ALG Estates was started by 3 brothers, but the family has been farming here since the 1700's and have, during the years invested in a logistics company, processing plant and their own packhouses.
Gerrit van der Merwe, Director of ALG Estates who are the only Southern Hemisphere citrus supplier to US supermarket Whole Foods, explained, ” We are fair trade accredited and our yearly contributions are around R500 000. The contributions go to a joint body which decides how to spend the money, from every box we send 43 Euro cent goes in to the account. This year 15% of our production will be sold Fair Trade. The EU also used to be big on Fair Trade but it has gotten less in the last few years, it is slowly coming back now though."
The company also supports the Black Empowerment scheme, a programme launched by the South African government to redress the inequalities of Apartheid by giving disadvantaged groups of South Africans economic privileges previously not available to them. It includes measures such as employment preference, skills development, ownership, management, socio-economic development, and preferential procurement.
"We give the black shareholders guidance on how to grow citrus as well as increased responsibilities and shares in the company, last year each worker in the project received 12,000 Rand in profit sharing is according to van der Merwe.
The workers get the minimum wage which is 122 Rand a day, so the 12,000 Rand (around 4.5 months pay) at the end of the season is quite a bonus.
"We have also built a crèche on each of the farms, we saw that there was a big problem when the workers were working in the orchards every day and the kids have to stay home with for example, Grandma. We want to up-lift the community, seemingly small things such as bus shelters are a big improvement, people don't want to stand in the rain."
The fairtrade joint body also hosts an annual sports day where everyone joins in, even Gerrit. All farms are involved and there is big competition between them, but it is lots of fun.
On one of the farms there is pre-school and a primary school. The joint body provides scholarship for eg. athletics or kids who are excelling so we can send them to better performing high schools in Piketberg. They are also helped with transportation and all extra costs which would be hard for families to afford on normal wages."It is nice to see people who you have given a scholarship to rising with in the company. Our philosophy is that we live in Africa and if you are not part of the solution you don't need to be here."
Citrus is very labour intensive and there is a big potential for growth, at the moment ALG has 800 employees during the season.
"We are looking to expand the Black Empowerment schemes, it is not straight forward, as the Government is playing around with the rules a bit. In the beginning there were a lot mistakes made, such as just giving people land and saying 'farm it', but they had no expertise on how to do this. This is the only way to go," according to van der Merwe.
In total there are 7 projects in Citrusdal , which for a small town is a lot, it means the growers there have decided to back this which is good. Van der Merwe said they are looking to expand it too.
Also as a direct supplier to supermarkets van der Merwe said it is very important to be socially aware as more and more retailers are demanding it.
For more information:
Gerrit van der Merwe (jnr.)ALG Estates
Tel: +27 22 921 3439 ext: 10
Email: gvandermerwe@algestates.com