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THE
GRAIN AND OILSEED INDUSTRY
OF SOUTH AFRICA – A JOURNEY THROUGH TIME
ႃႆ
The non-delivery action was initially supported well, but it was not sustainable. The
State President’s threat about the possible reconsideration of the subsidy on interest
rates may have played a role in the producers’ decision to end the strike. At that
stage South Africa was experiencing an enormous increase in interest rates and
the scrapping or downscaling of the interest rate subsidy would have broken many
producers financially.
Apparently the State President had also threatened at one stage to call in the
assistance of the Defence Force to make sure that the crops were indeed harvested
and delivered.
The resignation of the NAMPOmembers from the Maize Board in 1985 created a major
problem for the Minister of Agriculture, as the remaining members of the Maize Board
no longer formed a quorum. The Minister was forced to address the problem, as the
Marketing Act required the existence of a functioning Maize Board. The dilemma was
that since 1980 the eight producer members of the Maize Board had to be appointed
by NAMPO, but NAMPO had walked out.
The Minister then appointed producer members to the Board at his discretion,
some of whom were in fact NAMPO members, but they had not been nominated
by NAMPO. The persons who were members of NAMPO were expelled from
NAMPO after they had been appointed to the Maize Board by the Minister, as they
had violated the organisation’s constitution, which provided that only executive
members of NAMPO were permitted to serve on the Maize Board. However, the
Maize Board continued functioning on this basis until discussions between the
Minister of Agriculture and NAMPO led to the Minister agreeing in 1987 to appoint
members of NAMPO as producer members to the Board again.
From the 1981/1982 up to the 1986/1987 marketing years there was a systematic
switch from using production costs as basis for determining the producer price
for maize to a system where the price was fixed by the Minister after negotia-
tions with the Maize Board, where the majority was producer representatives and
NAMPO members.
The Chairperson at the time, Mr Hennie de Jager, remarked that he had noted
a shift away from a controlling body to a marketing body, although he believed
that the Maize Board would always remain an integrated part of the industry and
would play a key role in resolving marketing problems. This finally realised after
the reappointment of the NAMPO members to the Maize Board in 1987, when an
agreement was reached with the Minister in terms of which the basis for fixing the
producer price was changed.
This essentially changed the Maize Board from a control board to a marketing
council with market-oriented prices, risk hedging, product promotion and market
research as point of departure. The marketing of maize was changed to a single-
channel pooled system, in terms of which domestic prices were determined by the
WHEN THE DELEGATION TO THE STATE PRESIDENT
ASSUMED AT ONE STAGE THAT THE DISCUSSION WAS
OVER, MR DE JAGER GOT UP. MR BOTHA ASKED HIM
WHERE HE WAS GOING AND HE SAID THAT HE WANTED
TO GO TO THE TOILET, UPON WHICH MR BOTHA
ORDERED: ‘SIT DOWN. I’LL TELL YOU WHEN YOU
CAN GO.’