Our most memorable moments

The Farmer’s Weekly journalists, who visit farms and attend conferences in various regions across South Africa, share their personal impressions and experiences of the year that’s been.

The vital role of developing farmers

Interacting with and visiting developing farmers this year opened my eyes not only to the struggles of this segment of the agriculture sector, but also showed me what tenacity these farmers have. I realised how many developing farmers were not only part of established commercial value chains, but were also employing members of their communities, making them invaluable to South Africa where unemployment is rife. This dispelled my belief that a large-scale operation is essential in farming. A visit to Sanna Tibane near Meyerton in Gauteng was a particular eye-opener. Tibane has 2ha under netting and grows various vegetables that she sells to the Joburg Market. She also runs cattle and smallstock on communal and municipal land, and occasionally sells some of this stock when she needs a cash injection.

She had been attempting to farm for years with varying levels of success, but one year of training provided by John Deere and Peritum made a great difference to her production. She now uses sound agronomic and agricultural practices, along with good marketing skills, to make a success of her farming business. Tibane employs four workers, and regularly mentors other aspiring farmers by teaching them how to improve their farming methods.

The struggles of commercial farmers and new growers may not be exactly the same, but I have seen that these two groups mostly want to work together for the greater good of agriculture, despite what politicians want us to believe.