Jaco Oosthuizen, CEO of RSA Group, told Farmer’s Weekly that all fresh produce players were desperate to see government taking action in this regard, and assigning the necessary budget accordingly.
Infrastructure challenges needed to be addressed in the Budget Speech at a higher national level, rather than at the agricultural level, Oosthuizen said.
He added that the key areas of concern when it came to infrastructure were roads, rail, ports, electricity supply, water supply, and the general state of fresh produce market infrastructure, which was strongly influenced by generally poor management of municipally-run markets.
Collapsing infrastructure nodes dramatically escalated the cost of doing business for all role players in the value chain. A lot of these costs were then passed on to consumers. Equally, small and emerging agribusinesses were hit the hardest and were least able to cope with the friction poor infrastructure created.
Oosthuizen added that while previous budget allocations had been sufficient in addressing these challenges, these allocations have been poorly utilised.
The Agriculture and Agro-Processing Master Plan (AAMP) enjoyed broad support across the sector in principle, and, as per last year’s budget, the emphasis needed to be on accelerating the delivery of this plan, Oosthuizen said.
If its key components were effectively implemented, important strides could be taken in terms of opening up new export markets, improving the overall efficiency of the value chain, offering meaningful support to emerging producers and ancillary agribusinesses, and rolling out important biosecurity and phytosanitary interventions.
Furthermore, it was important to note that the fresh produce open market system was already fundamentally self-sustaining, and South Africa’s system was one of few in the world where government did not provide subsidies.
The focus therefore needed to be on buttressing and strengthening the existing system in key areas:
- Dramatically strengthening core national infrastructure,
- Achieving effective management and maintenance of National Fresh Produce Markets, and
- Vastly improving the support offered to emerging farmers and agribusinesses.
