Banana farmers on the South Coast are saying that the future is uncertain in terms of sales and job provision for their staff.
The farmers are faced with a crisis as imported bananas are more popular on the market, as it is cheaper.
Scott Kvalsvig, vice-chairman of the Southern KZN Banana Association said since local farmers met with government officials about the issue during a People’s Parliament site visit more than a month ago, they have not received feedback on the challenges they addressed.
He said the situation is still bad, prices are ludicrous at the market and the farmers are still in the same situation.
“The price has moved slightly at the farms and this may be because the weather has become hotter and people are eating more bananas. I am not sure, but the money we are making is not close to covering costs of production and I am concerned,” Kvalsvig explained.
He said he recently embarked on a fact-finding mission to KwaMatikwe, Mlalane and other areas and found that the farmers there were removing banana crops because they cannot compete with imports from Mozambique.
“The farms up there are black-owned and are big farms, up to 1 000 hectares and thousands of people have been retrenched and I think it’s only a matter of time before it happens here,”Kvalsvig added.
One of the local farmers, Lucky Mthembu of Igeja Farm agreed that sales have picked up compared to the previous few months, however, he said that the crops are not looking good.
“In terms of the crops, I feel that they are not so good as a result of us not being able to fertilize and apply weedicides and pesticides as we do not have the money to purchase them,” said Mbhele.
He said in terms of employees being retrenched, it looks like the situation will be temporary, however, it is dependent on sales, but jobs are still on the line and no one knows what the future holds.
“Hopefully in January and February, we will be able to determine what is going to happen,” added Mbhele.
Kvalsvig said the situation is bad because banks are also reluctant to give farmers funding currently.
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