Purpose-Built Logistics for Africa’s Feed Industry

0:05
Welcome to another episode of the Unitrans podcast. Today we want to have a conversation about the animal feed industry and the logistics systems that support food production across Africa. Feed logistics is a critical but often overlooked link in the agricultural value chain, influencing reliability, quality, and continuity across food systems. Joining me in the discussion today is Ryno van der Berg, who is GM of Consumer and Chairman of AFMA, Anina Hunter.

0:35
Please tell us a bit about your roles and we look forward to having a conversation around the importance of purpose-built specialised logistics systems in meeting the unique demands of the feed industry.

0:46
So welcome, lady, and gentleman.

0:49
Thank you.

0:49
Thank you, Francisco.

0:50
So my name is Anina Hunter. I head up the EPOL feed mills across South Africa. So, we’ve got six feed mills across South Africa. And I’m also the Chairman of AFMA, which is the Animal Feed Manufacturing Association of South Africa.

1:04
I’m Ryno van der Berg, General Manager of the Consumer division within Unitrans, overlooking the poultry and animal feed divisions.

1:12
So to start us off, we’d like to ask you why is a one size fits all logistics approach risky when it comes to feed production and distribution?

1:22
If you look at the genetics of the animals that we feed in the food chain, it’s been developed over years, and we’ve got to refined genetics to ensure that we operate and produce cost effective food for South Africa and the world. With these refined genetics, we’ve also got precision feed that we formulate. A general transporter that does not understand the feed value chain will not get it right. When companies contract-in transporters to transport the feed, this is the face of the company on the farm. The farmer gets to trust them. If your precision or biosecurity are not right, and if you pose any risk to the performance of the animals on farm, it does not work.

2:12
The other aspect that we’ve got to consider is that animals don’t pause and wait if there’s no feed. Public holidays, weekends, feed needs to be delivered, needs to be on time, it needs to be correct and within the right biosecurity protocols.

2:29
Dealing with livestock, there’s several factors that can impact the consumption of animal feed. From a transport and logistics company perspective, you need to be agile enough to adapt to those factors and react swiftly enough, but also in the same sense remain cost effective.

2:49
How do specialised assets, processes and people help protect quality, consistency, and safety across the feed supply chain?

2:58
All three of those are extremely important. If we look at specialised assets, we transfer our feed in bulk tankers dedicated to only the one feed mill to make sure that you have no cross contamination from external products. We have closed offloading or discharge booms that discharge on the farm, so the feed is not exposed to any contaminants on the farm. We also have separated compartments so no cross contamination can take place.

3:30
If we look at the processes, we have specific sequences that we transport feed with. Taking into consideration biosecurity, we would firstly discharge feed to high-risk farms like breeder farms or have dedicated trucks for breeder farms and then just discharge to broiler farms. Often, we will go from the youngest to the oldest farms, to try and protect your biosecurity chain. What’s also very important is that we, in the process, seal the trucks to make sure that no theft takes place. We need to realise that 70% of our input cost in broiler production is feed cost. It’s extremely cost sensitive and we’re working with this commodity that we have to protect at all times.

4:12
If we look at people… People are extremely important. The drivers need to understand that they are part of the food value chain, and we are feeding a nation. They need to do simple things like keep the cabin clean, avoid mud pools and manure heaps driving over that and just ensuring that they apply the basic biosecurity principle. Professionalism of the drivers leads to trust of the farmers and the feed mills.

4:41
Our staff are trained in the risks and exposures that they could face, with the processes and procedures that’s in place to mitigate those risks and also the repercussions of non-adherence. They fully understand the impact of not complying with the processes and how it can impact the operations. If your staff are not properly trained, you can have the best assets and the best procedures, but they if they’re not following it, then it’s null and void.

5:13
Now the term, biosecurity, has been thrown around quite a lot and we know in the feed industry biosecurity is non-negotiable. What measures or design principles in purpose-built feed logistics help minimise contamination risks and protect the nutrition pipeline that producers rely on?

5:30
I think that’s a very interesting concept. We’ve seen how diseases like foot and mouth disease, avian influenza and African swine fever have impacted our food value chain over the years. Biosecurity is non-negotiable, but it must be something that we live. It can’t just be a checklist. That’s very important.

