Windhoek
While the beef industry provides food and a livelihood to thousands of people, disruptions within the supply chains can have a significant impact on the company’s profit, leading to a domino effect in all aspects of the business.
According to Meatco CEO Vekuii Rukoro, the habit of not honouring delivery agreements will have disastrous consequences for marketing opportunities in the lucrative EU markets.
Executive for marketing and sales Cyprianus Khaiseb says Meatco has a production schedule in place to manage customers’ expectations: “With low cattle numbers expected this year, in particular, we need to manage our production schedules more effectively.”
Meatco works on a three-month production planning schedule with the aim of placing 70 percent of production forward to regular, key customers, such as those in the EU markets. “Serving these clients requires consistent supply and we can only do that when we have enough raw material. Supply becomes challenging if delivery agreements are not honoured,” he says.
Overall, the production schedule helps Meatco identify how many clients need to be supplied at any given time to maintain its market share and maximise producer returns. For this reason it is important for producers to assist Meatco to better plan ahead to further grow the industry and to have a positive, rather than a negative effect on producer prices and the business as a whole. This creates a problem, as mostly the booked cattle cannot be replaced in time with cattle from other producers.
This can potentially cause fellow producers to lose slaughter space to a “no-show” producer in peak times.
“Therefore, farmers are urged to work closely with their procurement officer to notify us well in advance if they want to cancel their slaughter slots, so that we remain in a position to develop alternatives that will mitigate potential disruptions,” Rukoro said.