Business

Gugu Mlipha is the SA Agricultural Writers’ New Entrant to Commercial Farming for 2015. She farms vegetables on 6ha in Walkerville, Gauteng, and also runs a vegetable processing business. She has plans to further diversify her business.

Stephan Fourie of Potato Pride near Frankfort in the Free State sees his workforce and surrounding community as a responsibility not to be taken lightly. He explains his approach to Gerhard Uys.

While the South African government and the country’s white farming sector are still finding mutually acceptable ways to implement land reform, a small agri-village in the Winterton area of KwaZulu-Natal became a trendsetter decades ago.

The Mohair Empowerment Trust has launched a project aimed at establishing commercial mohair producers within a five-year period. Mike Burgess travelled with the trust’s Bongani Ndhlovu to one of four projects in the Eastern Cape’s Karoo region to find out more about its unique approach to the sustainable development of emerging farmers.

Leading UK potato producer Tony Bambridge was recently sponsored by Syngenta to give a presentation at the Potatoes SA Congress on potato production and market trends in his home country. He spoke to Glenneis Kriel about the lessons that had been learnt in the industry.

The Namibian Agricultural Union’s Production-Cost Index is a valuable tool for determining and monitoring price trends in the country’s livestock production industries, according to Jaco Hanekom, the union’s assistant manager of commodities. The index has lately shown an alarming negative price trend in cattle production.

Farmer Sam Nkosi started out small, but with good management and the right support he has grown his business into a 1,5 million-broiler farming operation.

The cost of transportation has become an ever-greater burden for SA farmers. There are several reasons, for this. Transport consultant Alistair Christison and Prof Jan Havenga, director of the Supply Chain Management Centre at Stellenbosch University, gave Gerhard Uys insights into the road and rail situation – and what can be done to improve matters.

At just 24 years old, Thato Moagi is already an award-winning farmer. She spoke to Luyolo Mkentane about her mixed farming operation and plans for the future.

The definition of successful production is changing. Where high output and farm profits were the main measures of farming success in the past, today what matters just as much is the impact of farming on nature and others when measuring it. Kobus Pienaar spoke to Glenneis Kriel about this trend.

The Agricultural Research Council’s Eastern Cape emerging beef farmer for 2015, Sinako Ntseke, farms on three properties which collectively amount to more than 1 200ha. His passion for farming drives the development of his livestock operation.

Within four years of its launch, a micro cheese enterprise in Darling is experiencing macro demand from gourmet outlets across the Western Cape for its soft European-style cheeses – a rarity in South Africa. Jay Ferreira visited Carla Bryan of Udderly Delicious Cheese to find out more.

The Suurbraak Grain Farmers’ Co-operative in the Southern Cape recently won the Western Cape Agricultural Writers’ Association’s Emerging Farmer of the Year award. The group ascribes its success to Boet Pretorius’s ‘Farming for the Future’ model.

A South African company, CLC Solar Wind Energy, has recently developed a cost-effective gasifier to allow farmers to generate electricity from wood or stone fruit pits. Chris Coetzee, project manager of the company, told Glenneis Kriel more about the technology.

In 1997, father-and-son farming team Keith and Chris Clubb moved from their Gauteng-based farming operation to establish what is now a large commercial mixed farming operation in Zambia. Chris, a veterinarian, shares their experiences on the subject.

North West farmer Salphanius Motswenyane tells Luyolo Mkentane how farming saved him from poverty. Having achieved success on a small scale he now hopes to grow his farming enterprise into a commercial operation.

If the South African food industry wishes to compete successfully on a global scale, a viable and workable traceability system must be introduced and adopted, says Anné Calitz, research assistant at the University of the Free State’s Department of Agricultural Economics.

Since 2003, this Eastern Cape small-scale ostrich farming project has been providing opportunities for farmers to improve their livelihoods. Having overcome stringent biosecurity requirements, the project is set to expand further. Grant Hollins met with Klein Karoo Group Transformation Trust board member, Johannes Jacobs, to learn more.

Until about two decades ago, SA racehorse breeders tended to purchase stallions that were very good, but not exceptional. In more recent years, the stallions used in South Africa are world-class. The Taberer family, owners of the Avontuur Wine Estate near Stellenbosch, have made an important contribution to the sport.

Soweto businessman Xolani Ndzaba has always had an entrepreneurial spirit. He spoke to Luyolo Mkentane about how he founded Lethabo Milling, SA’s first black-owned milling company.