AGRICULTURE
AMADLELO POISED TO TRANSFORM SOUTH AFRICA’S AGRIBUSINESS SECTOR “Amadlelo has undergone major structural changes and is now a transformed 72% black-owned agribusiness, with established rural community partnerships and a strong network of successful commercial farmers,” says Somdyala.
Amadlelo Agri CEO Simpiwe Somdyala (left) with a young graduate of the Amadlelo internship programme.
F
or nearly two decades, Amadlelo Agri has been at the forefront of dairy farming in South Africa.
The Eastern Cape-based agribusiness, established in 2004, operates dairy farms and is a strategic investor in a macadamia farm, a piggery farm, and food manufacturing company Coega Food Group. In 2006, Amadlelo teamed up with government and the University of Fort Hare to launch the company’s first dairy farm in Alice, Eastern Cape. Since then, the number of dairy farms under Amadlelo’s management has grown to five, laying the foundation for the company to add more dairies to
58
Municipal Focus
its portfolio and to diversify into non-dairy agribusinesses. The five dairies produce 28 million litres of milk a year. The milk is processed by Coega Dairies in Gqeberha, formerly Port Elizabeth. The company operates mainly in rural areas on land owned by the communities. It engages in sharemilk partnership agreements with the communities, whereby it provides management skills, movable assets, and livestock required to operate the dairy farms. In turn, the communities bring to the table land and physical infrastructure. Amadlelo’s sharemilk
model is based on New Zealand’s sharemilk model, whereby the company also facilitates skills transfer to communities and creates market access for the milk produced by the dairies. Amadlelo operates dairies in Alice, Middledrift, Shiloh, Keiskammahoek, and Ncora. Amadlelo’s chief executive officer, Simpiwe Somdyala, has been driving the next phase of the company’s expansion. The seasoned corporate executive took over the reins in 2019 from dairy guru and agri-business entrepreneur, Jeff Every, who played an instrumental role in establishing the company. The management shake-up was
