Parts of SA battling with low rainfall, while threat of another drought looms – agri economist

The Northern Cape and Eastern Cape provinces are still contending with the effects of a drought in the areas, and the SA agricultural industry is still not out of the woods as the country might be hit by another drought in February, an agricultural economist warned.

Wandile Sihlobo, chief economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa, on Saturday morning posted a video on his Twitter account warning of the dire situation farmers, and even households, are facing.

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"Driving around South Africa you will actually discover that, some of the provinces like the Eastern Cape and Northern Cape are still in a dire situation. It is dry there. Livestock farmers are in a difficult situation.  Crop farmers are in difficult situations, and even households are starting to feel the pain," he said.

The economist went on to explain that players in the agricultural industry are concerned that there could be another drought or below normal rainfall, between late January and early February. There will be more certainty about the status of the potential drought at the end of January, he added.

"South Africa's agricultural sector is not completely out of the woods. There are still some pockets that are facing extreme, tough conditions," Sihlobo said.

As a short-term remedy to the drought-stricken Northern Cape and Eastern Cape, government should prioritise supplying feed to livestock farmers, he said. Given that national government finances are constrained, Sihlobo called on provincial governments to reprioritise their budgets and allocate resources to areas which are most vulnerable.

Despite there being rainfall in provinces like Limpopo, Sihloo said that the dams are still not filled at capacity.

In a blog, published on Friday and which he co-authored with Alexander Forbes chief economist Isaah Mhlanga, Sihlobo explained that the Magoebaskloof dam in Limpopo is at capacity - but the same cannot be said about the Tzaneen and Ebenezer dams. The latter two dams are at 5% and 28% capacity, respectively.

Compiled by Lameez Omarjee