RED-HOT CHILLI FARMER

Eric Mauwane, owner of Oneo Farms in Tarlton, Gauteng, is gearing up to enter the lucrative export market with peppers and chillies after establishing a name for himself in the local market. He’s building a packhouse and getting through the audits for the necessary certification. “We’re going big this season, focusing on bell peppers and chillies as our specialties,” says Eric.

A market research analyst by training, Eric established Oneo Farms in 2012 after leaving a corporate career. But farming has always been in his blood: he is from a farming family based in Bapong outside Brits in North West. “My grandfather is from the chieftaincy family under the Bapo ba Mogale and has farmed all his life. He had a mixed operation of livestock, maize and sunflowers on communal farms in Bapong,” says Eric. “I had a passion for pigs and was inspired by Ntate Kabelo Bogatsu of Bogatsu Boerdery and