Sustainability
We are incredibly proud of our range of premium quality South African products. As farmers ourselves, we love supporting our friends in the industry. We have worked tirelessly to not only produce but also source the best quality products, from other farms, to complement our range.
We source from no fewer than 10 different farms, some of which like ourselves are small scale local producers. As a female owned business, we are particularly proud of the 5 other female owned businesses we work with, women in agriculture is certainly on the rise!
We also use only South African produced packaging for all our goods.
Job creation in a rural area
In rural Eastern Cape we have a major job scarcity. Creating employment opportunities that can uplift people in our local community is a very big motivator to grow our business.
Over and above our small staff compliment who work for us all year round, we employ 20-30 seasonal workers. Although this is only piece work, it provides them at least some income to support their families. We are always glad to see the same familiar faces for the few months of our season, but it serves as a sad reminder of how little permanent work there is out there.
Any industry in a poor area has a knock-on effect of creating other work opportunities. We also love being able to employ local contractors for improvements, repairs and maintenance on our farm!
Eco friendly packaging & recycling
Our products are sold in as environmentally friendly packaging as we can find and we are always trying to improve. We use biodegradable zip seal bags, glass, and brown paper bags. We introduced our very special bespoke cardboard punnets in 2022, doing away with the conventional single use plastic punnets for our fresh blueberries. The first of its kind we have seen in South Africa.
If we can’t put it in environmentally friendly packaging, we choose something that can at least be re-used or recycled in your home.
We offer the option of returning your used glass jam jars to us for a R5 deposit so that we can process and re-use them. We also encourage all our customers to bring along their own bags when collecting orders and distribute our larger orders in only cardboard boxes or paper bags.
sustainable practices
Sustainability is defined as the ability to meet your own needs without compromising the future needs of our environment or others. It’s important to us that our small business takes this into consideration.
In the production of our own blueberries, we use organic fertilizers and do not use insecticides. Our shrubs only receive supplementary irrigation which comes from a natural stream, and they are grown out in the open and not under tunnel. We like to call our blueberries free range! We do sell out of our own stock of blueberries, and then buy in from other farms so that we can continue to supply our customers all year round.
It is important to note that the produce we buy in from commercial farms comes from leaders in the industry, who all go through rigorous Global GAP audits in order to be able to export. Part and parcel of these audits is ensuring these farms also adhere to sustainable, food safe practices.