5:51
For this reason, we’ve got a lot of protocols in place. We’ve already spoken about dedicated trucks, close discharge systems, we’ve got routine cleaning, dry cleaning, disinfecting of the trucks and the cabs in place and we’ve got access control systems in place on the farms and at the feed mills.

6:12
If we then just look at the guideline that AFMA gives us, AFMA tries and puts protocols and procedures together and encourages industry to follow good manufacturing practises. With this, it actually gives credibility to the feed mill and the logistic partner that’s part of the AFMA audit process.

6:33
You’ll get audited to make sure that you comply to this process. It’s very important because biosecurity doesn’t just end at the feed mill. It’s up the value chain and down the value chain. And what I mean by that, it’s all the raw materials coming into the feed factory and it’s all the final feed going out of the feed factory that’s got to comply with these biosecurity practises.

6:56
It is a holistic approach to protect it because I think we need to realise biosecurity risks can happen anywhere in the value chain and we’ve got to comply across the value chain.

7:08
From a logistics perspective, these processes, and procedures that Anina alluded to, but further on is to be cautious or to understand where you service your trucks, what potential risks are there? Because that’s further additional to the farms or the loading areas or the overloading areas. Where do you maintain your trucks? Is there a possibility of contamination there? Your staff, where do they stay? What’s around them? Are they exposed to potential risks?

7:34
It goes a little bit further. It becomes a lifestyle and not just a process that you’re following. People are being trained, highly trained in that. And we make sure that they do understand those exposures and risks and create the environment for them where they are free to say, “I have been exposed” and we can manage it accordingly where they could keep quiet and then you open up the risk.

8:03
What role does logistics planning play in supporting producers and downstream food systems?

8:08
We’ve already spoken about the fact that animals don’t pause if you want to have a public holiday or a weekend. It’s a nonstop system. That’s why planning is extremely important. We need to ensure that feed is delivered on time, as scheduled, and at the right state and the right quality, at all times.

8:26
In terms of logistic planning, what then becomes very important is that your logistical partner plans the maintenances and the services and do not skip on your disinfection or cleaning system in the process because it’s extremely important for biosecurity. You really need to make sure that all of this planning is done efficiently so that your feed is still delivered on time.

8:51
One aspect that I always like to mention is that logistical effectiveness creates space for the farmers to focus on the operations. They don’t have to worry about trucks being late. When logistical company is silent on a farm, you don’t even notice them, and you don’t talk about them – that’s the ideal situation to be in. If you’re talking about them, there’s a problem and that’s not ideal.

9:18
From a planning perspective, there’s two aspects to it. One is the biosecurity and the pure operational part to it. Schedule your loads in the sequence that comprise of biosecurity protocols from the youngest to the oldest or from the most fragile to the older birds where you can have a little bit more exposure. So, it’s that practical view.

9:38
And then secondly, it’s from an economical perspective. It’s very expensive assets. It is specialised. You want to get the absolute value and throughput through them, and you plan accordingly to make sure that you maximise the volumes that you deliver so that you can dilute the overall cost for the feed producer.

9:54
If we look at innovation… Innovation is reshaping feed logistics from smart routing to real time monitoring. Where do you see technology making the biggest practical difference without over engineering the system?

10:07
In poultry we like to say: “stick to the basics and keep it simple.” There’s a lot of innovation and technology out there, but because we’re such a cost sensitive environment, we need to use innovations that are going to add value at the end of the day. If it’s just smart technology that you add and you can’t really analyse anything from that or get any real improvements from that, then I don’t think it’s adding value.

10:33
Having smart route planning, as you’ve mentioned, is definitely an option to make sure that your feed is on time at the farm, in real time, and then also just monitoring the trucks real time to know where they are. If the farmer is phoning the feed mills fuming already and you say: “It’s at your gate, don’t worry, we’ll deliver shortly.” All these things are very important and obviously protecting the loads because it’s quite expensive cargo that we are transporting.

11:02
Any innovation technology that adds value to the business must be used. Anything that’s nice to have, expensive and gives you a nice dashboard doesn’t make sense for me to use.

