Johannesburg — SA MAY be perilously close to losing its status as a food-secure country, as grain farmers and millers warn that crumbling rural road networks and the contraction of Transnet's freight service are seriously impeding the country's ability to import, process and distribute basic foodstuffs.

About 35% of SA's population, or about 15-million people, are already chronically vulnerable to food insecurity, according to a Statistics SA poverty survey.

Chronic food insecurity means people are malnourished. In worsening conditions, such as last year's food-price crisis, they could be subject to famine, for which there would be little relief if mass food aid could not be distributed.

The warning comes as wheat farmers in eastern Free State report their worst wheat crop in 30 years after late spring rains. Western Cape farmers also reported a poor crop.

While the agriculture department's crop estimate committee's latest figures forecast a near-normal harvest of 2,2-million tons, farmers put it closer to 1,5-million tons, analysts Forensies.com said this week.

A poor harvest means SA will have to ramp up imports. Millers are already importing wheat, notably from Argentina, to meet the quality requirements for their bread.

Chamber of Milling executive director Jannie de Villiers says the grain industry barely copes with keeping mills supplied in existing conditions. Added strain on the harbour and rail system when SA had to start importing grain in earnest would worsen the problem and greatly increase the country's vulnerability to food insecurity.

De Villiers said Transnet's subsidiary Freight Rail had chronically undersupplied rolling stock to silos. Demurrage charged by ships forced to wait because of delays at Durban harbour added at least R75m a year unnecessarily to the cost of producing bread.

Grain SA GM Kobus Laubscher confirmed the critical transport problems facing the grain industry, saying his organisation was deeply concerned about the threat to food security and the future of wheat farming.

"Farmers are struggling to bring their harvest to the silos via roads that they have to share with a greatly increased number of heavy vehicles," he said.

The poor harvest and difficulties caused by massively increased input costs during recent seasons mean many farmers will not plant wheat until conditions have changed.

Forensies.com analyst Philip Theunissen said domestic wheat-production capacity was being shifted to Argentina with the accompanying loss of jobs and an outflow of foreign exchange against an already huge deficit on the balance of payments.

Transnet spokesman John Dludlu acknowledged that the demand for rail transport sometimes exceeded supply of wagons, but denied the supply of rolling stock was inadequate.

"These wagons are not always utilised to their potential due to bottlenecks in the system caused by both rail and industry, but Transnet Freight Rail was in ongoing discussions with customers and the industry to increase efficiencies," Dludlu said.

"Given the seasonal nature of the (agricultural) industry, it would be uneconomical to provide additional capacity for short peaks, which then remained idle for nine months of the year."

Dludlu said agricultural imports in the Durban port were handled by Transnet Port Terminals (TPT) and other private terminal operators. TPT handled wheat and soya imports and met or exceeded the agreed discharge norms and had excess capacity.

Although rail transport is 30% cheaper than road transport, the ratio of rail to road transport had shifted drastically in the past three years, with road transport now accounting for 70% of grain shipped in SA.

Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Lulu Xingwana urged commercial farmers last year to increase production, and reaffirmed her department's commitment to small-scale farming.