No one locks this agripreneur down!

Lengau Mothiane has just signed on another 10 employees to handle the workload at his farmer support services business, Horizon Southern Group. Sabrina Dean spoke to him about his journey.

- Sabrina Dean

Less than a decade ago, Lengau Mothiane had to rely on a lift to transport the 10 sheep he had bought at an auction back to the family farm more than 100km away. He now farms 150 South African Mutton Merino sheep and a herd of about 70 Bonsmara-Brahman cattle. The 35-year-old agripreneur also owns his own business and is providing contract work to at least 25 previously unemployed people.

“It’s a good feeling to know you’re helping to support so many families, especially at a time like this,” he says.

BORN INTO FARMING

Mothiane is a third-generation farmer, born and raised in QwaQwa in the Free State.

“I never lived in a township; I grew up knowing farming,” he says.

His father, Albert, used to grow vegetables at sites located at clinics and old-age homes in the QwaQwa region; this was also where Mothiane completed his primary and secondary schooling.

Around 2012, the family moved to their own 445ha farm in the Heilbron district. It was immediately apparent, however, that this was a different type of farm to what they were used to.

“My father looked at this dryland without irrigation and realised he wasn’t going to make it trying to farm vegetables. So he decided to opt for cattle.”

Mothiane qualified as a solar technician after school, but struggled to make a living in the early days of the renewables industry and returned to the farm.

In 2013, the family entrusted him with his sister’s lobola