Partnerships crucial for transformation success

Agriculture can create jobs, alleviate poverty and grow rural economies, but needs partnerships to unlock its full potential. This was the main message from a panel discussion hosted by Farmer’s Weekly at a FarmSol and the South African Cultivar and Technology Agency (SACTA) mechanisation event held in Taung, North West.

Wandile Sihlobo, chief economist of Agbiz, said many people were already benefitting directly from agriculture, as about 920 000 people worked in primary agriculture and 450 000 in agro-processing.

Work done for the National Development Plan in 2012 indicated another million jobs could be created in these sectors.South Africa had a dualistic agriculture sector with a subsistence, primarily non-commercial and black farming segment on the one hand and a predominantly commercial and white farming segment, on the other. While other countries also had small, medium and large-scale farmers, the racial divide had to be addressed in South Africa because of the political tension it caused. “Not all farmers can be upskilled into commercial farmers, but we cannot continue with a situation where black farmers only account for 11% of our commercial agricultural output.”

Partnerships were needed to address skills shortages, financial challenges and market access challenges faced by emerging farmers, as FarmSol, South African Breweries (SAB) and SACTA were doing at Taung.

However, public-private partnerships were also required to create a favourable operating environment and address issues keeping the industry as a whole back. These included load-shedding, poor service delivery, logistical challenges, animal health disease, poor economic growth and climate change.

Aron Kole, managing director for FarmSol, pointed out that in many rural areas, agriculture was the only industry that presented an opportunity for people to generate an income.

Support to increase their economic viability improved their livelihoods and resulted in more money flowing into rural areas and the creation of other income opportunities.

Andrew Bennet, CEO of SACTA, said the agency provided funding for farmers but needed partners with expertise, like FarmSol, to ensure their investments paid off. “We would like to do more, but our focus is currently on farmers on the cusp of going commercial or getting a loan.”

Bennet said that Taung farmers could harvest about 4t/ha of soya bean on the more than 1 000ha they had planted with implements received from SAB and FarmSol.

Dr Mahlogedi Thindisa, director at the Department of Agriculture, Rural Development and Land Reform, said partnerships brought better leverage to interventions and helped to avoid a duplication of efforts. –