Assisting South African emerging farmers to become export ready through private standards certification

‘We are really looking for extraordinary solutions that creatively use market forces to tackle problems associated with compliance to private food safety and quality and fair trade standards.'

Although a number of emerging farmer groups in South Africa are ‘export-ready', these groups lack the private standards certifications that international buyers and discerning consumers, as well as local supermarket chains demand - which limits their ability to maximise the returns from their production The RSP, together with the National Agricultural Marketing Council, has initiated a small-grant pilot scheme to help emerging farmers lower the costs associated with standards certification.