Last night, as I landed from Cape Town, one of the notes in my inbox was a statement from South Africa’s Department of Agriculture outlining the work it is doing to modernise the Act that governs the registration of pesticides, fertilisers and farm feeds. We welcome the work the department is doing, and one can only urge for greater speed in it.
For readers who haven’t been monitoring these issues, the one thing to emphasise is that, in South Africa, we have relied on improved seed cultivars, better genetics, and other inputs to support the growth and expansion of our agricultural sector.
Farmers’ willingness to pay and apply the inputs has been key, along with the government’s progressiveness in registering new inputs, particularly from the early 2000s.
And yes, these are all safe products intended to boost agricultural output and ultimately support our food security.
The piece of legislation that facilitates such registration is Act 36 of 1947 (the Fertilisers, Farm Feeds, Agricultural Remedies and Stock Remedies Act). It has faced some challenges in recent years, necessitating modernisation to enhance efficiency and boost capacity within the unit that administers it.
There remains much work to reach the desired level of efficiency, and we should support the government on these efforts and urge them to move quickly, without fighting the department.
We need enhanced efficiency in registering new inputs to help South Africa’s agriculture remain ahead of the curve and competitive in the world market.
Some inputs also help us with climate adaptation and the addressing of animal diseases.
We also need to continuously work to be more efficient in helping local firms that export various processed agricultural products, and to provide the necessary forms of registration to achieve this ambition quickly.
I have heard of a few challenges exporters of pet treats face, and these must be addressed. We must work to support South African firms, not constrain them. But this message must be clear across all levels of government and not just with the Pretoria team.
The need for efficiency is the emphasis that the leadership of the Department in Pretoria must ensure is carried through to the provincial structures, which are “the face of the department on the ground”.
Still, fighting the department is not a desired approach; we must take a collaborative approach to achieve all these ambitions.
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