CEO, Grain SA
THE RECENT DECISION TO LEAVE SOUTH AFRICA’S WHEAT TARIFF FRAMEWORK EFFECTIVELY UNCHANGED IS DEEPLY DISAPPOINTING. GOVERNMENT HAS CHOSEN THE POLITICALLY CONVENIENT ARGUMENT OF SHORT-TERM CONSUMER PROTECTION, PRESENTING LOWER IMPORT COSTS AS IF IT AUTOMATICALLY TRANSLATES INTO CHEAPER BREAD. IN DOING SO, IT IS AVOIDING THE MUCH LARGER AND MORE DIFFICULT CONVERSATION ABOUT WHAT FOOD SECURITY REALLY MEANS.
Food security is not only about food being available, safe, and affordable. It also requires jobs, economic growth, and viable rural economies that give people the means to buy food. South Africa will not become more food secure by replacing domestic production with imports while local economic activity declines. A successful South Africa must create prosperity and employment while delivering affordable, safe, and nutritious wheat products.
Government’s current approach is frustratingly myopic. It focuses on the price of the loaf while overlooking larger cost drivers such as distribution, energy, transportation, and packaging, which account for around 80% of bread costs, while sacrificing the economic prospects and incomes of rural economies and livelihoods that contribute less than 20%.
I am equally disappointed that parts of the milling and baking industries have accepted this narrow narrative of supporting imported procurement above the long-term sustainability of local production. That is particularly difficult to accept because this value chain was built through partnership.
For decades, South African wheat producers worked with breeders, researchers, millers, and bakers to develop wheat with exceptional milling and baking characteristics. The Southern African Grain Laboratory has confirmed that this quality is the result of years of cultivar development, research, production discipline, and investment by producers.
Wheat quality is closely linked to milling performance, protein characteristics, and strong dough that allows bread to rise properly. However, this quality comes at a cost. A higher-quality wheat generally produces lower yields, requiring producers to sacrifice tonnes per hectare and carry greater production risk while the market is not consistently paying for that sacrifice.
Millers cannot insist on premium local quality while supporting a trade environment that undermines the conditions needed to produce it. They benefit from the quality created by South African producers while simultaneously placing those same producers under increasing pressure. The danger is that we will lose the quality inheritance built over decades.
This is effectively a one-way decision. Once the production base, breeding focus, specialist knowledge, and producer confidence are lost, we cannot simply recreate them. Production systems and expertise cannot be rebuilt overnight – once it’s gone, it’s gone.
Modern business reality is that value chains compete against value chains. Producers do not compete only against producers in other countries. South Africa’s wheat value chain competes against international systems supported by coordinated research, infrastructure, policy, insurance, and government support. It is therefore deeply frustrating that our own wheat value chain has failed to build the strong, mutually beneficial partnership required to compete. Personally, I feel betrayed by the loss of that partnership.
What happens next?
Producers must now decide what to do next. The answer is that a new approach is needed as tariff protection alone is no longer a complete strategy. They must pivot from quality towards sustainable, risk-adjusted profitability per hectare unless millers and bakers contract for quality and pay a premium. Where this is not the case, producers must prioritise yield, yield stability, disease resistance, and lower production cost. This requires a fundamental shift in cultivar development and technology access, prioritising precision breeding, faster pathways for high-yielding cultivars, stronger collaboration with international breeders, access to new breeding technologies, and more flexible release criteria across market classes.
The objective is to produce quality where it is valued and paid for – while delivering higher-yielding, fit-for-purpose wheat for the broader market. The strategy must align breeding, cultivar release, grading, storage, market premiums, trade policy, and producer profitability.
As Grain SA we will keep doing our utmost to protect producers during this transition. We will continue engaging with government and pursuing tariff applications and other trade measures where necessary. Wheat producers cannot be expected to transform their production systems while being exposed to subsidised international competition and global markets.
We cannot undo the decision that has been made. We can, however, decide how we respond. South African grain producers have always adapted to changing markets, climates, and policy environments. We will do so again – and this time our strategy will be built on competitiveness, profitability, and the sustainability of our wheat producers.
