The Native Land Trust Board through its Regional Director [Northern], Mr Eparama Ravaga, would like to confirm that they are currently working on the extension of the terms of various leases in the Seaqaqa cane farming belt in Vanua Levu as reported in the Daily Post of the 5th of August.
According to Mr. Ravaga, quite a number of leases, not only in the Northern Region are entitled to be extended for a further term of 20 (twenty) years under Section 13(1) of the Agricultural Landlord & Tenant Act.
However, the Board was not able to invoke that clause much earlier because of the various interpretations received and this led to the delay.
Under that clause, any ALTA lease which had an unexpired term of less than thirty years as at 1st September 1977, will be entitled to be extended for a further term of twenty (20) years provided that the lessee is farming the land in a good and husbandary like manner and that the tenant will have to pay a premium of one year’s rent on the first day as well as the eleventh year of such extensions.
The Board has now confirmed that the relevant clause in the Agricultural Landlord & Tenant Act is still intact and until such time it has been repealed or amended by an Act of Parliament, all leases governed by that Act will have to continue with all the atributes of such act.
In addition, Mr. Ravaga has also clarified that in some cases they are also accomodating the wishes of the landowners by offering new agricultural leases of 30 years (plus the balance term of their current lease) to those tenants whose leases had a balance term of four or five years on their existing leases.
