The health and wealth of SA’s poultry sector
Even factors as seemingly irrelevant as the attack on Saudi oil fields will affect SA’s poultry companies, writes Anthony Clark
Some key events are coming up and as this publication hits the news stands one of the biggest indicators to the impending health and wealth of the poultry sector will already be known.On October 24 the crop estimates committee (CEC) will have published its first intention report indicating how many hectares SA commercial farmers in the key maize belts will plant for harvesting in 2020. In 2019, the commercial maize harvest was 11,081Mt, which is about an average harvest on a 50-year production trend graph. This was produced on 2.3-million hectares.Late planting in some maize areas and indifferent weather affects the yield a hectare which, on a normal trend line, is 5.3t a hectare. Poor weather and rain affects the crop, the quality and this yield.Maize production fluctuates widely due to weather and rain. In the drought year of 2016 the domestic maize crop was 8Mt, rebounding to 17Mt in 2017 on a wetter farming production cycle. In 2018, it dropped back to 13.2Mt.Why are these tonna...
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