Article
A mild quarterly recovery in the SA farm job market
Published: 14/05/2025
While encouraging, South African agricultural employment was not as robust as some may have anticipated in the first quarter. The data released by Stats SA show that primary agriculture employment increased mildly by 1% from the last quarter of 2024 to 930k jobs in the first quarter of 2025. Field crops, game, and hunting are the subsectors that underpin this improvement in employment conditions.
- While
encouraging,
South African agricultural employment was not as robust as some may have
anticipated in the first quarter. The data released by Stats SA show that
primary agriculture employment increased mildly by 1% from the last
quarter of 2024 to 930k jobs in the first quarter of 2025. Field crops,
game, and hunting are the subsectors that underpin this improvement in
employment conditions.
- However,
from an annual perspective, the employment was down 1%, unchanged from the
first quarter of 2024. This suggests that while the agricultural sector is
recovering, supported by the favourable weather conditions, financial
difficulties from the previous year remain, and the recovery remains
uneven amongst subsectors and regions. Encouragingly, the primary
agricultural employment of 930k people is well above the long-term jobs of
799k. From a regional perspective, the Eastern Cape, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal,
North West, Gauteng and Mpumalanga are the provinces that registered
quarterly job losses. Meanwhile, the Western Cape, Northern Cape and
Limpopo underpin the mild job gains.
- Given that
the season was late by roughly a month in the summer crop regions, and
that we have harvesting underway from the second quarter into the third
quarter on field crops and some horticulture, it is fair to assume that we
may see a quarterly uptick in jobs in the subsequent releases.
Importantly, we have a relatively robust season. The 2024-25 summer grain
and oilseed production is forecast at 18.01 million tonnes, up by 16% y/y.
The wine grape harvest is also set to recover 11% from the past season to
1.24 million tonnes. We also anticipate a better harvest of the various
fruits.
- Admittedly, not all is well in South Africa's agriculture. The sector continues to struggle with foot and mouth disease, which will add financial pressures to the livestock industry and jobs. There also remain risks on the global trade front, mainly the U.S. tariffs. There are long-standing challenges, such as port inefficiencies, poor rail and roads, crime and stock theft, and worsening municipal service delivery.
