Newsletter
August 2002The weather has been quite a challenge. The Western Cape region of South Africa is used to wet winters, but this has been a winter in the best tradition of the Cape of Storms. Waves of up to 13m have been recorded and winds of up to 120 km/h have created havoc with roofs blowing off, trees  uprooted and, particularly in the low-lying areas, water damage has created problems for many living on the so-called Cape Flats which is the area between the Cape Peninsula and the Hottentots Holland mountains 50 km further in the direction of Honingklip Farm.
This resulted in difficulties to dry our Repens (P037) crops. Producers more to the north of the wet and cold area did not have the same amount of rain, so the harvest kept coming in we were bursting at the seams. The harvest has been particularly good, due to late summer rains, which resulted in more flowers per bush, and very nice quality. In order to cope with the quantities of freshly harvested flowers coming in, it was not uncommon to see crates stacked roof-high, waiting to be processed.
A number of additional workers who have in the past worked at Honingklip on a seasonal basis, were re-employed, but in spite of the additional hands, it was still necessary to put in lots of over-time. The workers felt that rather than to employ further unskilled workers, they would rather work overtime, as there was no time to teach new workers. In spite of our best efforts, the cold and wet conditions have delayed drying, resulting in late shipment.
Inevitably the storm, wet and intense cold has also delayed rebuilding of our bleaching and dyeing facility. We always called this our C/D (chemical and dye) division, which by popular request of the workers is now renamed PDB (Bleaching, Dyeing, Preserving).  By rearranging our present stores and utilizing each and every possible corner in addition to renting a facility about 10km away, we have managed to continue production under rather difficult circumstances.
The bleaching and dyeing section will be built on the old site and has been redesigned to give better space/workflow utilization. In-house designed drying rooms will be incorporated into the complex. The new preserving section is adjacent to where the new building will be situated.
Now at last our new controlled environment tunnel-style preserving facility is ready and the first batch of preserved Spiral Eucalyptus (F295), and Tortum foliage (F002) is looking really good. Richard has been given the responsibility of monitoring and testing optimum efficiency levels for each product and doing ongoing trials for new products. The state-of-the-art computer-controlled facility has been linked to his office computer.  We expect that this investment will result in better consistency of quality and increased production capacity.
Within the next few weeks our entire can be viewed on-line. We will host our catalogue within Europe as access speeds in South Africa are too slow. |
