Mpumalanga Business 2017 edition

OVERVIEW
Nkangala District Municipality on the site of the old Marapyane
College of Education near Siyabuswa. The college offers three-year
diplomas and two-year certificate courses in crop production and
animal husbandry. Some students go on to study further aspects
of agriculture at the University of the North West.
The Buhle Farmers’ Academy near Delmas runs successful training
for existing farmers. Trainers like Mposa Agricultural Consultants
provide SETA-accredited courses and the academy claims that
just 8% of its graduates have remained subsistence farmers, with
53% producing at a commercial level. Funders include Monsanto
Fund (USA), the Maize Trust, Standard Bank, Tongaat Hulett Starch
and Omnia.
Companies
Fresh fruit and nut supplier Halls has developed a countrywide reputation
since it was incorporated as a company in 1921. Halls’ Mpumalanga
operation (Mataffin) produces an avocado crop of about 1 300 tons,
37% of the company’s output.
Europe buys most of Halls’ 1.6-million cartons of exports (4kg equivalents)
and this represents about 60% of production. The company is
one of South Africa’s biggest exporters of litchis, with a total production
of about 850 tons in a good year.
Halls cultivates 375 hectares of its own land and has another 1 400
hectares under management. The Matsafeni Trust is the company’s biggest
outgrower and it exports in the region of 300 000 cartons every year.
Westfalia is a diversified agricultural group that runs extensive operations
in the province. The group’s South African operations regularly
sell more than five-million cartons of avocados (50% of the country’s
export volume) and seven-million cartons of mangoes. Westfalia is a
subsidiary of the Hans Merensky Group and most of its holdings are
in the neighbouring province of Limpopo.
Umbhaba Estates is one of the biggest banana growers in the
province. An idea of the size of the operation can be gauged from the
fact that Umbhaba runs its own rigs and trailers – 36 of them – and four
LAND USAGE
AREA
Commercial dry land 1 088 209 square kilometres
Commercial irrigation 110 734 square kilometres
Subsistence agriculture
99 710 square kilometres (20% of this
land is suitable for crop production)
Total
6 530 390 square kilometres
Land statistics in Mpumalanga
SOURCE: MPUMALANGA PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT
70-seater buses for staff transport.
About a quarter of South
Africa’s tobacco crop is cultivated
in Mpumalanga. British American
Tobacco South Africa (BATSA) has
about 65% of the legal domestic
cigarette market and its factory
in Heidelberg (in neighbouring
Gauteng) makes about 26-billion
cigarettes every year. South
Africa’s annual production is in
the region of 15-million kilograms
of tobacco.
While downstream production
facilities exist in the province,
much more can be done to beneficiate
the region’s rich natural resources,
including fruit juice blending,
sugar byproducts, processing
of sauces, oils, confectioneries,
canned products and cattle feed.
Excellent returns on investment are
anticipated given the close proximity
of the province to the economic
heartland of South Africa to the
west and the international port of
Maputo to the east.
Crops
South Africa’s production of
macadamia nuts-in-shell (NIS) has
grown from about 35 000 tons in
2012 to an estimated 46 000 tons
in 2015. International production
of the nut has been expanding by
20% year-on-year for some time,
and this trend is expected to continue
for at least another five years,
driven by strong demand from
Asia, although drought, hail and
high temperatures are expected to
adversely affect the 2016 harvest.
There are more than 500 farmers
growing the nuts and there are
14 cracking factories in South
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