Frustration, a New Marriage, and the All-Too-Common Call for Farm Money.

Hooray. Much thunder and lightning, but over two days we had beautiful rain, a farmer's dream and as I have learned, a cash saver for a gardener.

Hopefully, this will be a short blog, as despite multiple medications, many alternates, now taking nineteen (19) pills or remedies a day, my stomach discomfort and often pain are getting progressively worse, with all my tests to date not able to pinpoint the cause. I am still losing weight, get bloated, and have now suffered from vomiting on occasion. I have not vomited for years, maybe because I no longer imbibe so much, and I also have long periods between bowel movements despite the use of a laxative, as my stomach seems to no longer digest my food or get rid of the residue. So all the medicines so far have eased the pain and symptoms, but they all seem to return no matter what, never really disappearing for a couple of days and more often than not return worse than before. I get very lightheaded, and I can't make it through a supermarket trip without retreating to sit in the car. Grrr!! I am so pissed off and angry. So I am grumpy, exhausted, and have not eaten a full meal for ages. What is a steak? Instead, banana, toast and honey, my favoured meal this week. I am sick of drinking water, tea, and the occasional coffee, which I treat as a luxury. I often wonder if part of my problem is caused by one of my medications. It seemed to have been triggered after my last surgery in December, which was nowhere near my stomach but resulted in extended use of antibiotics as my wound healed. I decided to write this so you know where I am. Yes, I am frustrated and feel lousy, but I feel a great sympathy for my wife, Rozanne, who has to manage her life around my most recent illness, numerous doctors, daily tests and scans, and clinic visits and ensures my every need. Both of us obviously wonder what it is, and while frustrating and painful to me, it is exceedingly stressful to her, although she never tells me this. It is sometimes obvious from her demeanour, but when I notice her concerned face, she quickly puts on a positive smile. As I say, the internal scans, bottom and top to date, have come up blank, except I have learned I have an ectopic pancreas, which is congenital. They want to investigate that further, but as it has been around, I wonder if it is a problem. In the meantime, on Wednesday, following my Endoscopy, the doctor it carried ot out suggested I get a CT sooner than my routine one in June. So, on Thursday morning, I was waiting for my GP, unannounced, and told him of this advice, and he, there and then, gave me a prescription (a form to supply a medicine or carry out an examination) which I could take to any hospital or clinic, including private, that does CTs with the state paying. So at 8 am I saw the doctor, and by 1130am that same day I had had my CT scans. Can you believe that? Portugal often surprises me as it is known for waiting until tomorrow, something we certainly do not find in the medical services here. I now await the results. At least we now know that it appears my problem is neither in my colon, rectum, nor stomach.

On a lighter note, our son Selby and his wife, Maggie, return from a month in Georgia later this week and will be staying in Portugal for at least a month. At the beginning of June, my daughter Janine and her husband, Nathan, visit us from America, along with my eldest daughter, Storm, and her partner (long-time fiancé), Duncan, from London. No matter what, there is always something to look forward to, and Rozanne and I are really excited about the whole family being together. We also have our Dutch/Zambian friends Dirk and Klaske Muijs at the end of May.

Once again, getting back to 2002, a lot seemed to happen that year. On the morning after my wedding to Rozanne, I left her for Zambia and the fresh challenges I faced there. I do not know how we thought it was going to work, but as Selby was at Ruzawi school, it was felt that he would be best to stay in Zimbabwe, at least in the beginning, in a familiar school environment. Selby was a very young boy, but the impact of what was happening on the farms was huge; his anger far exceeded his years, an anger which I was also to see in Duncan Thorne, Chris Thorne’s youngest son, who had moved with Chris Thorne and his wife, Ro, to Zambia. It was not long before Rozanne called and said, to hell with it, we are moving to Zambia. The catalyst was an incident in the school playground where the white kids were taunted about losing their farms. Both Duncan and Selby had a really tough time settling into Boabob College in Zambia. Both were to get through it, but it was many years before Selby got over his anger, even blaming his mum and grandad for losing the farms. I must ask him what he feels about it now when he returns later this week. As for my daughters, Storm and Janine, they were both doing their tertiary education in Cape Town when we evacuated the farms. Both said they never really felt they had closure, with their personal belongings, childhood keepsakes, which girls love, all lost, either stolen or left on the farm. Like me in my childhood, they were torn from their farms and homes rather than by voluntary choice.

