As we approach the end of 2025 it is fair to characterise the year as a period of mixed fortunes for South Africa’s agriculture. On the upside we have robust field crops, horticulture and wine. On the downside it has been a more challenging time for the livestock industry, mainly cattle farming, due to foot-and-mouth disease.
Among the year’s positives, early concerns that late rains would disrupt plantings of summer grains and oilseeds dissipated relatively quickly. We received excellent showers, lasting for a much longer period than usual, through to the end of April. This led to further concerns about grain quality due to excessive moisture. Indeed, we struggled with the quality of maize, particularly white maize. However, this was not severely damaging.
We ended the 2024/25 summer grains and oilseeds production season with a harvest of 20.2-million tonnes, up 30% from the previous season. This figure comprises maize, soya beans, sunflower seeds, groundnuts, sorghum and dry beans. There was an annual uptick across all crops. In fact, the soya bean harvest reached a record 2.77-million tonnes. Moreover, the 2024/25 maize crop was the second largest on record at 16.44-million tonnes.
The benefits from the favourable La Niña rains did not end with grains and oilseeds. We saw ample harvests in sugar, as well as various fruits, vegetables and wine.
In poultry production, the ample maize and soya bean harvest led to lower prices, benefiting the industry. Maize and soya beans typically account for about 60%-70% of poultry production costs, so a decline in prices greatly improves operating conditions.
These ample harvests boosted overall agricultural exports this year. The cumulative value of South Africa’s agricultural exports for the first three quarters of 2025 was $11.7bn, representing a 10% increase from the corresponding period in 2024.
This is an encouraging development, showing that South Africa’s agricultural exports have remained strong since the start of the year despite significant trade policy shifts and uncertainty. The improvements in port logistics, which contributed to better export performance, were another positive this year.
On the downside, the cattle industry has been under pressure throughout 2025 due to the spread of foot-and-mouth disease, which led to temporary closures of some export markets. This also created financial pressure on the farmers.
Therefore, while much of the sector seems to have had a positive year, the cattle industry struggled. Fortunately, as the year draws to a close the country has taken a big step towards vaccinating the roughly 12-million strong national cattle herd, 7.2-million of which represent commercial production.
The logistics for successfully carrying out this process will be clearer as we head into 2026, as the vaccination process gains momentum. Another important realisation of the year was that South Africa needed to revive its vaccination programme and possibly involve the private sector.
Fortunately, this year the foot-and-mouth disease challenge in the cattle industry did not spill over into the wool industry. In the 2022/23 outbreaks we saw China block South Africa’s wool imports due to foot-and-mouth disease, even though it was not in sheep but in cattle. This time around we did not face such a risk and wool exports continued smoothly.
Overall, we are ending this year with renewed optimism in the sector, as La Niña rains are expected to continue and vaccination will help address the foot-and-mouth disease challenge. The Agbiz/IDC agribusiness confidence index is up, having increased by five points to 67 points in the last quarter of the year.
This shows the improvement in sentiment, as the index is well above its 50-point neutral mark, which separates optimism from pessimism. The indications are that 2026 is shaping up to be a broad growth year.
• Sihlobo is chief economist at the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa and a senior fellow in Stellenbosch University’s department of agricultural economics.
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