Nigeria surpasses South Africa as sub-Saharan Africa’s leading maize producer
Last year I boasted about South Africa’s contribution to sub-Saharan maize production, after having contributed nearly 20 percent to total production for 2017/18 season. Furthering my indulgence, I compared South Africa’s maize yields to then second biggest producer...
Thoughts on South Africa’s 2018/19 summer grain production outlook
The preliminary planting data showed that South Africa’s area planted to maize is 2.3 million hectares. About 1.3 million hectares is white maize, with 1.0 million hectares being yellow maize. This came as a surprise as we, at the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa (Agbiz), had a projection of 1.98 million hectares. I suspect that the late plantings might have been more than anticipated following early January rainfall.
What do South African political parties’ manifestos say about Agriculture and Land Reform? (part 1)
Agriculture and land reform has dominated policy discourse in the recent months, with diverse views about the sector’s role to the economy and land reform policy. Hence, it is hard to ignore what comes out of the political parties’ manifestos ahead of the general...
Good performance in SA agricultural exports despite the drought
The data we have for the first 11 months of 2018 shows that South Africa’s agricultural exports for 2018 amounted to US$9.9 billion, which is 0.5% lower than 2017’s full year exports. This is according to data from Trade Map. We are yet to see what the overall 2018 agricultural exports value will be when December 2018 trade statistics are released, but the available data corroborates Business Day’s headline that the Western Cape drought had minimal impact on exports in value terms.
