Judging by coverage of the black empowerment workshop for the wine sector, slickly hosted in Cape Town last month by the South African Wine Industry Trust (Sawit), the unthinkable is happening. The fragmented, conservative and insular wine industry, dominated for so long by bastions of Afrikaner power such as KWV, is embracing change.
KWV’s successor, the South African Wine and Brandy Company (SAWBC), presented a ”Wine Industry Plan” that was accepted by the government. And Sawit — a partnership between the industry and the government — agreed to facilitate a charter for broad-based black empowerment within six months.
The conference did mark a break with the past — but fundamental issues remain unresolved. The consensus on the need for black economic empowerment encompasses divergent agendas. Strong leadership will be needed to manage the process, and Sawit has its work cut out.
The wine industry has historically been shaped by links with Afrikaner power networks, dependency on state patronage and regulation, and the domination of a few large producing wholesalers. Leadership and vision have come from the margins, not the centre.
KWV first tried to avoid trans- formation and then to limit its scope. Vision 2020, the industry’s blueprint for the future, offered no convincing transformation agenda.
Initially Sawit, created by KWV at the government’s behest, showed little dynamism and seemed to go out of its way to placate powerful industry figures.
So the conference was an encour- aging step forward — but not because of the content of the Wine Industry Plan, which is problematic in some areas. Neither is the SAWBC, still mainly staffed and controlled by the old elite, a convincing driver of change. Rather, the change lies in the SAWBC’s commitment to a partnership with the government, the recognition by all that much more consultation and design is necessary, and Sawit’s commitment to drive the process.
By championing empowerment and committing itself to wide consultation on a charter, Sawit has assumed the mantle of the trans- formation leader the industry has lacked. Its board seems determined to be genuinely independent, and its chairperson, Gavin Pieterse, has gone on record on the need for a vision of broad-based empowerment that goes beyond elite deal-making aimed at restoring lost state patronage.
Sawit faces significant challenges. The conference showed there are several different empowerment agendas. One belongs to representatives of South Africa’s new black elite, justifiably hoping to share the spoils of an industry hitherto monopolised by a few whites.
The black middle class must, however, face the uncomfortable reality that there is not all that much money to be made in wine farming. Primary producers get a very small slice of the consumer rand.
The value chain in wine is buyer-led, and power lies not in growing or even wine-making, but in the ownership, management and development of brands. With the strengthening rand, even that is a risky and competitive business.
This creates doubts about some of the empowerment targets bandied about. Buying 10% or more of the wine industry in the next five years will need serious money — and serious money probably has better things to do.
Moreover, there are other strong claimants to empowerment. The conference heard repeatedly that not enough wine is made by black people. In fact, every drop of South African wine is made by black people, and has been since the days of slavery.
Today, even as the wine industry experiences unparalleled growth, coloured and African workers plant every vine and harvest every grape, but continue to be poverty stricken. Indeed, competitive pressures are arguably making things worse for many, encouraging owners to reduce permanent labour, demolish housing and increase their reliance on seasonal workers often recruited by unscrupulous contractors.
Such workers are often women living in townships, where costs are high, who bring home less than R50 a day.
Seasonal workers can be fairly treated. Business models exist where profit is ensured not through starvation wages, but investment in workers’ skills and motivation. Some farms have equity share schemes, giving workers part ownership. Labels like Winds of Change and Thandi have already shown that ”ethical” wine production can work.
It is not easy. Some projects have failed, and real empower- ment is hard to achieve. As some conference presentations showed, schemes are tricky to design and hard to manage.
But the effort must be made. We need black farm owners and cellar masters, but black empowerment that does not benefit farm workers — including off-farm and seasonal workers — is not worth its name.
How to juggle these divergent and sometimes opposing interests is not clear, but Sawit has accepted the task. It will have to depart from its timid track record and show itself to be genuinely independent from its erstwhile masters.
Andries du Toit is a senior researcher at the University of Western Cape’s Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies