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SAWB restructuring
Getting there slowly but surely

Charles Erasmus, CEO of Sawit, Jan Coetzee of Vriesenhof en Abrie Botha of WestCorp.

Four hard-working months since the process began, the restructuring of the South African Wine and Brandy Company (SAWB) is in its final stages. The restructuring process was implemented after broad-based consultation by SAWB within the wine industry as well as with government and aims to turn the organisation into a representative and effective industry body.
"Since its inception three years ago, considerable soul-searching on the SAWB has been done - both among the wine industry and industry-related bodies it represents, as well as from higher powers, i e government on whose behest the SAWB came into being," said Gavin Pieterse, chairperson of the South African Wine Industry Trust (SAWIT) who is spearheading the restructuring process, in a press release.
"After exhaustive research, feedback sessions from parties within the SAWB and qualitative audits, a process is under way to restructure the organisation."
At one of the restructuring workshops held in Stellenbosch in December, it became apparent that the process aims to look at means by which the diverse bodies within the framework of the SAWB operate as an aligned industry conglomerate of activities, being accountable to the industry in order to perform their own particular tasks and represent their support basis effectively and efficiently.

Considerable soul-searching on the SAWB has been done - both among the wine industry and industry related-bodies it represents ...

With bodies as diverse as Sawis, Wosa, Winetech, VinPro, Bawsi, the Independent Trade Union Federation and the Arise and Shine organisation that represents the disabled, SAWB has enough representative interest groups to make the Tower of Babylon look like a meticulously run Swiss banking corporation!
"The challenge is now to align such functions in all fields on the one hand but also to free each of the entities from rigid reporting back and cross-check procedures so that they are able to play their own respective roles in the fields of, inter alia, transformation, human skills development, market development and promotion, information and intelligence, and technological excellence in the wine industry," said Pieterse.

Left: Gavin Pieterse, chairperson of Sawit; Middle: Augustinus Hendricks of Bawsi; Right: Johan van Rooyen, CEO of SAWB.

"At the same time, each of the myriad parties and interest groups has committed its accountability to the wine industry through being part of a bigger organisation. Will this organisation still be called the SAWB? Who knows?"
What anyone attending this workshop would have noticed, is that the restructuring process is inclusive, proactive and of an exceptionally detailed and professional level.
As Dr Johan van Rooyen, CEO of current SAWB says, "When you look at the spirit in which this restructuring process is taking place and you see the positive manner in which all the interested parties - diverse as they are - want to work together to take our complex wine industry to a higher level, then it is no small wonder that other agricultural industries deem the wine industry to be streets ahead in tackling the difficult issues the South African landscape requires of them.
"This restructuring process and the amount of soul-searching and role definition is a success in itself."
This may be. But with Pieterse's draft report having been completed in mid-December and circulated for comment, the crunch will be in February 2006 when the final suggestions, as approved by the SAWB board, are put to the Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs.

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