that we have a government that is attempting to desperately prove that it can run a country on its own in complete contradiction to globalisation and succeed on its present policies. It has turned its back on the international community, not listening to the demands of the people of Zimbabwe.

It has managed to distort and influence every government institution into not making good governance decisions, in the interest of politics. We can see the results of this position and that is why the country is in free-fall. "However, many of our members believe that the Union and its leaders are miracle performers against a government that is not interested in listening to anyone but itself.They vent their frustrations on elected members and staff when there are no tangible results to their problems. This is understandable.

"What is concerning me is the lack of respect and the divisions being deliberately created by a small sector of our community. The strength of the Union is its diversity in managing different situations.

The strong points rise up through this diversity and this is what makes the Union a credible and strong organisation."

Mr Taylor-Freeme spoke out strongly on the Union's displeasure with the manner in which the land reform programme was implemented. He added: "We have politicians at both ends of the political divide making use of people to better their cause. We need to say 'enough is enough', sort out your differences soon, because unless this is done quickly, I can see the total collapse of agriculture ahead. I don't mean only commercial agriculture - small scale farmers, communal farmers, new farmers, old commercial farmers, farmers who just want to go back farming, everybody is unhappy about the prevailing situation in agriculture caused by politics. Industry that supplies agricultural inputs and services is also collapsing.

"We've had three years of politics and the requirements of the business of agriculture have been ignored. The politicians had better resolve the issues soon because otherwise there will be no country left to govern. We need to get back to sound business policies because agriculture is the engine of Zimbabwe. That engine needs to be serviced and tuned correctly to run efficiently."

Each delegate to congress was presented with a marketing brochure, which was produced in-house by CFU staff. In the brochure, the Union highlights the many services it offers to members, and lists other services it plans to introduce. There is also a questionnaire attached, covering matters of communication, service to members and farm status. All members will be receiving the brochure and questionnaire by mail in the coming months.

Following his election as Vice-President, Stoff Hawgood welcomed the challenges ahead. "Our challenge as a Union is to help the nation maximise production and deal with the business of agriculture," he said. Mr Taylor-Freeme echoed this, and said his focus was to return agriculture to a production-based, business-focused enterprise so that Zimbabwe as a nation could move forward with confidence. He said: "I hope that we can get some sense back into the situation, and get some farmers back in business on acceptable terms."

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