A group of commercial farmers near Tzaneen in Limpopo have resorted to using solar power in order to keep operations afloat. The owners of the Gubitz commercial farms say the move to combine electricity from the national grid and solar power is value for money.
The rolling blackouts affected operations but farmers say the impact was minimal due to back up renewable energy.
Johan Gubitz says the renewable energy helps their business to continue with production during power cuts.
“We could not run the whole pack house at once. We had to stop sections and lower sections and stop start and everything costs money to run longer. It takes us more and is more expensive for the product. At the end is so we did that for the most importantly was for the fridge, the fridge has to run on a constant six to nine degrees for the avocadoes to be able to be exported,” says Gubitz.