A view of Darwndale towards the wall from above Joe Whaley's farm. We had ten kilometres of dam frontage on Diandra, and we were leaving this forever. Such heavy hearts.

As stated in my last blog, Chris Thorne was now my full-time partner, which had eased the workload hugely, and he, being much more computer literate than I, with the help of his son, Marc, was busy putting systems together, from tracking documents, and just how important that tool was we were to find out later. It seemed farmers were not the only ones that had difficulty retaining records, filling or in fact any administrative systems of any kind. We found that Barclays Bank and Universal Leaf Africa, our co-sponsors, were equally bad if not worse. Maybe sometimes for convenience. It got to the stage where, other than signed legal agreements, and in some instances even then, we retained all the original documents pertaining to the scheme in our office. We also built a database of available farms, templates for the presentation to the Zambia Investment Centre (ZIC), lease agreement templates that met our sponsors' needs, and cash flow and business plan templates. We both learned a hell of a lot that year, with Chris rarely leaving his computer, aside from meals, between 7 am and 9 pm. The due diligence was also very hard to collate, with requirements from ex-bankers, accountants, etc. in Zimbabwe, often with one vital piece of information that the farmer, client, would need assistance in tracking down. What was a huge help were the tobacco-growing records of the applicants from the Zimbabwe Tobacco Association (ZTA). This provided accurate production records, yields, and prices of previously grown crops by each individual. We found that once we had access to these applicants’ records, we would self-select. If they thought their numbers were too poor, they would drop out or, more commonly, not apply. It was easier to take the option of the low-cost scheme in Mozambique, a critical error as it turned out. Unfortunately, high yields do not always mean profitability, but in the eyes of the bank and ULA, they considered it essential. Many low-input, low-cost farmers have a better bottom line than a high-input farmer. 

We planned to use these old tobacco barns on one of our sections for our experimental first tobacco crop planting in 2002

I returned to my bachelor's room at ‘Big Brother’ in Jesomodine, Lusaka, spending fewer nights on the farm at Chisamba, where Graham Rae had complete control as GM. Meanwhile, the dam was progressing, as was the land clearing exercise. Someone commented following an earlier blog when I mentioned the number and size of anthills. Why did you not choose land with fewer anthills? Well in Zambia, I am not sure there is such a place. Although Chisamba was bad, ULA, when it launched its own tenant farming scheme, was to learn that Choma and Kaloma put it to shame in number and size. The trouble with flattening anthills is that, for most crops, especially tobacco, it takes a long time to produce tobacco on the levelled, anthill-contaminated area. This is for the first few years, caused by the high clay content and the fertility of anthill (termite) soil. Tobacco produced in it is hard to establish, is bull, has too much nitrogen, if you succeed, is virtually uncurable, and produces poor quality. This was to affect all the farmers who had to clear land for tobacco in Zambia. The few who found cleared land were the lucky ones, but as we know, with the cost of installing irrigation all land under it, especially centre pivots, the system of choice, for economical reasons, had to be cultivated, which meant you had to include the anthills.

The dam on the Chongwe was going up surprisingly quickly

On the farm, the money was going out faster than I could raise it and with the poor first season, due to drought, little came in from crop sales. Later, it would be a bone of contention between Graham and me, my overruns on the land clearing and tobacco buildings and his on the dam. This was further exacerbated as every time I turned my back, Graham would be clearing more land. I know Vernon Nicholle, our partner, was not afraid to borrow money, and it seemed that Graham was of the same ilk. Not me, probably being Scottish. Many a day, I would be driving somewhere, and my phone would go with Graham, saying we needed more money. I began to dread his calls. I was totally stressed out and under a lot of pressure at work. I never envisaged myself getting involved in such a large farming enterprise, but in it I was. I had made my choice. Some companies, along with the bank, were very helpful: Jimmy Walsh at ATS gave us credit for chemicals; Dave Clements at Seed Co gave us credit for seed and seed quotas; and we even got credit for fertiliser from one of the South African companies. The trouble with this was it would all have to be repaid in one year, other than the money from ULA, it was all short-term. Huge risk. I think Graham had the skin of an elephant; he was able to brush off our borrower’s concern and my trepidation of the future and assure me it would be the last time. That was, of course, until the next.

Disclaimer: Copyright Peter McSporran. The content in this blog represents my personal views and does not reflect corporate entities.