How the Buy Local Movement Can Benefit the Furniture Sector
PG Bison, in collaboration with Proudly South African, the South African Furniture Initiative (SAFI), and the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (dtic), recently hosted a webinar on the importance of the Buy Local movement to the furniture sector and, in turn, to the South African economy. Panellists acknowledged the severe challenges that the sector has faced, even prior to the devastating effect of COVID-19, and discussed the exciting initiatives that are underway to address these challenges, recover and advance the sector, and, thereby, stimulate the economy.
SA furniture sector potential
Happy Ngidi, Chief Officer of Marketing and Communications at Proudly South African, facilitated the webinar. In opening the discussion, she detailed the blows the furniture sector has taken since the turn of the millennium. In 2000, the sector boasted 3 500 manufacturing plants and employed 50 000 workers. In 2018, these numbers had been reduced to 2 200 and 26000, respectively. The primary reason for this is cheap imports. While South Africa exports some R3.9 billion in locally-manufactured furniture annually, this is far exceeded by our import of furniture, which is estimated at R6.9 billion per annum.
“The furniture sector is one that has been vulnerable to cheap imported products, but it is a pocket of the economy with massive potential for job creation through the entire supply chain,” Happy says.
The immense potential of the furniture sector is a major takeaway from the webinar, a point reiterated by all the panellists. Currently, the sector represents 1% of GDP and 1.1% of the overall manufacturing sector’s employment, but its potential for stimulating the economy and creating jobs far exceeds this.
Furniture sector’s role in job creation
Eustace Mashimbye, CEO of Proudly South African, explains that this is because the manufacturing industry is particularly labour-intensive. Moreover, the furniture manufacturing value chain is extensive; it includes the metal industry, chemical sector, sawmills and board mills, textiles sector, agricultural industry, plastics sector, and design and packaging industries. Eustace emphasises that, each time a furniture manufacturing plant is closed, it results in job losses across the aforementioned industries, too.
In his presentation, he particularly stressed the importance of sourcing raw materials locally, so that “the entire value chain is localised and contributes to the growth of the economy.”
PG Bison, as a proudly South African company, is committed to leading by example in this respect. All members of Proudly South African are audited on their compliance, and in Proudly South African’s most recent audit of PG Bison, they certified that 95% of our raw materials are locally sourced.
Choose to buy local
PG Bison’s Executive of Sales & Marketing, Justin Berry, focused his webinar input on the key question consumers should be asking: “Where does this product come from?” Consumers should look for the Proudly South African logo—which is a registered trademark—and the country of origin, which all products for sale in this country are obliged to carry.
In addition to various consumer education initiatives and efforts targeting private and public sector organisations, Proudly South African runs an e-store, RSAMADE, where B2C and B2B customers can find all ‘proudly local’ businesses in their area. Eustace also gave the webinar audience a sneak peek at the exciting, soon-to-be launched online Furniture Portal, which will provide a database of proudly local furniture manufacturers.
Initiatives to support the sector
Tafadzwa Nyanzunda, Director of Forestry-based Industries at the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition, reiterates the importance of focussing on locally sourced raw materials, and also highlights the role of developing local furniture designers. In this way, the entire value chain is localised, from conception to the customer’s door. Initiatives to develop designers include the annual Furniture Design Competition as well as tertiary design qualifications, which are now being finalised and are soon to be offered at South African colleges.
Tafadzwa also calls on the industry to act as a watchdog for furniture purchases in the public sector, in which furniture is a designated product category, meaning that government regulations are in place to ensure furniture must be sourced from local manufacturers.
Furniture Sector Master Plan
As the final panellist on the webinar, Bernadette Isaacs, Managing Director of the South African Furniture Initiative (a joint-initiative promoting employment growth, value addition and transformation across the furniture value chain), updated the audience on the Furniture Industry Master Plan, which was initiated in 2019. The plan’s focus is on improving market accesses and competitiveness, has now been expanded to include COVID-19 recovery support, and is estimated to be signed off and implemented by November 2020.
If more consumers and businesses get behind the Buy Local movement, this will not only ensure better quality products are available on the market (since Proudly South African expressly focuses on quality control), but may also save our struggling economy. As Gerhard Victor, PG Bison CEO, said in his closing remarks on the webinar, “If we take hands with each other, we will build a stronger South Africa for the next generation.” Watch the Proudly South African Game Time video – a call to Buy Local:
