PODCAST: SA starts the 2022/23 summer crop season
South Africa is starting the 2022/23 summer crop production season this month. The preliminary insights suggest that we could have another good season.
Potential for growth in South Africa’s agriculture but testing times ahead
SA’s agricultural sector was one of the bright spots of our economy during the pandemic. This was the only sector that showed robust growth as others were constrained by lockdown restrictions, supply chain disruptions and reduced consumer activity.
Interventions to help SA farmers and agribusinesses battling higher costs
While some farmers in the grains and oilseeds industry benefited from the unusually long period of large yields and higher prices, higher input costs since the start of 2020 have limited the benefits. For farmers in the horticulture industry, where commodity prices did not increase as much as in grains, the higher input costs were an even heavier burden
Comforting weather forecasts point to good rains for crops in SA
We are about a month away from the start of the 2022/2023 summer crop season. Farmers in SA’s eastern regions, which includes the eastern Free State, Mpumalanga, KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape, will start planting by mid-October. This will primarily be summer grains and oilseeds.
Brief reflections on SA agriculture performance in the second quarter of 2022
The rough start of the 2021/22 agricultural season has been muted in several sectoral economic indicators. But the GDP data for the second quarter of the year put the picture in perspective. The agricultural gross value added contracted by 7,7% quarter-on-quarter (seasonally adjusted).
Agricultural finance is key to South Africa’s inclusive agricultural growth agenda
We have plans to grow South Africa’s agriculture. But for this agenda to succeed, agricultural finance is crucial. At the heart of it it’s also the revival of the Land Bank, and not undermining of this important organisation that could be instrumental for inclusive growth.
Good crop outlook locally could contain food prices
South Africa is now a few months before the start of the 2022/23 agricultural season. The current 2021/22 season is drawing to a close, and farmers are at the tail end of harvesting maize, sunflower seeds and other grains. Thus, the focus is shifting towards the 2022/23 production season, which commences in October. The preliminary insights suggest that South Africa could have another good season.
Zambia’s maize decline won’t cause a shortage in the region
There are two significant maize-producing countries in Southern Africa: SA and Zambia. These countries face a double-digit harvest decline in 2021/22. Still, this won’t risk causing a shortage in the region.
Wandile Sihlobo is the Chief Economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa (Agbiz) and the author of “Finding Common Ground: Land, Equity, and Agriculture.”
Sihlobo is Senior Lecturer Extraordinary at the Department of Agricultural Economics at Stellenbosch University.
He is also a Visiting Research Fellow at the Wits School of Governance, University of the Witwatersrand.
He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Agricultural Economics from the University of Fort Hare and a Master of Science degree in Agricultural Economics from Stellenbosch University.
Sihlobo was appointed as a member of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Presidential Economic Advisory Council in 2019 after serving on the Presidential Expert Advisory Panel on Land Reform and Agriculture between 2018 and 2019.
He is also a member of the Council of Statistics of South Africa (Stats SA) and a Commissioner at the International Trade Administration Commission of South Africa (ITAC).
Sihlobo is a columnist for Business Day and Farmers Weekly magazine.