Companies create value through transformation, and that can be a pretty simple process. You add value to wheat by milling it into flour. You add value to flour by baking it into bread. You can add value to bread by innovating it—into a French baguette, an artisanal sourdough loaf, or square, crustless loaves that are perfectly packaged for school lunches.
Transformation and innovation occur in response to customer demand, market research, technological breakthroughs or eureka moments from clever marketers.
However, there is another mechanism of value creation that is often overlooked: the enrichment of culture and cultural heritage.
How does culture create value?
Culture is most often used further down the line – when selling or marketing a brand or product. Advertisers capitalise on trends and use contemporary culture whenever possible. Eventually, a cultural hit becomes a market hit, as brand strategist Ana Andjelic so eloquently argues.
However, in South Africa, culture is rarely used to innovate upstream – at the category level. Some industries and countries, such as Italy and Japan, have been using culture for centuries to transform production and create value upstream.
Italy has a policy that vigorously protects and promotes regional and local products and agricultural products. Wherever possible, the country does not consider local products as an interchangeable commodity, but as a unique feature of cultural heritage and local identity. By using culture as a prism to redefine a commodity, it can add value to it and then protect that value with legal instruments.
More than 300 Italian food products and 500 Italian wines enjoy protected legal status due to their unique origins and cultural value. This value-added tactic provides significant market share to the respective industries and strengthens the reputation of the Italian brand as a cultural and agricultural superpower.
Each of its protected products falls into one of three categories: Protected Designation of Origin (DOP), Protected Geographical Indication (IGP) or Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (TSG). These categories provide consumers with certain assurances regarding the origin and place, the unique characteristics of the product and the place of production.
With the DOP classification, all production must take place in a defined geographical area. For IGP products, only one step of the production process must take place in a defined area. More than one in four geographically indicated and protected (GI) products in the world comes from Italy.
From balsamic vinegar and Parmigiano Reggiano to panforte and Parma ham, by carefully controlling the definition, production, origin and supply of these products, food manufacturers can charge a premium, increase global demand and benefit from the security that, by definition, no one else can compete with them. They will always be the only producers of these products. Pure value is created and protected by culture.
This also applies to fresh products. San Marzano tomatoes from the Italian region of Campania are DOP-certified and are sought after worldwide for use in pasta and pizza. Likewise, the IGP-certified red onions from Tropea in Calabria are known for their mild and sweet taste.
Italy has more protected foods than any other country in Europe. The Italian food and drink industry generates almost a quarter of the national GDP. From producer to fork, four million workers are involved in farms, food industries, restaurants and retail stores.
What about South Africa?
The only South African product to enjoy Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) status in Europe is rooibos tea – the first African agricultural product to receive this designation. This success was largely due to collaboration between producers and the Ministries of Agriculture, Trade and Industry and International Relations. The European Union (EU) recognised rooibos by granting it PDO status under the 2014 SADC-EU Economic Partnership Agreement.
South Africa has caught up and finally adopted geographical indication regulations for the local market in February 2023. This means that local food producers can now register their products as either PDO or IGP.
So far, Karoo lamb is the only product to have received local certification. In contrast, the European Union has an online searchable database of more than 5,600 legally protected food and agricultural products.
Why only Karoo lamb? Is it because the government is not doing enough to encourage the potential of what I like to call ‘cultural upgrading’? Is it because local industry views agricultural products as mere commodities? A melon is a melon is a melon?
If we looked at our products through the lens of culture and heritage, couldn’t we add, protect and create new value instead?
In Japan, Yubari melons enjoy a Protected Geographical Name of Origin. Although these melons are similar to our Spanspeks, they can only be grown in the city of Yubari in Hokkaido. The Japanese government has agreed that they qualify for the Protected Geographical Name of Origin due to the special geographical characteristics of their growing area (climate and soil conditions).
At the same time, Japan has also developed a complex culture (there’s that word again!) of giving fruit as a gift, much like we would give someone a bouquet of flowers. The main difference is that the fruit used as a gift in Japan is expertly grown and carefully bred for that purpose. It is a category of fresh produce that has been created through culture.
These fruits are considered luxury goods. In May, a pair of yūbari melons fetched three million yen at the first auction of the season. That’s about R350,000 for a pair of melons.
What made these melons so special? Culture. And careful cultivation, of course. But these melons are no exception – Japan’s luxury fruit industry is a large and well-established sector. From square watermelons to white strawberries, the Japanese use culture and novelty to increase the value of goods and, in doing so, have built a reputation for producing some of the highest quality fruit in the world.
So if we can imagine it, a South African spanspek could perhaps become more than just a melon.
Numerous possibilities
Italian Parma ham is protected because it can only be made from the hind legs of selected breeds of pigs in certain regions of Italy. Perhaps it is time to create and protect local variants of biltong as well.
What about Grabouw Boerewors? Karringmilk cheese? Amasi? Umqombothi? There are already regional variations of the SubscribeWhy not develop, protect and promote them?
We must encourage local communities and food producers to take advantage of this new legal framework – and remind South Africans that their culture and heritage are valuable.
With a little proactive collaboration from government (note ministers John Steenhuisen, Parks Tau and Gayton McKenzie) and food producers working together in consortia, South Africa can use what it has in abundance – culture – to create economic opportunities. This does not have to be a gamble.
A concerted, organized effort to create and promote these new, self-reinforcing value chains is, excuse the metaphor, a no-brainer.
We live in a time where culture is capital. It is time to recognize this and act accordingly. DM
Timothy Zeelie is a cultural marketing and communications strategist. He lives and works in Cape Town and Milan.
