Allan Waters is a communal area near Queenstown in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Households were surveyed using questionnaires which focused on the current socio-economic situations and farming systems. To define household typologies, factors such as land, source of income, modes of farming and composition of the family were used. Six typology categories were identified after the data had been collected.

2. INTRODUCTION

South Africa has always been an important country for providing agricultural opportunities and food. Since the introduction of the integrated livestock and farming systems Land Care Project of the Eastern Cape Province, the socio economic environment featured as a major factor. Problems such as rural poverty, inadequate innovative agricultural skills, insufficient agricultural practices, poor or absent agricultural value-adding and agricultural marketing were some of the main factors which needed to be addressed.

The aim of this paper is to give an overview of the six typology categories that were identified in the survey area, representing the typical African identities found in the rural areas of Southern Africa.

3. METHODOLOGY

3.1 Survey area

The Allan Waters communal area is situated in the former Ciskei of the Eastern Cape Province at 26.47°E and 32.40°S. It is approximately 50 km southwest of Queenstown. It comprises 1800 ha with an annual rainfall of 505 mm.

3.2 Typology technique

All the households (63) in the village were surveyed by means of an interviewed questionnaire. In order to improve the livelihood of the households and to secure food production and food security, a situation analysis of the rural farmers were carried out using typology as a research tool. The term ‘typology’ designates both (a) the procedures that lead to the building of types, designed to help analysis of a complex reality and to order objects which, although different, are of one kind (household for instance) and (b) the system of types resulting from this procedure (Landais’ 1998; Perret, 1999(a); Perret & Carstens, 1999). A typology is an attempt to group activity units according to their main modes of operation and their common characteristics (Low, 1986; Perret, 1999a). Typologies are built in order to analyze the diversity of production units (farms) or households (agricultural households). For agriculture, the previous preoccupations of land lead to the construction of farm typologies (or household typologies), which are based on identification of groups of farms that represent similar characteristics (Perret, 1999a).

3.3 Statistical analysis

Statistical analyses were performed using the GLM procedures of SAS (Little et al.1991).

4. RESULTS

Six types were identified, mainly with reference to scope of farming activities and different types of income activities that make up the household income. These types can be divided into two main groups comprising (a) livestock farming and (b) non-livestock farming or very little farming activities. The six groups are as follows (Table 1):

4.1 Type 1: Poverty–stricken households

4.2 Type 2: Newly arrived households

4.3 Type 3: Households depending on old age pension

4.4 Type 4: Household’s main income from old age pension and supported by subsistence farming

4.5 Type 5: Household revenue generated from business, wages and farming

4.6 Type 6: Full-time farming

Table 1 illustrates the demographic information and number of livestock owned by the different typology types.

TABLE 1: Demographic information and the number of livestock owned for the different typologies