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Access the Baseline 2022 publication through the BFAP Baseline Site. Click Here to download
Meat price increases were repeatedly highlighted in the domestic food inflation statistics in 2022. In this brief, Dr. Tracy Davids explores the direct and indirect drivers of this phenomenon and the prospects for normalisation in future. Download here to read the full brief.
StatsSA reports that South Africa’s GDP contracted by 2% in the first quarter of 2020 relative to the fourth quarter of 2019 while the Agricultural GDP grew by 27.8% and contributed 0.5 percentage points to the overall GDP. Download the publication here.
This report evaluates the impact of the 2015/2016 drought on the South African economy, on commercial and smallholder producers, and on consumers. Download.
June 2, 2021
Over the past few years, in South Africa, there has been a slow but steady trend within the local feed industry from using imported to domestically produced soybean meal as the domestic soybean crushing industry matured. To include locally produced soybean meal in their formulations/rations, the feed industry requires a reliable and consistent supply of […]
September 19, 2021
South Africa has faced multiple waves of COVID-19 infections since March 2020 with various levels of economic restrictions imposed to control the pandemic’s spread. Such actions included intermittent bans on alcoholic beverage sales, which have had a substantial impact on the wine sector. This purpose of this paper is to quantify this impact, using a […]
September 20, 2021
Tracy Davids and Ferdi Meyer wrote an opinion piece in the Business Day. The article is available here.
December 5, 2021
The Food Dialogue sessions are presented by the Southern Africa Food Lab, an initiative of the Faculty of AgriSciences at Stellenbosch University. It regularly brings together diverse, influential stakeholders in Southern Africa food systems to respond to systemic issues in creative ways and to inspire change in how we think and act on complex social […]
The agricultural sector was the lone shining light – the only positive contributor to GDP with an increase of 15.1% from quarter 1 to quarter 2 of 2020 and a contribution of 0.3 percentage points to the overall GDP. Read this one-pager for more details around which subsectors contributed to this growth. Download here
The national economy saw a record annual decline of -7%, the biggest contraction since at least 1946. By contrast, the agriculture sector realised an annual real GDP growth of 13.1%, which was the only sector, apart from government services, that saw any expansion. Click here to read more
Read more on agriculture’s contribution to the first quarter economic growth figures released recently
BFAP estimates that agriculture contracted by 8.9% on a year-on-year basis. Read this one-pager for some more details and context behind this contraction. Download Here.
December 18, 2018
A reality check regarding current-season rainfall and expectations for the 2019 maize crop. Read more.
November 5, 2021
BFAP has undertaken a study, funded by the Oilseeds Advisory Committee (OAC) to provide a deeper understanding of the key drivers of quality of soybean products for feed use in South Africa. Dr. Wiltrud Durandt, Ms. Helga Ottermann, Ms. Louise Cloete and Mrs. Marion Delport authored a report unpacking the drivers of soybean product quality at farm-level, […]
July 30, 2021
South Africa’s pork industry is small, but possesses immense growth potential. Relative affordability makes the product appealing and the industry ought to be able to contribute meaningfully to food security. South Africa’s pork consumption is low compared to global norms, but products seem to be gaining popularity locally, and are starting to appeal to a […]
June 2, 2021
Over the past 10 years (2010-2020) the South African soyabean industry has been one of the country’s biggest agricultural and agro-processing success stories. The area planted has more than doubled, production has nearly tripled and major investments in processing facilities have boosted total crushing capacity to 2.2 million tons (1.76 mil tons @ 80% utilisation) […]
One of the key sectors that contributed to the second successive quarterly decline was agriculture. Download this one-pager to read more about the factors influencing agriculture’s performance.
May 25, 2021
Maize prices remain high – despite the expectation of a bumper harvest. BFAP’s Tracy Davids and Wandile Sihlobo (Agbiz) unpack some key reasons in this article – first written for Business Day – suggesting that global drivers are the major reason for persistently high prices domestically. The biggest factor is strong import demand from China, […]
It is agreed that agriculture provides avenues for impoverished households to produce and trade their way out of poverty. However, this requires market access and value chain integration of small-scale farmers.
