omnia holdings annual report 2010 omnia holdings annu

42 OMNIA ANNUAL REPORT 2010 SUSTAINABILITY REPORT continued
Challenges and opportunities Our response
The opportunity
South Africa has been a net importer of food since 2000, and innovative
approaches are required to remedy the shortfall in food production.
South Africa’s agricultural capacity is under strain as it tries to meet
its transformation objectives. Effective ways are needed to assist
subsistence growers to become small-scale entrepreneurs.
Managing the skills shortage
The challenge
South Africa faces a well documented skills shortage in many sectors
of the economy. For example, according to an Ernst & Young report
released in 2008, the shortage of skills in the mining industry is so
acute that it is likely to persist even if 5% to 10% of new projects are
halted in the wake of the global financial crisis.
The opportunity
Best practice personal and career development are powerful attraction
and retention incentives for top talent.
In South Africa, for the country to become more self-sufficient
in producing food, it is critical that new approaches are found
to use the country’s arable land more effectively – Omnia’s
expertise in the development of high-performance nutrients
provide one such solution.
In addition, Omnia continues to invest in research laboratory
facilities and new technologies, including silica research and
its potentially favourable implications for crop production as
a fertilizer ingredient.
Development work in this area includes:
� Ground Penetrating Radar to map the spatial distribution
of soil water content in a particular field.
� Silica has been shown to activate genes that stimulate the
immune system of plants, assisting them to withstand
disease and climatic stress.
� Trials on hydroponic tomatoes confirmed that phosphites
have the ability to limit the severity of diseases and
reduce the rate at which they infect the plant. The benefit
in terms of crop performance is greater root development
and an increase in marketable fruit.
Omnia’s Agriculture division is implementing collaborative,
integrated approaches to facilitate the development of
emerging farmers to fully take up their role in the South
African agricultural sector as commercially viable and
sustainable businesses.
Developed by Omnia’s Agriculture Division to create a
favourable soil environment and manage the life cycle of
crops to increase production and improve farmer profitability,
our Nutriology ® training is instrumental in creating strong,
sustained relationships between Omnia and our emerging
agricultural customers.
Against a backdrop of increasing mobility in an era of
globalisation and acute shortages of technical skills, we are
attempting to meet this challenge by developing a pipeline of
talent through training interventions and by fast-tracking
high-potential achievers.
Training offered through the Omnia Academy of Learning
– which delivers training developed within the company to
meet the specific demands of the business and ensure that
knowledge is transferred across the Group to enhance skills
– has been expanded.
In addition, a skills deficit in the explosives industry, which has
resulted in the outsourcing of skilled explosives handling to
companies such as BME, has motivated the company to
contribute to the development of the local skills base by
establishing a skills training centre near Emalahleni.