CAs reported by the EFE news agency, Zimbabwe's Finance Minister, Mthuli Ncube, states that the compensation, which totals 145,9 million dollars (141,2 million euros), is intended for 94 farms and 56 white farmers covered by the Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements (BIPPAS), ratified before 2000.

The disbursement of this new item comes after the Government has already incorporated into the 2024 national budget an amount of 20 million dollars (approximately 18,3 million euros) specifically intended to compensate farmers affected and protected by BIPPAS.

"The compensation process has already begun. President [Emmerson] Mnangagwa believes this process is crucial to building trust, fulfilling our commitments, and ensuring consistency with our Constitution as we address Zimbabwe's debt challenge.“, Ncube told EFE, adding that the new payments began in the second week of January.

"Only applicants from countries with BIPPAS signed and ratified prior to the 2000 Agrarian Reform Program are eligible for compensation and 94 farms have been approved for compensation“, added Ncube.

Farmers selected for compensation come from Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and other Eastern European countries.

The Zimbabwean government plans to pay a total of $331 million (€315 million) to 439 local white farmers who were also affected by the expropriation of their land in 2000.

Ncube stressed that the payment of compensation to farm owners “marks a crucial stage” in the process of clearing arrears and resolving the southern African country’s huge debt that has not been paid since 1999.

The compensation payment is important in Zimbabwe's attempt to gain the trust of creditors to restructure its $21 billion debt ($13 billion of external debt and $XNUMX billion of domestic debt).

The government of the late Robert Mugabe, who ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist from 1980 until 2017, when he was overthrown by the military, expropriated in 2000 around four thousand white farmers from the lands to which they had had access during the colonial era, at a time when the country was going through an economic recession.

Until 2000, white farmers played a key role in the agricultural economy, producing tobacco and horticultural products, such as flowers, for export.

The indigenous population then began to informally occupy the vacant fields.

Picture: © 2025 DR