‘Our farmers need you now’ – open letter to President Ramaphosa, Minister Godongwana and Minister Aucamp

An open letter to President Cyril Ramaphosa, Minister of Finance Enoch Godongwana and Minister of Agriculture Willie Aucamp by Lebogang Mashala, editor at African Farming

The Land Bank’s Blended Finance Scheme has run out of funding at precisely the moment hundreds of farmers need it most.

The Land Bank has confirmed its R325 million grant allocation for the 2026/27 financial year has been fully committed. While the bank says the scheme itself has not been discontinued and that it is engaging government and other potential funding partners, the reality for farmers is immediate and deeply unsettling: some may no longer have the money they need to plant this season.

Some farmers had already received approval for blended finance. Others had made production plans, taken on commercial debt, acquired machinery and committed themselves financially on the expectation that the blended-finance component would be available.

Now, some are receiving letters informing them there is no funding available for them this year.

This is not an abstract budgetary shortfall.

For a farmer standing at the beginning of a planting season, an exhausted R325 million allocation can mean the difference between planting and not planting; servicing a loan and defaulting; keeping machinery and losing it; keeping workers employed and sending them home.

That is why I am writing this month not as part of my regular editor’s letter, but as a personal open letter to you, President Cyril Ramaphosa, Minister of Finance Enoch Godongwana and Minister of Agriculture Willie Aucamp.

I have spoken to some of the affected farmers. I have heard their frustration and their fear. Many believe they have exhausted the available channels of engagement and are now considering exercising their constitutional right to peaceful protest.

I understand why.

These are farmers who have done what government and the agricultural sector have asked of them. They have worked through application processes, complied with requirements, prepared business plans, secured commercial finance and, in some cases, invested in productive assets.

They did so believing the Blended Finance Scheme would help them build commercially sustainable businesses.

Now they are being told there is no money.

What are we saying to them?

Sorry, the money has run out. You will have to find another way. Perhaps next year?

For a farmer, there is no “perhaps next year”. The planting window does not wait.

One farmer I spoke to has been financing his operation through a commercial loan with the assistance of a major agribusiness development programme that has supported him for several years. This year, the organisation helped him apply for blended finance to ease the financial burden on his business. He was approved.

Because he had been approved for blended finance, no alternative commercial funding application was pursued on his behalf.

He subsequently received communication from the Land Bank informing him his funding could not be disbursed because the available blended-finance funding had been exhausted.

The consequence is devastating – he may not be able to plant this season.

Another farmer had recently secured credit to acquire new machinery. All he needed was the blended-finance component to plant this season and generate enough income to service the machinery loan.

He too received a letter informing him there was no money available to fund him this year.

These are not isolated stories. There are hundreds of farmers who have received similar communication.

These are not merely statistics on a spreadsheet. They are real people with real businesses, real employees, real debt and real livelihoods at stake.

And the consequences extend far beyond the individual farmer. A farmer who cannot plant, may not be able to service existing debt. A farmer who cannot service debt, risks losing machinery and other productive assets. A farm that cannot operate, cannot sustain jobs. And when productive farms fail, rural communities suffer.

Ultimately, this becomes a food-security issue.

It is also a transformation issue.

For years, South Africa’s land reform programme has faced criticism for failing to translate land access into sustainable commercial farming enterprises. The Blended Finance Scheme gave many developing farmers hope that this could change. It offered a pathway towards commercialisation.

That is why allowing the current funding crisis to derail farmers who have already gone through the process of becoming bankable would send a deeply troubling message about our priorities.

So, I am asking you directly: Why can’t we find a way to make additional funding available?

We have done it before.

Now the money has run out, and the farmers are being left to carry the consequences.

And this is where I struggle to understand our priorities.

In June this year, Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia announced R600 million had been redirected within the South African Police Service to ensure operational readiness ahead of the planned nationwide demonstrations on 30 June. Government regarded the situation as requiring an urgent mobilisation of resources, and it acted.

I am not suggesting public safety is unimportant. It is.

Nor am I suggesting money allocated to one government function should simply be taken and handed to another.

My point is much simpler: When government identifies something as an urgent national priority, it finds a way to respond.

We saw this again with the R500 million Spaza Shop Support Fund, established to help qualifying businesses formalise, meet compliance requirements and access financial support. By May, SEDFA and the National Empowerment Fund had approved support worth approximately R179.6 million for 2 369 businesses across all nine provinces.

And we saw it on an even greater scale during the Covid-19 pandemic, when billions of rand were mobilised in response to a national emergency.

So, I have to ask: Why can’t we do the same for farmers facing an agricultural financing crisis at the beginning of the planting season?

I am not arguing that farmers should receive preferential treatment simply because they are farmers. I am arguing that this situation deserves to be treated as an urgent national economic and food-security issue.

The farmers affected by the Blended Finance Scheme are not asking government to carry their businesses indefinitely. They are asking for an opportunity to produce.

They want to plant.

They want to employ people.

They want to service their loans.

They want to grow their businesses.

They want to become the commercially sustainable farmers South Africa has been asking them to become.

They need government to show up for them now.

President Ramaphosa, Minister Godongwana and Minister Aucamp, I am therefore appealing to you to urgently consider an interim funding intervention for farmers affected by the pause in blended-finance disbursements, particularly those who have already received approvals or made documented production commitments in anticipation of the funding.

Whether that takes the form of an additional allocation, an emergency intervention, guarantees, concessional finance or another mechanism is for government to determine.

What matters now is that something is done.

Because while government processes continue, farmers are watching their planting windows close. And agriculture does not operate according to the same calendar as government bureaucracy.

These farmers need certainty.

They need answers.

And, most importantly, they need to know the country they have been asked to help feed has not abandoned them at the moment they need support most.

Please find the money.

Please find the mechanism.

Please find the bridge.

But, most importantly, please do not allow hundreds of farmers to lose an entire production season simply because the funding allocated to an important agricultural transformation programme has been exhausted.

We have shown before when a crisis demands action, South Africa can act. Our farmers are asking us to act again.

These farmers need you.