In 2016, I planted chillies in my backyard in Kuruman because I was unemployed. Not to make a statement about agriculture but to survive.
By Letlhogonolo Leserwane, Founder of Tlhoks Vegis
Nine years later, that backyard has become a family-owned agribusiness. We grow the chillies, process them, bottle them as Sambok Hot Sauce, and the product is on shelves in more than 83 outlets across South Africa.
No inherited land. No processing infrastructure handed to us. No government programme built for a crop like chilli. We built this in spite of the system, not because of it.
That is not a success story about me. It is an indictment of everyone who was supposed to make this easier and didn’t.
The value is in what happens after harvest
Chilli is not a difficult crop. It needs less land than maize. It yields more per hectare than most vegetables. It has real export demand, and its margins multiply the moment it is processed into hot sauce, chilli oil or spice blends.
Raw chilli sells for cents. Bottled, branded chilli sells for rands. This is not theory. It is the entire business model of Tlhoks Vegis, proven with real products on real shelves.
And yet, chilli is still treated as an afterthought.
Also read: Lessons from the field: Crop challenges in the arid Northern Cape region
Are we telling emerging farmers to plant what pays?
Ask any emerging farmer what they were told to plant, and the answer is almost always maize or vegetables with no processing pathway attached.
Nobody is telling them that a small plot of chilli, properly processed, can out-earn a far larger plot of staple crops. The advice given to new farmers is built around what is convenient to fund, not what actually pays.
I had none of that advice either. I learned by doing, funding equipment and packaging out of whatever the business could generate that month.
Every step from farm to bottle to retail shelf happened because my family refused to stop, not because a system existed to carry us there.
Also read: Kasi Sauce: How a bartender built an agro-processing business from his village home
How many farmers never make it that far?
So here is the question South Africa needs to answer, not me: If a chilli business can go from a Kuruman backyard to 83 stores with almost no institutional support, what is happening to the thousands of chilli farmers who never get that far?
How many gave up before they ever reached the processing stage, not because the crop failed them, but because nobody showed them it was possible, there was no affordable equipment, and there was no path from raw produce to a finished product?
We talk about food security and inclusive growth as if they are inevitable outcomes of good intentions.
Chilli is the test that exposes whether that talk is real.
Also read: Forests and food: Communities plant groundnuts, veggies between the trees
A crop suited to small-scale agriculture
Chilli rewards processing over raw sales. It suits small landholdings. It fits precisely into land reform and youth farming strategies because it does not demand large-scale land to be viable.
If government, enterprise development programmes and retailers are serious about building black-owned agribusinesses at scale, chilli is not a marginal opportunity. It is one of the clearest opportunities sitting in front of them, unused.
The next farmer should not have to do it alone
What we need now is not sympathy for how far a backyard garden has come.
We need land-access support built for high-value crops like chilli, affordable processing equipment for small-scale agro-processors, direct pathways into retail for farmers ready to supply at scale, and agricultural extension advice that treats chilli as a serious commodity, not a side project.
Tlhoks Vegis proves the model works. It should never have taken this much improvisation to prove it.
The next chilli farmer should not have to build a national brand from nothing but stubbornness. They should be able to build it with support that already exists – if South Africa finally decides to build it.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author, Letlhogonolo Leserwane, writing in his personal capacity. They do not necessarily reflect the views or editorial position of African Farming, its publisher, editors, employees, affiliates or associated partners.
Also read: SA’s new generation of farmers: How training, technology and smart markets are driving real profits
