OFM News was in Pretoria and went for a walkabout through the facility with CEO, Dr Steven Cornelius. 

There are thousands of boxes of vaccines in a refrigerated store, including ample stock of the contentious Brucella-S19 vaccine. Lumpy skin disease, Rift Valley Fever, West Nile Virus, African Horse Sickness, Bluetongue and many more are also available.

Cornelius says he admits they have had some teething problems since taking over distribution earlier this year.

“We had a time when we did not have any product and systems broke down inside. That has been resolved through our team efforts.

“We have now moved to this new distribution network. We did that for economic reasons – it made business sense in terms of our income. As I said, there have been teething problems. So, in actual fact I think many of the critics are a little impatient.”

He says they are launching a new online resource by the end of the month which should help resolve a lot of issues.

“In that regard we’re also putting in place a system, which will come into operation by the end of October. It’s called First for Farmers. It’s a system that co-ops normally use so that they can make ordering easier.

 “They can also see what stock we have available. That is really going to improve the system.”

OFM News