Land Reform in Zimbabwe

Land reform in Zimbabwe officially began in 1979 with the signing of the Lancaster House Agreement, an effort to more equitably distribute land between the historically disenfranchised blacks and the minority-whites who ruled Zimbabwe from 1890 to 1979. The government's land distribution is perhaps the most crucial and most bitterly contested political issue surrounding Zimbabwe. It can be divided into two periods: from 1979 to 2000, where a principle of willing buyer, willing seller was applied with economic help from Great Britain and secondly, beginning in 2000, the fast-track land reform program. Mugabe's targets have included black political opponents as well as white farmers.