Funding shortfalls and delayed water pipeline construction presented persistent challenges to a ground-breaking macadamia nut farm in the Eastern Cape, but partners in the farm pressed on to make the now-community-led initiative succeed regardless.
The Ncera Macadamia Farm was established to plant 300 hectares immediately, but the farm had to wait for bulk water to arrive after obtaining a water use licence in 2011, and the water took a long time to get to the site, after which nearly 180ha were planted between 2009 and 2015.
Grant Simpson, an executive director at TGK Farming and a member of the investment group that helped establish Ncera Macadamia Farming, told parliament’s portfolio committee on agriculture that in 15 years, 180ha of macadamias were established and 330 tonnes of nuts were produced for the export market.
“We were limited by funding shortfalls and delayed water pipeline construction. This is the nature of farming and South African farmers. We don’t complain, we just adapt, make a plan, and get on with it while we wait. Our staff also learnt a great deal during this time about resilience and innovation.”
Simpson said TGK built a strong relationship with the late Chieftainess Nobhotwe Jongilanga in forming a partnership to establish the farm. TG K knew that as the trees grew, their water demands would increase, presenting yield target risks.
We were limited by funding shortfalls and delayed water pipeline construction. This is the nature of farming and South African farmers. We don’t complain, we just adapt, make a plan, and get on with it while we wait. Our staff also learned a great deal during this time about resilience and innovation.
— Grant Simpson, an executive director at TGK Farming
“The Simpson family or TGK were approached by Amadlelo around 2004, [namely] Amadlelo Agri. The goal was to find community land and turn it into a commercial macademia farm. Khula Development facilitators introduced us to the Ncera community.”
The Simpson family has macadamia and dairy operations in the private sector and had to restructure its operations to focus on this community opportunity around 2004 and 2005. By 2018, the farm was totally community-managed, and TGK stepped down in 2019 to become a minority shareholder.
The exercise of cultivating macadamias was a challenging one, Simpson said, because while the climatic conditions were ideal for farming macadamias, the soil in the Eastern Cape was not good for growing the nut. So the area was surveyed, and pockets of good soil were found that were suitable for macadamia farming.
“People started to hear of this macadamia farm, and people started to farm and employ people within the macadamia industry in the Eastern Cape.”
He said between 2005 and 2006, the partnership started the Ncera nursery to ensure the quality and variety of plant and root stock. He said he interviewed thousands of people to find the best personnel to aid in the development of the nursery.
“TGK used all of its contacts in the industry to source the best quality to ensure that we would ultimately plant the best possible tree at Ncera that would stay in the ground for a very long time.”
He said the initiatives developed appointees, some of whom only had a matric certificate and others who did not even have matric, into positions including farm manager.
“Our role was to provide establishment, management, and leadership to the Ncera Macadamia Farming operation, creating systems to manage the seed, the seedling, the tree, the nut, on-farm processing of the nut, and then get that nut to the market.
“We had to do this up-to-farm processing using locally employed staff from the community. We achieved this through endless hours of skills transfer and training. There were no technical courses on how to do this. We simply had to teach all the staff everything we had learned from the macadamia industry. We did it ourselves.”
Dina Pule, chair of the portfolio committee on agriculture, said the committee conducted two oversight visits to the farm operations in the Eastern Cape to find out about the farm’s needs, training initiatives and production progress.
MK Party MP Zwelakhe Mthethwa asked TGK to provide clarity on whether the farm made a profit and whether that profit was banked or ploughed back into the business.
Business Times
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