The #WhenHopeWhispers campaign launched by Potato South Africa (PSA) to reflect on the resilience of stakeholders during COVID-19 has an ironic twist to it – a loud and clear message from the CEO that it is time to live up to the association’s vision: Together towards excellence.
Appointed to head up PSA from 18 January this year, Willie Jacobs is certainly out of the ordinary.
His fresh and innovative approach has, in a short period of time, resulted in a fine-tuned focus of what it will take to consolidate the industry, and it is all about finding hope during an upheaval.
Looking back since the COVID-19 outbreak disrupted markets, the subsequent periods of lockdown, the effect it had on the potato industry, and how economic duress ultimately forced the joining of hands between producers and consumers at a different level, Jacobs highlights the necessity for improved communication.
“That is where the biggest need is at the moment”, he says.
“There is a gap in the producer-consumer spectrum due to one stakeholder group not having adequate understanding of the role, significance of, and need of other role players in food security.”
Jacobs’ profound empathy for the position that farmers have found themselves in couldn’t be overstated.
“I think producers are always on top of their game. COVID-19 was a shock for everyone. Fear, uncertainty, and a basic need to survive is what set in when the first life lost to the outbreak was announced on 27 March last year.”
What needs to be understood, Jacobs emphasises, is that the regulatory environment, “which generally is an environment that no one single business has control over, often comes with challenges and at times opportunities that business must respond to quickly to either avert the risks or take advantage of the opportunities”.
Moreover, it needs to be remembered that “in South Africa, fresh produce is mainly sold through national fresh produce markets where buyers and sellers meet to trade face-to-face. COVID-19 regulations did not make such trading viable or easy to navigate.
“From a logistics point of view the concern from the authorities was that, transporters of fresh produce might unknowingly or unintentionally spread the disease, This implied much more stringent sanitary measures to be undertaken by resellers over and above the common food safety requirements that must be adhered to.
“Due to these constraints, amongst others, both buyers and sellers had to resort to alternative ways of doing business. For the potato industry, it translated into a redirection of volumes from fresh produce markets to direct sales.”
Such insights, however, require an outreach exercise across the board, from farm to fork including all involved.
With #WhenHopeWhispers, PSA believes it has found the necessary impetus to drive this stakeholder engagement process that will culminate in an industry report and nation-wide discussion on 5 May called the State of the Potato Industry Address (SOPIA) – an event to which members of the media will be invited to.
In addition to SOPIA being an inaugural event meant to re-emphasize the value proposition of PSA as a dedicated commodity organisation, its primary objective is to spark continued discourse across the entire stakeholders network.
“We want to create a long-term narrative that will enable us to collect invaluable case material,” Jacobs says.
Inclusive engagements, from producers to all stake holders, including consumers, government stakeholders, informal traders, should be drawn into PSA’s consolidation campaign.
“We’ve experienced communication that is often one-way. The mission is to continuously find ways that encourages two-way communication (dialogue)to achieve a 360-degree perspective of all the angles permeating the potato industry.”
Consequently, PSA envisions a multi-media SOPIA that Jacobs refers to as a “hybrid event”.
That way, he believes, #WhenHopeWhispers can leave an inedible impression on the hearts and minds of all concerned by providing a quality immersive experience.
The lack of proper communication and understanding, Jacobs maintains, is what belies last year’s “noise in the media about pricing, volumes, and access, when the public conversation around potatoes during the pandemic could chart its own course.
He explains that “in one instance, one of PSA’s production regions had serious crop losses due to unfavourable weather, which caused a gap in the market. At the end of the day, it affected the consumer price to the extent that there were questions asked about price formulation in the industry.”
The “noise” that emanated from this, especially the negativity and turmoil that emerged from the ensuing palaver, showed how the situation could have been differently handled if early warnings from producers and consumers were received to duly alert stakeholders about what was happening at the time.
One must always be aware that to every action there is a reaction; a principle that also applies if one wants to progressively steer the conversation. For example: as last year’s uninformed storm raged about supply and related price formulation, PSA research found that a lot of the perceptions about so-called problems had no foundation.
“Taking a closer look, we realised that certain of the structural elements within our ability to deliver to the market had already been addressed by producers and traders. Where there were broken linkages, these were eventually solved to the extent that we could get our product to the market.”
In many instances, Jacobs adds, much emerged from the trading environment that, to a larger or lesser extent, fuels divergent views about the industry.
“Looking at 2020, we now understand what COVID-19 meant in terms of systematic breakdowns and what limitations there were. It also showed us that communication is heavily linked to the physical trading environment. The more problems you experience there, the more you will hear about price formulation and available stock.”
It creates the perception, he asserts, that the understanding of the drive behind potato industry is mostly made up of volume and price, which is not the case – everything but, in actual fact.
Through previous interactive engagements with the industry at large, he says PSA has accumulated a significant amount of informative material.
From this data bank of intellectual capital, the association has been able to disseminate high-value material that, although it has already been circulated through vibrant initiatives like www.potatoes.co.za and www.potatonation.co.za deserves re-imagined momentum, hence the #WhenHopeWhispers campaign.
“We need to create something that gives a bigger understanding of the humble potato itself as a product.”
In what Jacobs refers to as “de-commoditising the potato”, PSA would like to foster a more hands-on product-centric public experience.
“We don’t want consumers to just buy a packet of potatoes. We want them to turn the bag upside down, look at the cultivar that is being produced, find out where it comes from, get an idea of whether it’s a suitable product for them that is convenient at a certain price.”
In a nutshell, Jacobs says, PSA wants to inform, educate, and inspire South Africans about everything potatoes.
That is the broad view.
As to serving its members as best as they can, Jacobs is very clear about one thing: “The COVID-19 pandemic has shown us that getting to the market and getting feedback from the market is going to become much more paramount than it was in the past.”
