Gauteng Province
Gauteng is the most urbanized province in South Africa and the economic heartland of the country. However there are 39,000 farm workers in the province and many people living in peri-urban areas with insecure tenure. Many people in Gauteng maintain strong ties with rural areas as they have come their to find work, but still have families in rural parts of the country. Nkuzi's experience has been that conditions for most people on farms in the Gauteng are as bad as those in the Limpopo Province.
Gauteng has 28.2% unemployment according to government figures. It has large mining, manufacturing and service industries.
Limpopo Province
The Limpopo Province of South Africa is in the North East of South Africa. The province has borders with Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Botswana. The province has a population of 4,929,368 (All figures from Statistics South Africa, A Stats in brief 2000".) and covers an area of 123,910 square kms.
89% of the population live in rural areas, mostly in the three former homelands with a large number also living on farms. The agriculture sector is the largest employer in the Limpopo Province outside government. However workers in this sector and residents on farms face very poor conditions, live with tenure insecurity and frequently face abuses of their human rights. Most farm workers in the Province earn between R150 ($ 17) and R350 ($39) per month.
The Limpopo Province has 46% unemployment according to government figures which count those actively seeking work who could not find work. A closer analysis shows only 22.88% of the population between the ages of 15 and 65 actually have work. This situation is compounded by the fact that nearly half of the 4.9 million population are under 15 or over 65 years of age.
Within its capacity Nkuzi responds to requests for assistance throughout the Limpopo Province and on all aspects of the land reform programme.
The Gauteng Province of South Africa is surrounded by four other provinces with Limpopo Province to its north. The province has a population of 7,348,423 and covers an area of only 17,010 square kms.
