Marketing challenges and opportunities faced by the Nguni cattle project beneficiaries in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa - Institutional Constraints to Small Farmer Development in Southern Africa - page 105

6. Marketing challenges and opportunities faced by the Nguni
cattle project beneficiaries in the Eastern Cape Province of
South Africa
Lovemore Musemwa and Abyssinia Mushunje
Abstract
Market off-take rate is low in the communal cattle production system of Africa, with of-
take rates of between 5 and 10% compared to 25% in the commercial sector. Pre-tested
structured questionnaires were administered to 183 smallholder farmers to determine
factors that influence market off-take rate in three randomly selected municipalities in the
Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. The results show that off-take rates in the sampled
municipalities averaged 12%. Education, market distance, body condition and herd size were
significantly associated with municipality ( P <0.05). Chris Hani had the highest number
of the interviewees with at least primary education. Farmers in Amatole municipality sold
their cattle in far away markets. The body condition of cattle in Chris Hani was the best.
Lack of information access reduced cattle sales. Presence of markets that farmers like in
or near their communities facilitated cattle sales. Smallholder farmers sold more cattle as
transport became more available. The probability of smallholder farmers selling their cattle
decreased as the body condition of cattle increases. As the household head changed from
being male to being female, the probability of selling cattle increased. It is, therefore, evident
that an integrated approach is likely to underpin an efficient livestock marketing system.
This requires a joint effort by the government, municipalities, smallholder farmers, producer
organizations and private sector role players. Group marketing, decentralization of cattle
information centres and the involvement of communal farmers' in the dissemination of
information plays a critical role in improving market off-take rate of smallholder farmers.
6.1 Introduction
In terms of market access, Jooste and Van Rooyen (1996) concluded that the transition of the
small scale sector towards commercial production will ultimately be determined by its access
to markets. According to Stroebel (2004), several constraints affect the efficient marketing
of livestock in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa, chief of which are related to
market availability and high transactions costs. Currently there is poor response of consistent
cattle supplies to existing market outlets by small-scale farmers on communal lands (USAID,
2003). This raises serious concerns as to why these farmers do not sell their cattle.
This chapter empirically tests marketing constraints and household characteristics that are
hypothesized to have the largest potential to cause small-scale cattle farmers not to sell