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This paper deals with one basic problem that southern African countries will have to face in any transformation of their agriculture: if these societies are ‘labour reserves’ can they be easily transformed so as to eliminate labour migration. Zimbabwe seems to have an official policy of ending ‘divided families’ by pushing some into being unambiguously working class families with no land and others into a settled, non‐migratory peasantry. Thus former white‐owned land is only distributed to those without jobs. But this could be only a more radical variant of plans that were attempted in the 1950s to end migrant labour. Are today's plans for separating out worker‐peasants into separate classes any more realistic? Isn't there some danger of creating a landless, unemployed stratum in between, and of ignoring the needs of women heads of households? May it not be better to recognise that combining paid work and farming may have to continue for some time as Mozambique and Nicaragua seem to have done?

It is now part of received wisdom that humanitarian assistance in conflict and

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