Launched in 2008 to help ensure a charity’s food security, the Siyavuna programme has expanded to agriculture, education and the development of its value chains.
By 2009, 628 more farmers had joined and vegetable sales had expanded to 4 communities. This marked the birth of the Kumnandi brand, now a well-known brand on the south coast of KZN.
In 2010, Siyavuna hosted 1,130 active and operational farmers in nine other communities.
Thanks to its wonderful success, Siyavuna has gone from the pilot level to a full-fledged agricultural enterprise with its own members. In 2011, it was registered as a non-profit organization with over 1200 active farmers.
With more than 2,000 farmers trained in food production in 2014 and the progress of farmers’ associations, Siyavuna provided on-the-ground mentoring and carried out regular inspections, providing nutritious food to 2,000 families.
In 2015, it conducted an organizational assessment that resulted in the creation of agricultural centers, with 3 registered agricultural centers.
The progression of the sectors and 3 plans continued: the Bulbine Frutescens Plan, implemented in 2021, and the Legumes and Youth Activation in Agriculture plans, implemented last year.
Since its inception, Siyavuna has expanded its success into agricultural sector spaces, focusing on agriculture, schooling and training, expanding price chains, empowering youth and strengthening the agricultural ecosystem.
Despite the addition of branches, agricultural clusters and cooperatives, the cornerstone of the Siyavuna project is food security for all. This is achieved through education, capacity building, education and awareness-raising, based on the principle: “If you give a man a fish, he will eat it for a day; If you teach a guy to fish, he will eat all his life.
In addition to the seeds, seedlings and new vegetables produced by farmers in Siyavuna, the organization has also diversified into the production of amaranth and Bulbine frutescens (a succulent plant that produces a gel extract used in cosmetics) and dried vegetables, adding paprika.
Siyavuna creates localized opportunities for communities to become more self-sufficient and less dependent on ad hoc aid and program funding. His technique includes opportunities for Americans at all stages, from seed to sale.
Mofokeng’s determination to push Siyavuna forward was rewarded with the 2021 SAB Foundation Social Innovation Award. He also identified himself through the mail
Through fundraising and strategic planning, while collaborating intensively with the board of directors, Siyavuna is the seed and Mofokeng brings the rain. She oversees all operational facets of the organization, from seed to harvest, from harvest to sale.
Speaking to Farmer’s Weekly, Mofokeng recounted Siyavuna’s arduous but promising journey. The creation of the program, Mofokeng explained, arose from the launch of the initiative through Give a Child a Family as a way to reach the families of the young people in its care and enable them to earn a source of income by promoting their surplus production in their communities.
“The other facet they added that would allow families to earn a source of income was Give a Child a Family’s Siyavuna program to buy the products they could not consume or sell, as long as they were of good quality, regardless of quantity, and sold in urban markets, such as hospitality and restaurants.
He said that in the communities, other people who were not involved in Give a Family to a Child showed a lot of interest when the task began, which motivated it to be expanded to include stakeholders.
“By the end of 2013, the program was operational in 12 communities. What attracted everyone was that they could sell their products in Siyavuna, which guaranteed them a market. This has become one of the demanding situations we face because we collect products worth R35. 000, but only 46-51% were sold. This means that the remaining percentage was amortized and used to make our credit. But fertilizer does not produce the same yield as new vegetables!
At that time, they had Siyavuna as an organization, then their Kumnandi logo, which is better known because this is how their cars are marked, and Siyavuna as their logo.
“We operate in two municipal areas: Mdoni Municipality and Ray Nkonnieni Municipality. We have separated those areas, and the population of each municipality belongs to its own cooperatives. We had two cooperatives within Siyavuna, which were controlled through a board of directors. But we learned that farmers were not interested in cooperatives. They had no connection with them, they only sought to be part of Siyavuna.
“In 2014, we conducted extensive strategic planning, where we brought together all stakeholders, funders like Wesbank, Natal Portland Cement, the Industrial Development Corporation [IDC], the board of directors, farmers, where we discussed how to keep pace. model.
It was then a question of creating agrocentros, a networked organization that would manage its own finances, cultivated products, costs and markets.
“Only 3 of the 12 communities have expressed interest. These won IDC with infrastructure and monetary matrix. They are still operational and the other nine are still promoting Siyavuna, and that is how we are still structured today.
Interestingly, the agricultural poles began to compete with Siyavuna. “Our farmers know our customers, so they started promoting to them. They were happy to buy directly from farmers because it was more satisfying because they knew their history.
According to Mofokeng, they learned a lesson when their president emphasized:
“If his beneficiaries don’t challenge him, then he failed. If your beneficiaries start challenging you, then you did your job.
“It’s worth it, because organic farming supports the ecosystem, improves production and also increases the nutritional price of food, as is the case in South Africa, where malnutrition is widespread. “
In describing his methods, Mofokeng claims that Siyavuna uses chemicals.
“We practice permaculture and agroecology and are part of the PGS SA organization [which supports component warranty schemes]. We do not use chemicals, we conduct our own inspections and peer monitoring. We also conduct annual visits and an annual visit. PGS Day where we have customers, other PGS members from all over South Africa and our farmers, and we conduct spot checks on farmers’ gardens to see if they meet our standards. It also allows consumers to see where their produce is grown and by whom. They support, so the connection makes everything more realistic and the other people who buy from us perceive the price of the project.
If they find out that farmers are chemicals, they suspend them for two years.
“If they need to come back after that, we start training, rebuild them and make sure the chemicals have been removed. We do a lot of things before we get them back.
“The first to cultivate Bulbine frutescens, which is used in the cosmetics industry and which we supplied to a company in Limpopo, Botanica Natural Products. We have a three-year sales agreement that ends this year. Thanks to this business plan, we implemented the SAB Foundation Social Innovation Fund and were awarded in 2021. “
In 2022, thanks to the Presidential Recovery Fund, Social Employment Fund, they began employing an additional 1,000 young people to create their own gardens.
“We exercise them (we have SETA-accredited exercise), we advise them and they also have a guaranteed market where they sell us their products. We have discovered other people interested in signing origin agreements with us, so we now have AGT Foods. Contract to grow paprika, which we dry.
Siyavuna has an agreement with Umoya Foods to source dried amaranth leaves. It also has a vegetable drying facility, equipped with a drying device to dry the products and turn them into powder or flakes, depending on the desired shape.
In the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, Siyavuna lost 12 farmers to the virus and struggled to invest due to the economic crisis brought on by the lockdown.
“After COVID-19, banks were the biggest investors and we financed ourselves through the Nedbank Foundation. For six to eight months, we work for a short time or earn only a percentage of our salary.
After the lockdowns, demand was replaced considerably. ” Our biggest consumers were in Durban: fine dining retailers in Umhlanga, Durban North and Kloof bought their products from us.
But due to the COVID-19 shutdown, most of them closed, causing us to lose some of our most important customers. Only this month, we learned that some of them would reopen.
The July 2021 floods also posed huge problems. ” Our five-hectare Bulbine site was flooded and roads were damaged. Even if we don’t lose crops to heavy rains, all inputs will be washed away. Buying Ecocert biological inputs is not child’s play. After every heavy rainy season, we have to buy inputs, all from scratch. “
Speaking about the existing scenario in Siyavuna, Mofokeng said: “For the past 14 years, we have invested in development, assessment, studies and realignment, in close consultation with our farmers and key stakeholders. In the coming years, we will focus more on anchoring our farmers in sustainable agricultural businesses, expanding our price chains, and strengthening the agricultural ecosystem.
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