Socio-economic development

As a national food manufacturer we understand that we play a valuable role in the upliftment of the South African society.

The Pioneer Foods Fund

The Pioneer Foods Fund (“The Fund”) was established in 2007 and is an independent sub-committee of the Board’s Human Resources Committee with 50% of the committee comprising of external representatives. In keeping with our commitment to governance, we established The Pioneer Foods Fund to ensure impartial and transparent decision-making in our Socio-Economic Development investments. This will ensure that all people who apply for funding relief and who meet the criteria, have an equal chance of success.

The vision of The Fund is to alleviate poverty in South Africa, so that all citizens have an opportunity to access food from a just and sustainable system. The strategy is to invest in sustainable development initiatives which address the needs of, and expand opportunities for, stakeholders in accordance with our development goals which are:

Nutrition
Agricultural Initiatives along the value chain
Environmental Sustainability
Natural Disaster Relief

Nutrition

Our country faces many socio-economic challenges. Therefore, it makes sense for us to assist with critical social issues related to poverty relief. However, whilst poverty relief is important, it is not developmental by nature, therefore. The Fund aspires to ensure that beneficiaries receive sufficient nourishment, education on nutrition, and are enabled to better ensure their own food security. Pioneer Foods has had a long and mutually beneficial relationship with its NGO partner Feedback Food Redistribution (“Feedback”). Feedback provides meals to impoverished communities as well as education and training to build knowledge about health, nutrition and hygiene. Food gardens in the various communities supplement the donations to beneficiaries, allow for beneficiary organisations to develop their own food security initiatives and, over time, their own organisational capacity.

Agricultural Initiatives and Environmental Sustainability

Agricultural initiatives along the value chain should be focused on providing food security and relief to beneficiaries. We recognise and respect the pivotal role played by primary agriculture in the food value chain and the sustainability of the Company itself. Agriculture correlates effectively with our third focus area, namely Environmentally Sustainable Initiatives.
The Fund has sponsored Phase 2 of a School Feeding and Greening Project at the Pula-Madibogo Primary School in Mankweng in the poverty-stricken Sovenga community in Limpopo province. The Pula-Madibogo school needed a reliable water supply to continue with its expansion, and water tanks, fruit and indigenous trees and the necessary gardening implements were donated to the school. This supports the school’s permaculture project that supplements the current feeding programme with a variety of fresh vegetables. The school has managed to expand its commercial footprint through the sale of its surplus vegetables to the surrounding communities and has used such proceeds to purchase the needed protein based food.

Natural Disaster Relief

During the flooding in the Western Cape in 2008, Pioneer Foods provided grants to the Salvation Army and the Red Cross society to assist communities. We also purchased rain resistant track-suits with neon reflectors for 3 700 learners in the Paarl and Wellington area in the Western Cape to ensure that learners from informal settlements were visible to traffic on the roads, and protected from the harsh wind and rainy Cape winter.