Oudtshoorn farmers, who had their own Day Zero almost a year ago when their irrigation dams dried up, have suffered losses of hundreds of millions of rands in lost production.

Agri SA is looking forward to the Minister of Finance, Tito Mboweni’s maiden Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) in Parliament tomorrow.

In a world that’s warmed 1°C against pre-industrial levels, bringing wildfires, droughts and heatwaves to vast regions of the planet, South Africa has warmed at twice the global average.

Farmers in Zimbabwe are appealing for funds to irrigate their land, in hopes of fending off a possible drought predicted by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.

The South African wine industry expects, at this early stage, that the 2019 wine grape crop will return to normal levels in most regions, thanks to good rainfall hot on the heels of a three-year drought. The Klein Karoo, however, is still experiencing a serious water shortage.

The drought conditions in some parts of South Africa are still having a severe impact on the sustainability of many farms. Farmers in the Northern Cape, Western Cape, Eastern Cape and Limpopo are still under threat by the continuing drought.

The government has lost out on more than R1bn in VAT from drought-stricken farmers who were forced to cut production after their irrigation water from the Cape supply dams was radically reduced a year ago.

Given concerns regarding the impact of El Niño and the general lack of rainfall in many key maize production regions, futures prices have spiralled over the past week. This raises concerns about staple maize inflation, as well as the financial position of many producers, especially in the western production regions that have experienced multiple droughts over the past five years.

Almost every December holiday I drive from Gauteng to the Eastern Cape, not only to enjoy the majestic views on the way, but to also use the opportunity to do a mini crop tour.

The production conditions in the N-West Free State and the N-West Province are currently extremely critical and virtually no maize or other summer crops have been planted in these areas.

Mvezelwa Mhlabunzima stands in a wooden pen of a hundred or so shaggy young goats and points out his charges, one by one.
“This one’s a twin,” he says, gesturing to a kid leaning into his leg. He points to two others. “That one’s a twin, with that one … I know them all.”

In her book Silent Spring, Rachel Carson writes: “The sense of smell, almost more than any other, has the power to recall memories….”

 South Africa’s corn (maize) production will likely miss earlier estimates as dry weather delayed plantings and may impact yields, the Agricultural Business Chamber said Jan. 14.

The department of agriculture in the Western Cape province has disbursed R 8.3 million in drought support to 586 farmers in the central Karoo region this month, it said on Monday.

Ostrich farmers in the Little Karoo have lost an estimated R1bn and have had to lay off 15% to 20% of their workforce as the crippling drought enters its fourth year.

Food security is a hard-won privilege and can easily be lost due to the persistent drought. Agri SA will rally all stakeholders to support farmers and farm workers in drought afflicted areas. Rising food prices, malnutrition and food-inequality will be our future if nothing is done.

A sharp improvement for rainfall conditions for most of the Summer Rainfall Areas for weeks to come. It also will lower the frost risk but increase the risk for insufficient growth related temperatures to complete development cycle of late planted summer crops.

Climate change has been blamed for the wild swings in agricultural crop yields, but it could also result in a doomsday scenario for drinkers: Beer, the world’s top-consumed alcoholic beverage by volume, may at some point be out of reach for hundreds of millions of people around the world, according to a new study.

A survey released last week by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) confirms what many around the country already fear: the poor rains in the first half of the season and their inconsistency in the second have driven away farmers from the fields, blighted crops and left livestock teetering on the brink.

The world’s driest desert is flooding and some of the planet’s wettest woodlands are burning. Welcome to summer in Chile.