Oct 16, 2026 · 11 min · 7 segments
Standing at #NAMPOHarvestDay 2026 — the largest agricultural show in the Southern Hemisphere — I break down why South African agriculture is one of the most powerful and underrated economic forces on…
Zimasa VabazaHost
When nine hundred and sixty thousand jobs are just the starting point of the South African agriculture when we enter twenty-twenty-six, this was real momentum.
Now, according to a good friend of mine, Uwandi Maesehobo, who is the chief economist at the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa, that's Agbiz, farm employment reached that nine hundred and sixty thousand jobs number in the first quarter of twenty-twenty-six, a three percent increase from the same period last year.
And this was well above the sector's long-run average of seven hundred and ninety-nine thousand jobs.
That figure is being driven by genuinely favorable agricultural conditions when it comes to production.
La Nina rains that have pushed yields higher, expanded planting seasons, and they've equaled strong performance in horticulture, wine, and even in field crops.
Now, the summer grain and oilseed harvest for twenty-five, twenty-six came in at twenty-point-eight million tons, up one percent year-on-year.
And a lot of this was anchored by upward revisions in things like maize, soybean, and sunflower seeds.
The South African table grape industry inspected eighty-one-point-two million cartons for export in the twenty-five, twenty-six season.
The numbers tell an interesting story when we take a closer look across almost every subsector that exists in agriculture that wasn't hit by foot-and-mouth disease or African swine fever.
When nine hundred and sixty thousand jobs are just the starting point of the South African agriculture when we enter twenty-twenty-six, this was real momentum.
Now, according to a good friend of mine, Uwandi Maesehobo, who is the chief economist at the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa, that's Agbiz, farm employment reached that nine hundred and sixty thousand jobs number in the first quarter of twenty-twenty-six, a three percent increase from the same period last year.
And this was well above the sector's long-run average of seven hundred and ninety-nine thousand jobs.
That figure is being driven by genuinely favorable agricultural conditions when it comes to production.
La Nina rains that have pushed yields higher, expanded planting seasons, and they've equaled strong performance in horticulture, wine, and even in field crops.
Now, the summer grain and oilseed harvest for twenty-five, twenty-six came in at twenty-point-eight million tons, up one percent year-on-year.
And a lot of this was anchored by upward revisions in things like maize, soybean, and sunflower seeds.
The South African table grape industry inspected eighty-one-point-two million cartons for export in the twenty-five, twenty-six season.
The numbers tell an interesting story when we take a closer look across almost every subsector that exists in agriculture that wasn't hit by foot-and-mouth disease or African swine fever.
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