11:15
This is a specialised field, and you will always have specialists operating because there’s a lot of factors that can determine the consumption. You need to be agile like we mentioned earlier, and AI can’t always be as agile as a human would be. Conversations happening between the plant and the farmer, like Anina mentioned, and sometimes special discussions need to happen.

11:42
However, there is technology that can assist the specialist in their decision making and communication. For instance, routing and planning. But we’ve got other tools, automation of documentation and where the drivers log all their progresses. It’s more “real life” than reactive. One can then have better communication to the farmers. All of that exist.

12:09
But it still remains critical to have a specialist on the floor that can understand what’s happening, what are the exposures and react to it because AI, at this stage, is not there yet. We deal with emotions, we deal with metabolisms, if I can say it like that. Time is of the essence. We can’t wait for a system to generate the right answer.

12:31
However, I do think there’s space in feed bins. Maybe communicating the stock levels directly to the feed producers and from there integrate with the logistics. There are tools that can do that.

12:46
That is where a lot of value will be added to remove waste out of the system. Cleaning production lines on your side, Anina, and for us to build a plant assets to be available when the product is completed that the truck is available to move again, getting the throughput through the assets to reduce the overall cost for the feed producer. Those things are definitely in the pipeline.

13:07
We are faced with diesel and fuel cost and innovation from a capital and equipment perspective. How do we reduce those running cost – maintenance, tyres, fuel – what can we do? The roads are not always getting better. We need to work smarter, understand what’s in the market and see how we can address those risks and those exposures and make it more cost effective for the feed producer, for the animal grower and ultimately for the consumer.

13:36
Lastly, let’s talk about partnerships. Now, Feed systems rely on close alignments between logistics operators, AFMA and producers. How do strong partnerships contribute to reliability, compliance, and the performance of the broader food value chain?

13:52
This alignment is extremely important, and that’s also a role that AFMA plays. AFMA does not just help the transporter and the feed mill to be generally compliant. If you look at logistical partners, they look at biosecurity, hygiene, behaviour on farm. There is additional compliance models built into the AFMA protocols and good manufacturing practises that we focus on in order to improve the logistical partners.

14:20
It mustn’t be a case of “I’m doing business with you because I like you.” It must be: “I’m doing business with you because I trust you and I trust you because you’re going through all the audits.” You have a system in place. It’s not just a general come-to-work day, load a truck and go off to the farm. There are certain steps that we’ve got to go through. We’ve got to ensure that all these steps are met before we leave the farm gate or before we enter the feed mills gate.

14:50
Because we’re dealing with specialised equipment and we, from a transport and logistics perspective, try to do a bit of innovation and see how we can improve on the current equipment that we are using, make it more economical and feasible, you need to partner up with the industry, AFMA and all the role players within it. So that you’ve got something sustainable that you can do research and development on and on which you can improve. So, it’s vice versa.

15:22
And again, to, Anina’s point, trust! It’s about trust. It’s about when there’s a crisis, you know you can phone and without questions assist because you’re dealing with livestock and you can’t store, safeguard, or keep it and put it on hold. You need to feed the animals. And that’s the first priority. If there’s no trust, if there’s no collaboration between the different partners, then it’s going to be quite difficult to achieve it.

15:57
There’s a lot of conversations that always happen between the parties, especially when it’s at budget time and rates, but when this crisis hits, it’s nice to see how people take hands and stand together against the crisis. Doesn’t matter who’s the logistics partner, who’s the feed mill. We understand livestock, animal welfare, all of that is at stake.

16:17
If you think about it, years ago, feed companies used to own their own trucks and their own assets. With time, we’ve migrated to contracting that in. It has to speak to the fact that we’re getting better service, it’s easier to manage the assets, there’s trust and they understand the business. It really has become a partnership over all these years.

16:43
Such interesting, valuable input that you guys are giving us. We really do appreciate that.

16:47
Through this episode we’ve learned that the reliability of food systems is influenced well before products reach shelves, starting with dependable feed supply. Thank you Ryno and Anina for joining us and shedding light on vital but often invisible part of the agricultural ecosystem. You’ve reminded us that purpose-built logistics enables resilience, quality, and long-term growth across Africa’s food systems.

17:12
In our next episode, we continue the discussion about how sector specific logistics is shaping everyday life on the contract.