A YOUNG FARMER CLAIMS HIS LEGACY

When Moloko Swanepoel inherited the farm 152 Nazugongo in Beska from his late father in 2019, the 136ha property outside Lephalale had a farmhouse and 13 dorper sheep. “My dad inherited the farm from his father, but he was never a full-time farmer. He ran his construction business, and a few sheep on the farm were enough for him. We stayed here for a few years before we moved to town in 2000,” recalls Moloko.

Only two years later, the 35-year-old has established a promising emerging commercial mixed farming operation with a 5 000-capacity layer unit, a large flock of free-range indigenous chickens, as well as sheep, goats, cattle and more than 200 game animals. “I have also acquired more land to try to grow the farm into a sustainable unit,” explains Moloko, who now farms on just over 700ha.

CONSOLIDATING THE FARMLAND

Some of the land Moloko bought was part of the original farm, which, when his grandfather, Johannes Christoffel Swanepoel passed