T WO - A - DAY G R O U P
TWO-A-DAY GROUP
Growing Giant Remains
Twice As Caring PRODUCTION: Benjamin Southwold
The Two-a-Day Group is among the leading fruit growing, packing and marketing companies on the African continent. The Group’s total area under fruit exceeds 3300 hectares while its total production, including processing, equates to more than 200,000 tonnes per year.
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Nestled at the foot of Africa lies the Elgin Valley, a region of South Africa renowned for its spectacular scenery and home to the Two-a-Day Group. Natural features like rich fertile soil, bracing winters and golden summers tempered by cool sea breezes make this one of the Cape’s most beautiful fruit growing areas. An hour’s drive from Cape Town and one of the Western Cape’s better
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kept secrets, this stunning fertile valley is filled with vineyards, orchards and forests, offering the ideal conditions to grow and the more than seven million cartons of Two-a-Day fruit consumed every year across five continents. Previously Elgin Fruit Packers Cooperative Limited, Two-a-Day began life as a primary agricultural co-operative in the Elgin district in South Africa’s Western Cape. Elgin Fruit Packers hit
upon a rich seam of produce during the 1950s when crop sizes swelled by 150%, which resulted in the packing of more than 550,000 cartons of fruit. This upward curve continued throughout the ensuing decades, reaching a peak in 1976 when more than 1.5 million cartons were packed and of which two thirds were exported, suddenly giving Elgin Fruit Packers an 8% share in the South African apple export crop.
INDUSTRY FOCUS: AGRICULTURE
The Group restructured itself in December 1993 and converted to an unlisted private company, the Two-a-Day Group that so many know and love today. “TAD is one of the leading fruit growing, packing and marketing companies on the African continent comprising more than 50 farms owned by the principle shareholders,” the company states. “Total area under fruit exceeds 3300 hectares, and total production, including processing, equates to over 200,000 tonnes per annum. “The Group is currently exporting 5,200,000 cartons of apples and pears
// THE GROUP IS WIDELY RECOGNISED AS HAVING DISCIPLINED MEMBERSHIP, COMMITTED TO PRODUCING HIGH QUALITY FRUIT EMPLOYING SOUND ENVIRONMENTAL, SOCIAL AND ETHICAL PRACTICES //
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per year, and we also supply the local market with 2,900,000 cartons of apples and pears per annum. The Group plays a leading role in the growing, marketing and technological fields and is widely recognised as having disciplined membership, committed to producing high quality fruit employing sound environmental, social and ethical practices.”
// TAD IS ONE OF THE LEADING FRUIT GROWING, PACKING AND MARKETING COMPANIES ON THE AFRICAN CONTINENT //
TECHNOLOGICAL LEADERS The employment of innovation and technology by businesses in such a traditional endeavour as farming and fruit growing is rapidly on the rise. For Two-a-Day Group a lot has had to happen quickly since its early days, developing at the rate required to support the everincreasing scope of its operations. Even in the past two decades, that way that the company uses technology has changed dramatically, Managing Director, Attie Van Zyl explained: “We’ve more than doubled our volumes in my more than 20 years with the company and I think the main thing that has changed is technology. “Technology is now a huge driver of the business. The definition of technology is widening; for example, we use mobile devices throughout the business even at orchard level. In the factories, the technology is so different from what we had just ten years ago.
Importantly, technology in the orchards, horticultural technology, has advanced greatly. For example, water usage has become much more efficient. “We embrace the science of fruit growing from a technology point of view and that is what is going to help us drive the business forward in the next 20 years.” Two recent investments for the company have been technological and have surrounded the pack house equipment and the cold storage facilities. “With the pack house technology, the machinery that we had was old and we’ve put in machinery that can do weight sorting, diameter sorting, colour sorting and defect sorting,” Van Zyl detailed. “In the past, the old machines only did weight sorting so this makes a huge difference. This will help us to drive productivity and will also allow for increased accuracy in packing thanks to much more precise weighing technology.”
TWO-A-DAY GROUP
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GLOBAL OPPORTUNITIES “South Africa’s urgent need to create jobs requires that the country take advantage of opportunities in the global economy that it can convert into quick wins,” says The Conversation, and the fruit industry presents an ideal such opportunity. The country’s fresh fruit industry is currently the largest exporter of agricultural products, contributing 52% of the value of South Africa’s agriculture export basket while it represents 28% of total employment in agriculture. If South Africa can aggressively find new export markets and grow its exports, it can achieve a conservative 5% export growth per annum over the period 2019 to 2023, which would imply a production increase by 34% from approximately 6.5 million tonnes
in 2017 to 8.7 million tonnes by 2023. At such increased level of production, assuming normal weather conditions, the fruit industry could create an additional 100,000 jobs by 2023. There are obstacles to be negotiated, The Conversation is at piano to point out. “These include improving access to export markets, addressing congestion at the ports and improving the rail and logistics infrastructure. “The high levels of congestion and delays at South Africa’s main ports remains a constraint to growing fresh fruit exports. Addressing such bottlenecks require investments in integrated digital systems to assist with planning and avoid product overload at the main ports. “Fruit farmers would also need to make changes,” it concludes, and it sounds like nobody is better
placed to help achieve these aims that Two-a-Day. “Workers would need re-skilling to meet the growing demand for digital skills, using advanced machinery and equipment as well as research and technology development.” The success of the citrus industry demonstrates what is possible with concerted and coordinated action for fresh fruit, and decisive organisation of the many sub-sectors in agriculture should see ambitious objectives met and surpassed.
WWW.TAD.CO.ZA
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December 2019
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