From reactive to strategic - Partnering and collaborating for a sustainable future in the meat trade

The Association of Meat Importers and Exporters has played a strategic role in South Africa's food security since 1995.

The current context: pressures and imperatives:

The industry is no stranger to challenges. For instance:

• This year, South Africa importers and producers were significantly hamstrung by the Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza in Brazil, causing a shortage of Mechanically Deboned Meat (MDM), the primary ingredient for processed foods and a staple for lower LSM consumers.

• Disease challenges such as multiple outbreaks of Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) have constrained export access, affecting industry credibility and growth potential.

• Trade and export growth increasingly depend on robust traceability, biosecurity, value-added, and access to new markets.

• Inefficiencies at ports are leading to extended import processes, causing delays and costs, with a knock-on effect felt by consumers.

In short, the old model of “fire-fighting” doesn’t cut it anymore. A more strategic, partnership-based model is required—one that links producers, processors, regulators, researchers, infrastructure providers and market actors.

As an industry organisation, AMIE is privy to the challenges and opportunities within the Association’s own industry, as well as understanding the challenges and changes in adjacent industries. Agriculture, logistics, cold chain, retail, and production, to name a few, all play key roles in the value chain.et volatility and consumer impact.

Why partnerships and collaboration matter

1. Shared risk, shared capacity:

When producers, logistics, retail, industry organisations and government agencies align, they spread risk—from disease outbreaks to climate stress to market volatility and consumer impact.

2. Traceability and market access:

Access to premium export markets is increasingly requiring proof of origin, animal health status, chain of custody, and sustainability credentials. Collaboration enables investment in traceability systems across the supply chain, allowing producers to access higher-value markets. The RMIS’s traceability programme has launched phase 3 of its rollout in early November. This initiative, developed in collaboration with the government and aligned with global standards, is a strong example of partnership and progress, and the need to enable exports.

3. Inclusive growth and transformation:

A sustainable industry must draw in emerging traders and develop potential traders to ensure inclusive growth and the continued evolution of the industry. The AMIE Academy has been pursuing this goal for the last three years and was showcased at the African L&D Conference in Kenya this year as an innovative model for partnership towards sustainable transformation.

4. Innovation and value-addition:

Collaboration enables producers, processors, exporters, and retailers to invest in product development, branding, and logistics together. Only with innovative, collaborative solutions can the industry grow.

5. Infrastructure development and maintenance:

Through public-private partnerships and cross-segment collaboration, massive challenges like infrastructure development and maintenance can be addressed. An example of this is the significant positive impact South African businesses had in mitigating the country’s electricity crisis by investing heavily in alternative energy sources, implementing energy efficiency measures, and participating in a new private power generation initiative.

What a strategic partnership-based model might look like.

Here are some key components and how they might operate in practice:

• Farm-to-market traceability networks: Forums, such as AMIE, represent both importers and exporters, providing an opportunity to understand the complete value chain when designing a solution.
  
• Joint climate-adaptation and efficiency programmes: Climate change not only impacts disease outbreak prevalence, but also the production capacity of countries and logistics chains. The more diversified the supply chain's portfolio is, the less impact it will need to absorb. This emphasises the importance of a balanced import/export portfolio. Collaborating with all adjacent industries in the value chain enables better forecasting and planning, ultimately working towards food security.
  
• Inclusive supply-chain platforms: Larger commercial value chain players mentor, partner and develop emerging players, local supply chain and employees to ensure inclusive growth, while industry bodies provide training, extended services, and facilitate access to finance.
  
• Value-chain integration for export-readiness: Processors collaborate with producers and exporters to optimise carcass yields, maximise value-added cuts, meet halal/quality/traceability standards and access new markets. Trade associations and governments negotiate regionalisation agreements (to avoid blanket bans during disease outbreaks) and trade facilitation.
  
• Stakeholder governance bodies: Multi-party forums (industry, government, research, community) set strategic road-maps and follow through with measurable actions.

Challenges to overcome

Transitioning to a strategic partnership model is not without obstacles:

• Coordination issues: Aligning producers, processors, regulators, researchers, and trade bodies is complex. Clear governance, roles, incentives and accountability are required.
  
• Funding and Investment: Upgrading and Maintaining Infrastructure. Partnerships must include financing mechanisms—public, private, blended.
  
• Variable capacity and inclusion: Emerging farmers often lack access to technology, training, and market linkages. Emerging traders lack capital investment. Partnerships must be deliberately inclusive.
  
• Biosecurity/regulation/market access: Disease outbreaks continue to pose significant disruptions (e.g., FMD). Strategic collaboration must embed proactive biosecurity, rapid response, and regulatory-trade alignment.
  
• Climate experts predict that the prevalence of animal disease outbreaks is likely to increase worldwide. Having bilateral trade agreements with multiple countries is one of the most obvious ways to minimise the impact on the supply chain, whether the outbreak is domestic or foreign.

Path forward:

To embed a strategic partnership and collaboration framework for sustainability in the meat trade, the following steps are necessary to consider for South Africa’s industry stakeholders:

• Establish multi-stakeholder value-chain platforms
  
• Lobby for and help facilitate proactive trade agreements, such as regionalisation
  
• Prioritise traceability and biosecurity systems
  
• Co-invest in the digitisation of import and export systems
  
• Build inclusive supply-chain enablers
  
• Focus on value-addition and market diversification
  
• Monitor performance and adapt

AMIE remains vigilant and steadfast in driving these objectives in 2026 and invite the industry to bring their collaborative solutions for a sustainable future.