‘I don’t want to lose a single farmer’: Steenhuisen amid agriculture storm

Minister of agriculture John Steenhuisen said South Africa needed to be proactive about protecting its agriculture sector. The country is threatened by tariffs from the US and could be excluded from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa).

His remarks came after the US accused the South African government of confiscating land, and offered Afrikaners asylum in the US. Organisations such as AfriForum have declined the offer.

Briefing reporters on Tuesday in Cape Town, the minister was asked if he knew of any Afrikaans farmers accepting the asylum offer, to which he said he was not aware of any who wanted to leave, nor would he want to lose any farmer to the US.

“I don’t want to lose a single farmer from South Africa; whether they are Afrikaans, English, whether they are black, white, Indian or coloured, we cannot afford to lose a single farmer.

“I’m not surprised that people want our farmers because we have the best farmers and farmworkers in the world. The fact that we are able to compete as an agricultural sector against heavily subsidised northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere competitors and still are able to hold our own is attributed to the fact that our farmers and farm workers are the best in the world. We can’t afford to lose them.”

He said he was not aware of any farmers who were preparing to take Trump up on his offer. On the contrary, he said, his most recent engagements with farmers gave him the overwhelming sense that they wanted to remain in South Africa.

“I have not yet met a single farmer who wants to go. I was in the Free State last weekend, where I met both small-scale and large-scale farmers. I’ve met Afrikaans farmers, I’ve met Tswana farmers, I’ve met Sotho farmers and English farmers. Every single one of them has said to me very clearly, ‘We don’t want to go; we want to make this work, but we need your help as the minister.’”

There are serious challenges in the agricultural sector, though.

“Farming has been tough. Farming has enough obstacles already without Mr Trump’s potential tariffs. [You have] ports that don’t work properly, roads and rail infrastructure are broken, a stock theft problem that is spiralling out of control, rural insecurity and obviously prices that affect farmers.”

He said fixing the ports and rail could quadruple the agriculture sector’s production in five years.

Steenhuisen acknowledged that South Africa had made bad decisions in the past but said the government of national unity was focused on mending the errors of previous administrations.

He responded to claims by Sakeliga CEO Piet le Roux that he had become a “BEE tsar”, introduced “agri-BEE” and introduced new empowerment funds in the department at the expense of white farmers. He slammed these claims as “slavish and misinformed criticism”.

“These claims are false and are clearly being used by Mr Piet le Roux to steer a public campaign of misinformation and distortion. Mr Le Roux is attempting to paint me as some BEE tsar to drive Sakeliga’s own membership and income through manufacturing outrage and sensationalism.”

Steenhuisen said while he did not support the Expropriation Act, his work in the department of agriculture was being distorted by Le Roux. He said he was supportive of interventions and policies that create “equality of opportunity” over those that attempt to “manufacture an equality of outcomes”.

On Agoa, he said South Africa’s exclusion from the scheme, should it materialise, would be a considerable loss for the country's motor and agriculture sectors, adding that tariff increases would be bad for commercial farmers. Agoa allows African exports to enter the US market at favourable rates.

“The biggest group of people who will be affected by this are the commercial farmers. People who have big contracts into the US market for things like avocados and the like. Those are the people in the field who are going to be hit hardest.”

“We can’t change who sits in the White House. That is a reality. That is a democratic outcome. The Americans made their decision, and they went forward. We have to navigate these next four years, and we’ve got to navigate them in our best interests.”

Steenhuisen said Roman Cabanac was still in the department as chief of staff, though he had not engaged with him. He said he had asked Cabanac to stand down, but he had refused. The human resources processes are reaching their final stages and announcements will be made in due course, said Steenhuisen.

TimesLIVE