‘The worst drought in 40 years’

A three-month dry spell could drive maize prices up to R2 000 a ton by the end of the month, in what farmers are calling ‘the worst drought in 40 years”.

Maize farmers in North West and Mpumalanga have watched in horror as their crops have withered during the current drought. The Crop Estimates Committee last week put the forecast for the harvest at 7,757-million tons, less than South Africa’s required annual harvest of roughly eight-million. While some traders and farmers believe the harvest may drop as low as five and a half million tons, economists say South Africa will have to import at least one-million tons of maize to feed its population.

In the light of the projected shortages, the maize price has already started climbing. In contrast to the R600 a ton price of the last three years, a ton of maize was this week trading at R1 952, raising alarm bells about the price consumers will ultimately have to fork out for maize meal.

The South African Weather Service said that, in February, South Africa’s interior received below normal rainfall. The service’s drought index indicated that almost all the maize-producing regions were experiencing moderate to severe drought conditions. The Witbank area in Mpumalanga, for example, only recorded 5mm of rain for the whole of February, making it one of the worst-hit areas, along with patches in North West.

About 50km outside Witbank, on the road between Ogies and Delmas, browned crops scar the landscape. Farmers in the area say they will be lucky if they can harvest 40% of what they planted.

‘Kak,” Gert Claasen grimaces when asked how he is doing. ‘This is the worst drought in 40 years. Some old-timers say it is the worst drought ever.”

Last year, the Claasens, who planted 3 100ha of maize on their 4 000ha farm, harvested five and a half tons of maize per hectare. This year they will count their blessings if they can salvage two tons.

‘Closer to a ton and a half is more likely,” he said. Looking at the horizon, Claasen just shakes his head.

‘It can rain till I’m blue in the face, but it’s not going to help this harvest. The horse has bolted,” he says. ‘It’s too late.” But he quickly adds that rain will never be unwelcome for farmers. In the maize field, he angrily kicks at one of the withered maize plants, exposing the head of an underdeveloped mealie.

He explains that the only way that rain can help now is by enabling the veld to recover to feed livestock during the winter.

‘But farmers will have to slaughter a lot of their stock already,” he says, adding that while the maize price will increase food prices, red meat might become cheaper due to the flooding of the market.

Prophets of doom have already predicted that this year is the beginning of a lengthy dry stretch for South Africa’s summer rainfall regions, while climate change estimates also foretell that the country will only get drier.

Yet Snyman says bad weather will not get the better of him. ‘You have to believe,” he says.

On his farm on the Ogies road, farmer Bertie Truter, who has planted 11 000ha of maize, also curses the bad weather, which he believes is the worst in his farming career. ‘My harvest is gone,” he says. ‘It’s ugly.”

While First National Bank agriculture economist Ernst Janovsky agrees that the outlook looks bleak, he is quick to say that South Africa’s food security is not under threat and that the situation is not ‘catastrophic”. He says South Africa’s saving grace is that farms that are under constant irrigation guarantee a harvest of three-million tons of maize.

Janovsky says that even in the worst-case scenario, South African production will not drop below five and a half million tons, as the ‘drylands” — rain-fed fields — are expected to produce 40% of their usual output.

‘Maize meal consumers will definitely feel the drought in their pockets and the poor will be impacted,” he says. ‘But I believe that many people in the country have also moved on to rice and maize as their staple diet, and the price of wheat remains low.”

Apart from humans, animals account for a large chunk of maize consumption. Janovsky believes poultry prices will also soar, while the effect of the high maize price on red meat will only be felt in six months’ time.