<P> There is evidence that slash and burn agriculture was first brought to South Africa by the Bantu expansion, by about the 4th century AD . </P> <P> The earliest written record of farming life in South Africa start slightly after 1500 . </P> <P> Grains and cereals are South Africa's most important crops, occupying more than 60 percent of hectare under cultivation in the 1990s . Maize, the country's most important crop, is a dietary staple, a source of livestock feed, and an export crop . Government programs, including generous loans and extension services, have been crucial to the country's self - sufficiency in this enterprise . Maize is grown commercially on large farms, and on more than 12,000 small farms, primarily in North - West, Mpumalanga, Free State, and KwaZulu - Natal provinces . Maize production generates at least 150,000 jobs in years with good rainfall and uses almost one - half of the inputs of the modern agricultural sector . </P> <P> Maize production exceeds 10 million tons in good years; owing to regional drought in the early 1990s, however, production fell to just over 3 million tons in 1992, and roughly 5 million tons of maize were imported, at a cost of at least US $700 million . Both domestic and imported maize was shipped to neighbouring countries to help ease the regional impacts of the drought . The drought eased in 1993, and officials estimated the 1994 harvest at approximately 12 million tons . Below - average rainfall in late 1994 again threatened to reduce maize output in 1995, and officials expected to import some 600,000 tons of maize in that year . Plentiful rain in late 1995 provided for a bumper crop in 1996 . </P>

Factors favouring and hindering agriculture in south africa