Abstract:
The study was carried out to assess the community-perceived determinants of access to land for development in Mutale Local Municipality. It was conducted in the Makuya and Mutele Traditional Authority areas of the former Mutale Local Municipality. All the views relating to access to land for housing, agriculture and business development expressed during the Vhembe District Land Development Summits and Forum meetings held in 2008, 2010 and 2014 were consolidated. Using this information, a questionnaire comprising entirely closed-ended answers requiring responses on a Likert-type scale of 1 (strongly agree) to 5 (strongly disagree) was prepared. The questionnaire was administered through focus group discussions in community workshops during which youth (male and female), women, men and community leaders were the respondents. Open-ended questions were also administered focusing on the factors hindering or enabling access to land, and solutions that the community perceived needed to be taken. Mean and mode for each response were calculated. Chi-Square tests for association were conducted to determine whether there was any association in the responses obtained from the traditional authority areas. Kruskal Wallis and Mann-Whitney tests were conducted to determine the level of agreement of perceptions respondents with Vhembe district land development summits resolutions among youth, adults and community leaders. There were no statistically significant differences (P > 0.05) in perception of issues relating to access to land for housing, agriculture and business development of land development. Thus, the issues are real and should form a solid basis for planning interventions that might unlock access to land for different types of uses. Moreover, improving transparency and deepening community participation and consultation over classification and sale of unoccupied land could minimise the likelihood of potential land conflict.
