Poverty, gender and migrancy: Lesotho's migrant farmworkers in South Africa
Ulicki, T.; Crush, J.
Development Southern Africa 24(1): 155-172
2007
ISSN/ISBN: 0376-835X DOI: 10.1080/03768350601165983Document Number: 200795
During the 1990s, eastern Free State vegetable farmers increasingly relied on migrants from neighbouring Lesotho for seasonal labour. This coincided with a major downsizing of the mine labour force in South Africa, hitherto the major employer of Basotho migrant workers. However, there was no simple process of transfer of unemployed migrants from the mining to the farming sector; rather, decisions were mediated by domestic relationships and household poverty in Lesotho. Basotho women and girls have been a major casualty of mine retrenchments and the drying up of remittances, and those with domestic skills but little formal training have been forced into the labour market, mainly domestic work in towns and labour on farms. This article examines the Basotho migrants' experiences and conditions of employment, the regulatory environment within which they are recruited and employed, and their future in the context of changing immigration and migration legislation in South Africa. The paper is based on the findings of a Southern African Migration Project (SAMP) survey of 152 Basotho farm workers (including 40 undocumented workers).