For FarmSol, guiding farmers towards sound soil management practices is crucial. Aron Kole, managing director of the company, says that this helps to build resilient farming businesses.
Ensuring that farmers maximise the true potential of the land includes the proper maintenance of their most precious asset: their soil. A well-executed crop rotation strategy ensures that the soil is not weakened but rather strengthened so that the farmer reaps the benefits over a longer period.
Agriculture is never about the short term rewards. New farmers, like the farmers enrolled in the FarmSol programme, always need to think long term. Crop rotation builds up the potential of your soil so that as a farmer you can farm sustainably and achieve good yields over a longer period of time.
It is important for the farmers to try and rest their land to build up moisture. And I know this is not necessarily easy, as generally farmers would want to plant every season and on as much of their land as possible, but there are good advantages in resting your soil.
Building up moisture in the soil will give you a head start on the new season, so that you are able to plant in time and have a better chance of success, especially as South Africa is relatively a dry country and there a periodic occurrence of droughts.
FarmSol aims to support farmers for long-term success with the help of our partners. With various partners coming on board assisting farmers throughout the value chain, we are able to maximise the true potential of the farm and the farmers, helping them protect and enhance their soil through implementing soil correction interventions and adopting multiple-crop rotation strategies.
In the end this leads to shared risk among partners and more money ending up in the pocket of that farmer.
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