FARMER FOCUS: Good season for South African dairy farmers

NEW WRITER: Gratefully, we have had an exceptional rainy season on my farm so far. Like 90% of South Africa, we fall in a summer rainfall area. Only the Western Cape and parts of the Eastern Cape are winter rainfall areas.

Normally our rain starts mid-October, but this season it started in mid-September and continued consistently since. I cannot remember my kikuyu pastures – a hardy and prolific African grass – ever being so consistently green and luscious as in the last few months.

Sadly, this has not translated into exceptional milk yields. The summer heat, spells of rain and the fact that the cows appear to prefer the kikuyu to the feed prepared for them, take their toll. But the butterfat content of the milk is good and I am sure we will get the benefit of better pastures later in the year.

The bulk of my milk is transported to a processor who uses it to make organic yoghurt and drinking joghurt for a major retail chain. The rest of my produce is used either to produce kosher dairy products at the highest level (Chalav Ysrael) on the farm, or butter and cheese under my own label. We produce two camembert types of cheese, the one pasteurised and the other unpasteurised. With the last one we were fortunate to take second prize out of 80 cheeses at the National Dairy Championship held in the Cape last year.

But when the grass is green as it is now, my butter is an intense bright yellow, compared with a pale white in winter. I still don’t understand how the colour of industrial butter remains the same year in and year out. Unless colouring is added, which the processors deny – of course.

Danie Schutte is an organic, Ayrshire dairy farmer who also processes dairy products on his 90ha farm near Pretoria, South Africa.