Namibia country report

5 FARM UNITRESETTLEMENTSCHEME (FURS)5.1 Characteristics of beneficiaries andhousehold composition5.1.1 Social categories of beneficiariesAs with AALS beneficiaries, attempts were made to include the oldest resettlement farmsin the sample of FURS beneficiaries. All FURS beneficiaries interviewed in Hardap wereresettled between 1991 and 2004 and in Omaheke between 1992 and 2008.The average beneficiary household sizes did not correlate closely with the national averagesize of 5.1 determined in 2001. In Omaheke the average size of the households sampled was5.6, but most had only 4 members and the largest had 11 members. The 20 respondents inHardap indicated that a total of 88 persons were residing on the farms, averaging at 4.4members per household. The largest 5 households in Hardap had 7 members each. Therelatively small household sizes in Hardap are due to the fact that a substantial numberof FURS beneficiaries there are pensioners. On the farm Mara, for example, one familyconsisted of two pensioners and occasionally a visiting grown-up child. Their neighbourwho had also retired lived on the farm with his wife, and another beneficiary there, thoughnot retired, lived only with his wife and her child. The household of a 74-year-old pensioneron the farm Tulpvlei in Hardap consisted of himself and two of his grandchildren, whilethree relatives lived close to his house in their own shacks. Common to most beneficiaryhouseholds was that they grew in size during school holidays when grandchildren visited.The data suggests that the majority of FURS beneficiaries were middle-aged or reachingretirement. The average age of FURS beneficiaries sampled in Hardap was 49 years, withnone being younger than 45, while in Omaheke the average age of those who responded tothe semi-structured questionnaire was about 55. 17 This broadly corresponds to the averageage of 52 for all FURS beneficiaries in the country as determined in the survey conductedby the Permanent Technical Team on Land Reform in 2003/04 (PTT 2005b: 49). 18 Table 9on the next page shows the age and gender distributions of FURS household heads.17Being aware that some respondents did not know their age, broad age categories were provided in theOmaheke questionnaire, i.e. 0-5, 6-14, 15-59, 60 and older.18The PTT survey did not distinguish between group and farm unit resettlement.Livelihoods Section after B ● Land 5. Farm Reform: Unit Resettlement Namibia country Scheme report (FURS) (2010) ● 85