The unprecedented times in which we find ourselves pose a great many opportunities for the buy local movement. Local procurement is a proven driver of job creation as demand for locally manufactured, produced and grown goods stimulates productivity which in return calls for a larger workforce.
Once life resumes its former economic pace – if indeed it ever does – much work will be required to kick-start the economy once again, to put South Africa and South Africans back to work. Many jobs will have been lost after the COVID19 pandemic has run its course. Many companies, both small and large, will not have weathered the storm and the consequences will be felt most by those whose jobs were lost along the way.
Post COVID19 lockdown, South Africans must reflect on their priorities when it comes to purchasing decisions. Prices of goods and services will be vastly altered – the plummeting oil price will likely favour consumers, but we will be hit hard in our pockets for other items whose raw material inputs have become scarce or not available at all. This means that items that are wholly made in SA are likely to remain stable in price versus those which rely on imported components or ingredients.
Many countries – South Africa is not alone – will be using this period to review their reliance on overseas markets for imported goods, services and inputs. The coronavirus pandemic will test many companies, challenging them to source some of their required raw materials closer to home.
Proudly South Africa began working in 2019 already with retailers on identifying a list of FMCG items – foodstuffs and other items – for the implementation of an import replacement programme, and the current crisis offers us an opportunity to extend this list and look at what on our supermarket shelves is local and what is imported. What amongst those products that are imported can we replace with a local equivalent?
There are many products – poultry and tinned tomatoes are just two that we find on our shelves – that are almost wholly imported from overseas but which we have the capacity as a country to source entirely from local suppliers who produce sufficient quantities of both to satisfy the domestic market. But what reaches our shelves is the responsibility at the same time of the retailers as of consumers who drive demand.
During this lockdown period we have seen a whole host of beautifully shot and crafted adverts – or perhaps we shouldn’t call them adverts, as traditional advertisers have suspended commercial messaging in favour of feel good, stay home, in -this- together public service announcements. We saw an unprecedented collaboration between retailers Shoprite, Checkers, Spar, Pick and Pay and Woolworths whose food sections obviously remain open at this time to keep us fed and nourished and supplied with all essential items. It reads ‘We shall proudly serve’ using the fonts and colours of the different stores to make their point.
So, as we try and look forward to a time when life returns to a regular rhythm (it’s hard to imagine that ‘ normal’ can apply here) we appeal to businesses, consumers and retailers to put all their support behind local manufacturers and suppliers. We cannot squander the advantage that this pandemic has given us to show us that we do not need to reply on imports as much as we have to date. If all the businesses that are showing support for South Africa at this time of crisis want us to support them back after this is over, they need to change their local procurement mind set. This means not just retailers stocking more local goods – consumers can’t make local product choices if they can’t find them readily on the shelves- .but it means corporate South Africa making buy local choices through their entire value chain, from furniture to stationery, uniforms, detergents and all other daily consumables they require for the functioning of their businesses.
And we as individual consumers have a choice – to recognise that local really is lekker or to go back to our old habits of buying imported goods. After all this is ‘over’, not buying local will result in us helping other economies get back on their feet when we should be focussing on our own. Buy local to create jobs.
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