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Overview of the South African Macadamia Industry
THE SOUTH AFRICAN
INDUSTRY - 2007
From fairly humble beginnings in
the 1960’s when macadamias were first introduced
into the country, the South African macadamia industry
has grown into a major world force, being the third
largest producer in the world today. It is arguably
the fastest growing tree crop industry in South
Africa, with production increasing more than five fold
in the last 10 years, from 840 tons of edible kernel
in 1996 to about 4500 tons in 2006. The total sales
value of annual production has increased from R32
million in 1996 to R276 million in 2006, while farm
gate value of production increased from R24 million to
R200 million over the same period. New macadamia tree
plantings have increased the number of trees from
about one million in 1996 to over four million in
2006, covering a total area of some 12000 hectares.
The main growing areas are Levubu
and Tzaneen in Limpopo province, Hazyview to Barberton
in Mpumalanga and coastal KwaZulu/Natal. There are
close to 1000 farmers involved in growing macadamia
nuts that are supplied to 12 cracking factories. A
number of growers have already achieved EUREPGAP
accreditation and all of the cracking facilities are
HACCP and/or ISO 9001 accredited. Quality assurance is
given priority throughout the industry, from farm
level through the processor and exporter to the
customer. Individual batch processing used in all the
cracking facilities provides for the kind of attention
to detail that not only ensures full traceability of
every carton of macadamias from the customer back to
farm level, but also supplies farmers with fast
feedback of quality attributes of each batch
processed.
[Go to “SUPPLIERS”
for a list of SAMAC affiliated South African macadamia
marketing companies to make your purchase of fine
quality macadamia nut products]
The industry is export based with
more than 95% of annual production shipped to
international markets. Europe is presently our largest
market, followed by the USA and Canada, Japan,
Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
Given the large number of young trees yet to
come into production, the industry has tremendous
growth and development potential. Although most of the
workforce in the industry is employed seasonally, for
the harvesting and processing from February to August,
it is estimated that at least 3000 new job
opportunities have been created on macadamia farms
over the last decade and another 1000 jobs in cracking
facilities. In peak season, the industry presently
provides employment for more than 4500 farm workers
and about 1500 factory workers. Since production is
expected to double within the next 5 to 7 years,
employment creation will continue to grow at a similar
pace.
The industry body SAMAC was
formed in the early 1970’s by a group of growers
seeking to pool their resources in order to address
their common problems and issues. SAMAC opened its
first permanent office in October 1997 with two staff
members. Membership of SAMAC has since grown from 345
in1997 to 950 members in 2007. SAMAC is a dynamic
organisation, funded by a voluntary levy and directed
by macadamia industry participants who have the
orderly growth and development of the industry at
heart. SAMAC initiated contact with other African
macadamia producing countries, Kenya, Malawi and
Zimbabwe, at an historic “indaba” held in Harare
in 1998. These contacts were further developed when a
number of representatives from these countries
attended the SAMAC symposium in Tzaneen later that
year. These initiatives resulted in Zimbabwe macadamia
producers becoming full voluntary levy paying members
of SAMAC in 2002, so as to receive an information and
advisory service similar to their counterparts in
South Africa.
International contacts were
further developed with the hosting of the ‘First
International Macadamia Symposium in Africa’ in
Nelspruit in September 1999. SAMAC then also hosted
the 8th Convention of the then
International Tree Nut Council (INC) in Cape Town in
2002, attended by over 200 delegates from 24
countries. This was followed by a large group of South
African growers attending the ‘Second International
Macadamia Symposium’ hosted by Australia in 2003 and
the ‘Third International Macadamia Symposium’
hosted by Brazil in August 2006. Out of this last
symposium has come an initiative to form an
International Macadamia Association (IMAC). Formation
of IMAC was further discussed at a meeting of
macadamia producing country representatives in May
2007, during the International Nut and Dried fruit
Council Foundation Congress held in Madrid, at which a
steering committee was appointed to progress the
formation of IMAC. SAMAC representatives are playing
an active role in this process of forming IMAC.
The South African macadamia
industry is proud of its strong private enterprise
base and the structures in place for its governance,
created, funded and controlled by the growers,
processors and marketers who are committed to its
successful future.
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