Australian know-how proved the catalyst for the largest carrot growing enterprise on the African continent which now produces 200 tonnes a day.
Italian farming partners Vito Rugani and Vincent Sequeira have proved fast learners since they first specialised in growing carrots on the high veld at Tarlton, about 75km outside Johannesburg in 2000.
They started with a 20 hectare block and now have more than 2500ha irrigated by 110 centre pivots on three properties at differing altitudes for year-round production.
Their big break came in 2003 when they decided to broaden their horizons by looking overseas for knowledge on how to do things better.
Being in a similar climate zone, they chose Australia and spent more than a month visiting farms in the Mildura region.
“It was the best thing we ever did,” said Vito.
Within a week or two they realised they were their own worst enemies.
“South Africans were not that far behind when you considered tonnages per hectare, but we were doing some things that were 100 years out of date. Practices that Australian farmers had left behind in their grandfathers’ days,” Vito said.
The impact was immediate and within five years they had paid a silent investor double the cash he put in to underwrite their first expansion.
“A big part of our success has been finding the right balance between man and machine,” Vito said.
Their farms are highly mechanised by African standards yet still employ more than 250 workers.
“We learned valuable lessons in how to make our workforce productive. Combining mechanisation, and the latest technology and efficiency has allowed us to pay 265pc above the South African minimum wage for farm workers,” Vito said.
Their company Greenway Farms has set aside 10 per cent of the business's equity into a workers trust and have a pioneering scheme for workers to buy housing blocks on the farm, assisted by their dividend income stream.
With four of Vito’s six sons now engaged in the family business, their next big expansion was vertically into on-farm production of fresh carrot juice.
Specialist juicing machinery was built to their specifications in Italy with the unique extraction process ensuring high levels of natural Beta-Carotene are retained.
“We package 100 per cent pure juice for maximum freshness and nutrition and we promise that carrots still growing in the morning will be juiced and packed by sunset,” Vito said.
The factory turns about 80 tonnes of carrots into 40,000 litres of juice daily with the residue fermented in a methane digester to power the juicing plant and packing shed before being returned to the soil.
“It’s still early days with our juice processing venture, but I believe there are very exciting prospects for our unique health product in Europe,” Vito said.
