160
farmers have titles to offer. Banks will often use other assets as collateral, but will even make
uhnisteocruyr.e2dO loans if a farmer can establish a sound credit
Enumerators asked all respondents whether they felt title to land would increase their security
and whether they expected credit use to increase with title. With respect to security, the results were
nearly identical across the two provinces. In Southern province, 36.7 percent of households said that
they would be more secure with title and 35.8 percent felt similarly in Eastern province. However,
in Southern province, 84 percent of those in State Land replied affirmatively as opposed to only 19
percent of households in the Reserves. The responses with respect to perceived change in credit use
from titling differed with about twice as many in Southern province predicting greater use (62 percent)
as compared to those in Eastern province (32 percent).
G. Concept of ownership
Even though land belongs to the state under the 1975 Land Act, this was hardly recognized
by the respondents when asked who was owner of their farmland. Table 5.5 shows that 54 percent
of the respondents in Eastern province said that the household head is the owner of the land, while
31 percent mentioned the chief or headman. Nine percent of respondents said that the land belongs
to the extended family. The results in Southern province are virtually identical, despite the fact that
28 households held state leases which stipulate that all land is owned by the state.
Table 5.5: Distribution of households by perceived owner of land
|
Owner |
Southern province |
Eastern province |
|
No one |
1 |
3 |
|
Household/household head |
57 |
54 |
|
Extended family |
10 |
9 |
|
Chief, headman, community |
28 |
31 |
|
Other |
4 |
2 |
A cross-tabulation made between the perception of landownership and mode of acquisition
indicated that households acquiring land through patrilineal ties are more likely to claim ownership
over land than households who have acquired land through matrilineal ascendants. In both provinces,
59 percent of patrilineal households claim ownership rights, while for matrilineal households, the
percentage is 36 percent in Eastern province and 32 percent in Southern province. Conversely,
matrilineal households are more likely to name the chief as owner. All households located in State
Land believed they were the owners of the land.
20
As indicated shortly, easy credit proliferated in days prior to the present market liberalization, where credit from state
banking institutions was closely intertwined with purchases and sales through government-controlled input and commodity
markets. With the beginning of greater financial scrutiny in loans applied to banks in the early 1990s, title may become a
more significant determinant of credit access.