Farmers ‘need more drought relief funds’
Hope prevails for good winter rainfall in Cape
WITH winter a few months away, farmers in the province are hoping it will come with much-needed rain. Without this, the Western Cape is looking at very high temperatures, empty dams, dry fields and increased veld fires according to Agri Wes-Cape.
Agri Wes-Cape spokeswoman Jeanne Boshoff said the province’s fruit season was currently looking good, but producers in extensive farming areas were still in dire need of feed.
“Agri Western Cape is still assisting producers in the drought-stricken Central Karoo and West Coast regions with feed.”
She said they were grateful for the feed donations they received from other producers as “very little rain has fallen so far in the summer rainfall region of the Karoo”.
“Producers in Oudtshoorn are also running into trouble as the Kammanassie Dam is 10.73 percent and the Stompdrift Dam 11.27 percent full. This means that no more lucerne can be cut in the area since no water is available for irrigation.”
Boshoff thanked the national government for contributing R12 million to drought relief in the province and also the provincial agricultural department “for their support and financial help to smallscale and commercial farmers”.
“We hope that during his February budget speech, Minister Pravin Gordhan will allocate funds towards drought relief.”
Independent agricultural economist Fanie Brink said the general outlook at the end of last year was much better than a year ago, “especially as far as the production of maize and other summer crops was concerned”.
“Some areas in the country did unfortunately not receive any rain but the hope that the ‘Good Giver’ will still provide adequate rain for the whole country will prevail. The improved outlook can be attributed to the positive change in the climate and it will hopefully not become the biggest threat to food security in 2017 again.”
Brink said he believed the government had turned its back on the agricultural sector last year and he had no doubt the “government will again walk away from agriculture in 2017”.
“Commercial agriculture has not received any drought aid after the worst drought in decades, while the utilisation of the assistance given to emerging producers can be regarded as highly suspicious.”
The Department of Agriculture had not commented by the time of going to print.