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October 07, 2018

Grappling with price risks in South Africa's barley industry

by Shem Oirere, Freelance Journalist 

For many decades South Africa has recorded a deficit in its barley production volumes, despite government projections of an increase in area under production by 16.2 percent to 106,150ha.

Minimising the barley production deficit in South Africa would require an improvement in the quality of the produce to ensure more sales to the country's new beer brewing monopoly, Belgian-based multinational beverage and brewing holdings company, Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev).
 


In addition to the unpredictable weather in the primary barley-growing areas of Northern Cape, Southern Cape and the North West Province, which have recently produced devastated cereal crops with record yield reductions, concerns have also been raised by the country's grain producers on the likely impact on production of a review of the barley pricing structure by AB InBev.

These concerns came to public attention in May 2018, when the local farmers voiced their concerns over the adverse impact of AB InBev's proposal to review the nine-year-old barley pricing structure that has been tied to the wheat futures, at the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE).

Before the merger with SABMiller in South Africa, AB InBev was supplying beer products, such as Corona Extra, Stella Artois, Beck’s Blue and Budweiser brands, largely imported and distributed via DGB (Pty) Ltd (DGB), a global distributor of alcoholic products.

A reviewed pricing structure for the 2008 barley crop, according to Pretoria-based Grain SA, a non-profit organisation that champions interests of grain producers of South Africa, would result in farmers earning less than initially projected.

The grain farmers' lobby has sought for the intervention of South Africa's Competition Commission after AB InBev’s new pricing structure resulted in barley growers being paid 97 percent of the price for top grade wheat (B1) for the 2008 crop, down from the 102 percent of second tier wheat (B2).


Read the full article in Milling and Grain magazine, HERE.
 

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