Farm Land in S.Africa.

S African white farm to be seized.

South Africa's landless have been calling for swifter land reformSouth Africa says it will for the first time force a white farmer to sell his land under a redistribution plan. The decision was announced by the Commission on Restitution of Land Rights, set up to return to black people land lost under apartheid.

An official said talks to agree on a price for the farm had failed and the farmer has vowed to challenge the move. South Africa's government says it wants to hand over about a third of white-owned farm land by 2014. The commission on Thursday said an expropriation notice would be served on Hannes Visser, the owner of a cattle and crop farm in North West province. The government offered to buy the 500-hectare (1,250-acre) farm for $275,000 but Mr Visser said it was worth almost twice as much.