Jannie de Villiers is CEO of Grain SA. BUSINESS DAY TV: Industry group Grain SA sees 2017 recording a maize surplus after last year’s drought-induced deficit and its survey shows farmers have planted 2.4-million hectares this season. That’s an 18% increase over 2016. Grain SA’s CEO Jannie de Villiers joins us now in the News Leader studio to take a look at the turnaround we’re seeing and some of the broader implications. Jannie ... so how encouraged are you by this 2.4-million hectares this season because you project a surplus coming into the market, but some might say isn’t it way too premature to be calling a surplus given that things rely on one very erratic factor, that being the weather? JANNIE DE VILLIERS: I don’t think we can call it a surplus yet. If we look at the current circumstances, before Christmas we saw all these dust storms and we had a lot of wind damage on the little maize plants and we were very worried, but in the first week of January we saw some good rains in ...
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.
Subscribe now to unlock this article.
Support BusinessLIVE’s award-winning journalism for R129 per month (digital access only).
There’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in SA. Our subscription packages now offer an ad-free experience for readers.
Cancel anytime.
Questions? Email helpdesk@businesslive.co.za or call 0860 52 52 00. Got a subscription voucher? Redeem it now.