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Ross Heyns

Young Leaders Programme | Ross Heyns

The managing director of Glen Fruin in Grabouw applies his experience in the financial world to pome-fruit production. 

Hortgro launched its industry leadership programme in 2022 to expose the next generation of industry leaders to industry structures and programmes. Ross Heyns was one of the first graduates and joined the Hortgro tour of Australia and New Zealand. 

Heyns studied economics and finance at UCT before becoming a Chartered Financial Analyst. He worked for a hedge fund in London and as an asset manager in Cape Town before returning to Glen Fruin in 2014. The farm has been in his family for four generations. Anna Mouton spoke to him.

How did you go from a farm to a hedge fund and back again?

I always wanted to farm. I was always in the vegetable garden as a kid. But I wanted to study something else before I went farming.

I was in boarding school from the age of 13, so I hadn’t lived on the farm before I came back. And I didn’t work on the farm during holidays. So, my parents worried I would get bored when I returned. But I’ve been here for 10 years and enjoy it. 

Farming is about figuring out solutions to problems. My current role has similarities to what I did previously, in that it involves long-term economic choices. For example, look at the return on investment of different orchards when you replace an orchard. 

What was your biggest takeaway from the Hortgro study tour?

Apple farming is under pressure throughout the world. Everyone struggles with the same things we do, but probably at an elevated level. They have a better climate, but we’re in a privileged position to have access to labour.

If you go to the States, the UK, Europe, Australia, New Zealand — all the traditional apple-growing regions — it’s not just that labour has become prohibitively expensive. It’s just not available. If they want to thin an orchard tomorrow, it doesn’t matter how much it costs. They literally can’t get hold of people. 

New Zealand and Australia bring people in from the Pacific Islands, including educated people like teachers and other professionals, because they pay well. 

I think that gives us an opportunity. Although our labour has become more expensive, it’s still abundant. We can train and retain people. Glen Fruin has agricultural workers who have been with us for 40 years. 

You also visited Europe recently. What were your impressions?

In Europe, the pruning is now mostly done by the owners and their families. They might get one or two people to help them, but in comparison, Glen Fruin is currently working with 240 people.

In many traditional apple-growing regions, farmers are reaching retirement age with no next generation to take over. And no one wants to buy the small farms of 15–20 hectares. 

If you farm something like 200 hectares, there is normally a corporate entity prepared to take over, but small family farms in Europe and Australia face an existential crisis. The next generation has far better income prospects away from the farm. 

If you look at on-farm production costs, they are pretty much uniformly higher in Europe, but it’s also useful to look at the cost of getting the fruit to the shelf in Europe. They have a much shorter chain, so their after-farm-gate costs are competitive with ours. 

Shipping is a big cost for us and has become much more expensive in the last few years. It’s also been challenging to get your product onto a boat. So, we’re at a disadvantage there, but we’re in a good position in terms of on-farm costs and labour availability. 

What do you see as the biggest challenges for South African growers?

There is a massive cost push, which is causing our short-term profitability to take a knock. It’s like we’re running faster every year to take a step backwards. We’re doing everything so much better — yields, quality, colour, pack-outs — but we’re still earning less money even in nominal terms than six or seven years ago.

The ports are an issue. Many people don’t realise quite how high the opportunity cost has been in the last few years. If one boat a month instead of one a week lands in Nigeria, it makes a huge difference in the market price and the volumes you can sell. 

I also think limitations on crop protection chemicals are very challenging. You won’t be able to sell an apple with a residue of a product that’s banned in the destination market. With our climate, we have specific pest and disease pressures that some of our destination markets don’t have. 

How did the Leadership Programme inform your views of Hortgro?

Hortgro fulfils an essential function. We don’t have government support for much of what we’re trying to achieve, so Hortgro must exist to look after our interests.

There are a few areas where the people paying the levy should have more involvement and more say in Hortgro. It’s very easy for farmers to look after their business. They want to farm and they’re not that interested in what’s going on in the industry or where their levy money is being spent. 

We’re all busy and getting busier. It’s a complicated environment, and we’re under increasing pressure. It’s the classic economic problem where your actions have positive externalities — your involvement will benefit everyone around you, but you’ll have to do all the work. 

So, we almost need to move back to a rotational system. Everyone should have a turn serving on committees and getting involved. 

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