Saffron is the world’s most expensive spice, priced at between $5 000 and $10 000 a kilogramme.
Iran is the world’s biggest producer, pushing out between 85% to 90% of yearly global production, followed by Afghanistan and India in a distant second and third spot.
South Africa doesn’t feature anywhere on the list of significant global producers, but, when considering the arid landscape of the countries where the saffron flower thrives, one can conceive that it would be able to grow in certain parts of the country.
Cue Bennie Engelbrecht, former SuperSport producer who studied agriculture and, in 2013, at the age of 47, decided to swap the broadcast industry for farming.
Engelbrecht didn’t choose just any old crop to kick off his new career, but one that hasn’t yet been produced in South Africa at scale – saffron.