October 25, 2021
Louw Pienaar took part in the monthly series held by Beanstalk Global & The PMA in South Africa, with the spotlight on kiwifruit this month. Read more about it here.
November 15, 2021
Louw Pienaar and Wandile Sihlobo wrote an opinion piece in the Business Day. Article available here.
January 31, 2022
Prof Ferdi Meyer discusses the contribution of South Africa’s agricultural sector as well as the informal agricultural market to ensure food security in Southern Africa. Watch it here:
The South African poultry industry is an important subsector within South African agriculture. It is the single largest contributor to total gross agricultural production value and has significant up and downstream multiplier effects through its long, integrated value chain.
Maize is an important staple crop in southern Africa that has often been prioritised from a policy perspective, particularly in the imposition of export controls under periods of perceived uncertainty…
BFAP has undertaken a study, funded by the Oilseeds Advisory Committee (OAC) to provide a deeper understanding of the key drivers affecting sunflower seed quality, the impact of varying (lower) oil content on the industry, and potential interventions to achieve an upgraded state of the value chain. Download the Full Report. In the September 2020 […]
September 16, 2021
This BFAP brief strives to inform the perennial debate on the extent of market concentration in South Africa’s agriculture sector. The complexity of the country’s food system warrants relevant context on the issue, preventing generalisation and over simplification because of some debilitating data challenges. Read the full brief here and a shortened version that appeared in […]
June 1, 2021
BFAP expects a sharp, almost 50 thousand hectare contraction in the area planted to Barley in 2021, with producers shifting into Canola and wheat instead. BFAP analysts Divan van der Westhuizen and Tracy Davids unpack some of the reasons in an article published in the June 2021 Edition of Oilseed Focus. Barley stocks increased sharply […]
The Government of the Republic of Zambia has committed to transforming the economy to support economic growth and facilitate job creation. Central to the transformation agenda is a commitment to open trade regime for agricultural exports and imports. This collaboration between researchers from the World Bank, BFAP and IAPRI demonstrates and quantifies Zambia’s potential gains […]
BFAP provides context for Agriculture’s contribution to GDP in Quarter 2, 2019. Read more.
This report benchmarks the efficiency of South-African broiler producers. It considers terms technical efficiency and production cost in SA relative to other leading producers globally. Read more here.
BFAP calculates that agricultural GDP grew by 1.2% in Q3 2018 when compared to Q3 2017. Download this one-pager unpacking various sub-sector performances.
In this study, modelling techniques were applied to explore plum production profitability under different scenarios in order to aid decision-making in the industry. The analyses were done on two output levels: 1) a scenario-based stochastic simulation at farm-level that considers macro-economic factors, and 2) a sensitivity analysis of the effect of different production costs, Rand per […]
November 8, 2021
Ferdi Meyer and Tracy Davids wrote an opinion piece unpacking the opportunities and limits of import replacement for South African veggie oils. Read the full brief here and a shortened version that appeared in the Business Day here. For enquiries, please contact Ferdi Meyer (ferdi@bfap.co.za) or Tracy Davids (tracy@bfap.co.za).
August 26, 2021
Louw Pienaar and Wandile Sihlobo wrote an opinion piece in the Business Day. Article available here: https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/opinion/2021-08-25-make-kiwifruit-part-of-the-agriculture-master-plan/
BFAP calculates that agricultural GDP contracted by 2.1% in Q4 2019 when compared to Q4 2018. Read this one-pager for some more details and context behind this contraction. Download Here
November 25, 2021
Food Security – Prontuit | 15 November 2021 | KykNET South African’s grocery baskets are becoming smaller and are costing more. Prontuit discussed rising food prices and food security with Wandile Sihlobo, chief economist at Agbiz and Professor Ferdi Meyer, Managing Director of BFAP. Watch it here:
Soybeans and its related products are used in a multitude of forms in different food products. The main soy derivative products produced for the human food market are full-fat soybean meal, white flakes (also referred to as defatted soybean meal), textured vegetable protein (TVP), soy concentrates and soy isolates. Full fat soybean meal is mainly […]