The government’s strategic shift to invest more money into agriculture, as announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa in his economic stimulus plan – supported by finance minister Tito Mboweni’s Medium Term Budget Policy Statement – has the potential to yield massive results.
Pressed by a sluggish economy and declining production in agriculture in the province, the Eastern Cape department of rural development and agrarian reform resolved to implement an agriculture economic transformation strategy aimed at supporting farmers to venture into commercial production for confirmed markets.
We invested in partnerships with commodity groups like the Grain Farmer Development Association (GFDA), Grain SA, the Citrus Grower’s Development Association, Eastern Cape Macadamia, Karoo Catch, and the University of Fort Hare.
The strategy was necessitated by slow growth of 1.8% in the provincial agriculture sector, and a need to boost the contribution to the provincial agriculture economy of both livestock and crops. The current 20% contribution made by horticultural crops needs to be at least 50%.
Given that field crops brought only 4.3% into the provincial agriculture economy, our focus was to develop smallholder farmers working with commodity and industry organisations to create opportunities for sustainable growth.
After coming up with a budget, we had to identify commercial commodity groups willing to partner with us in providing technical support to increase production in the province, find the markets for the produce, and create value addition.
The aim was to increase agriculture’s contribution to the GDP from 1.8% to 2%.
We are mindful of the need to invest resources into infrastructure development for all the farmers.
Hence money was channelled towards building 37 sheep shearing sheds equipped with small flock dipping tanks to benefit some 7,000 communal farmers who generate R180m income annually from wool sales.
One beneficiary of our sheds is Malesang Setlobong from Bethania near Mount Fletcher, who owns 63 sheep and has been producing wool for 22 years.
She said the new shearing shed in Lundini would help farmers produce better quality wool and get good profits.
Together with the Land Bank, the department invested R100m in expanding the macadamia production on 205ha in Amajingqi outside Willowvale in 2015.
This is the second such site with Ncerha being the first macadamia producing rural village in the province, and plans are afoot to expand to a third site in Thandela under Chief Daliwonga Mgwebi.
At inception R198m was invested in the 180ha under production in Ncerha for the establishment of farming, a nursery and the nut-cracking factory. R17m has been realised in income since the first harvest in 2013.
A state-of-the-art citrus packing facility, where R55m was invested, was opened in Ngqushwa recently to help three land reform beneficiaries. Though they produced quality fruit, buyers had turned them down because of the low standard of their packing warehouse.
After the opening of the the new facility, the farmers are now exporting to retailers in the UK.
Aided by the R10m investment from the Eastern Cape department of rural development and agrarian reform to produce maize on 2,416ha, 14 co-operatives owned by Matatiele-based farmers exported their maize to Vietnam.
Our five-year plan is to produce grain on 100,000ha in the Amathole, Chris Hani, Joe Gqabi, OR Tambo and Alfred Nzo districts of the Eastern Cape.
In the annual report tabled at the provincial legislature by rural development and agrarian reform MEC Xolile Nqatha, we reported that 166 on-farm livestock infrastructure projects were completed.
These include fencing, stock-water systems, shearing sheds, poultry structures, multipurpose sheds, small-scale irrigation systems and dip tanks.
A total of 3,457 emerging farmers benefited from the support and 1,179 jobs were created.
Among the improvements are the R16.5m invested to increase feedlots from 14 to 19 in the province, with one of the new ones in Aliwal North.
The chairperson of the local farmer’s association, Thuluti Sibhidla, said the feedlot would help farmers who don’t have their own land.
The approach proves that farmers are willing to produce for bigger markets.
The pronouncements by Ramaphosa and Mboweni give policy certainty to farmers that they will get support from the government, buyers and investors as part of the transformation agenda in the agriculture sector.
Working with the Land Bank and Eastern Cape Macadamia, a new funding model was introduced in which the government, communities and the private sector join hands and resources to bring industrialisation into rural communities where unemployment is high.
On the downside, about nine farmers in the province were battling to service their Humansdorp Co-op loans.
They had low yields as a result of drought and there was a threat from the funder to seize their farms and assets to recoup the money.
However, the department, with the Land Bank, engaged Humansdorp Co-op to restructure their debt. Farmers were then given a grant through the Grain Farmer Development Association so that they could start producing this season.
The intervention gave the farmers a new lease on life as they were on the brink of losing everything.
The partnership between the department and the Land Bank proves what can be achieved when state programmes are reconfigured to commercialise the agriculture sector.
As farmers need land, one of their pressing needs is to service their current debt.
The policy pronouncement by the government, which confirms provision of funding by the government through the Land Bank, will rejuvenate commercial farming by black farmers and positively drive economic recovery as planned by the government.
Bongikhaya Dayimani is the chief operations officer for the Eastern Cape department of rural development and agrarian reform..