{"id":848053,"date":"2026-01-16T12:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T10:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=848053"},"modified":"2026-01-16T11:17:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T09:17:13","slug":"world-class-south-african-facility-collapsed-despite-r500-million-funding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/848053\/world-class-south-african-facility-collapsed-despite-r500-million-funding\/","title":{"rendered":"World-class South African facility collapsed despite R500 million funding"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) went from a world-class facility to a struggling one despite receiving R500 million to revamp it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Onderstepoort Biological Products is a South African state-owned animal vaccine manufacturing company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its mandate is to prevent and control animal diseases that impact food security, human health, and livelihoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It plays a key role in South Africa in preventing and controlling animal diseases that impact food security, human health, and livelihoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The facility must ensure vaccine affordability and accessibility through varied distribution channels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, many agricultural experts and farmers have raised concerns about the OBP not fulfilling its mandate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The current Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreak, which is wreaking havoc across the country, has brought the facility’s dysfunction into the spotlight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The situation is so dire that South Africa is currently importing vaccines from Botswana to address a severe outbreak of FMD in livestock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since Botswana’s factory alone cannot keep up with the demand, the government is also sourcing vaccines from Argentina and Turkey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For decades, South Africa produced its own FMD vaccines through the Agricultural Research Council (ARC) and Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the specialised high-security laboratories required to handle live FMD viruses were neglected and eventually lost their ability to adequately serve the local market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mismanagement and corruption at state-owned OBP led to a significant decline in manufacturing capacity, leaving the national laboratories silent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, instead of farmers getting vaccines from local facilities, the government is paying millions to get FMD vaccines from the Botswana Vaccine Institute (BVI) and others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

R500 million to upgrade the Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) facility squandered<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A decade ago, the National Treasury allocated approximately R492 million to the Onderstepoort Biological Products to upgrade the facility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This upgrade was needed to modernise the ageing 1960s-era infrastructure to meet international Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, a large part of this money seemed to have been squandered, and OBP received a qualified audit from the Auditor General (AG).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its latest annual report, the AG said it could not obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to substantiate certain amounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Auditor General previously revealed that a large portion of a grant to Onderstepoort Biological Products was unspent and unaccounted for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen took over the role, he said he was very concerned about OBP, which has been given R500 million to revamp the facility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said a large part of the R500 million went missing and is unaccounted for, and promised that a forensic audit would help reveal where the money went.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, to date, there is not much clarity on what happened to the money or what the forensic audit revealed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ActionSA Parliamentary Leader Athol Trollip said he was concerned about Steenhuisen\u2019s continued silence on the investigative report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This investigation should have shed light on the disappearance or improper accounting of approximately R500 million at OBP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These funds were intended to upgrade vaccine production facilities to meet Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) standards,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis failure lies at the heart of South Africa\u2019s vaccine shortage and undermines confidence in the current strategy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said the Agricultural Research Council (ARC) and Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) have lost the ability to produce sufficient vaccines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trollip argued that this collapse was due to chronic mismanagement and infrastructural decay at the institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow can the very institutions responsible for this failure now be trusted to lead a proactive vaccination campaign? Are they capable of doing so?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cInstead of dealing with the question, the Minister remarked that it was highly unusual for a Member of Parliament to ask questions at a press briefing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Foot-and-Mouth Disease is a national crisis<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
ActionSA Parliamentary Leader Athol Trollip<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Trollip said his engagements with farmers and industry stakeholders confirmed that the department lacks the capacity to manage the FMD outbreak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFoot-and-mouth disease is a state-controlled disease. If the state fails to control it, farmers cannot be expected to bear the full economic burden alone,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEven the department\u2019s own head of biosecurity stated that failure to act swiftly allows the disease to spread.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trollip argued that the department\u2019s heavy reliance on livestock movement controls alone is fundamentally flawed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reason is that it is done in the absence of compensation for production losses, livestock deaths and the loss of irreplaceable genetic material,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRed zones effectively impose zero income on farmers, create severe price distortions, and place both farming operations and farm workers at risk,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He warned that, faced with these realities, farmers across the country will inevitably move livestock to survive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An effective response requires urgent and genuine public-private collaboration in research, vaccine production and vaccination programmes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBureaucratic gatekeeping and rigid adherence to outdated legislation will only worsen the crisis,\u201d Trollip said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Legislative and regulatory reform is urgently required, as the department lacks the human and technological capacity to manage this outbreak alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The availability of effective vaccines in high-risk, disease-prevalent areas remains deeply concerning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt also emerged that ARC, OBP and the department have been delinquent in regularly submitting FMD samples to recognised reference institutions,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Minister\u2019s acknowledgement that he has only now instructed that strains be prepared and sent is alarming.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis outbreak is a national crisis. The Minister and his department must adopt an all-hands-on-deck approach to extinguishing the foot-and-mouth disease.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BusinessTech asked Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) for comment, and will add their response when received.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) went from a world-class facility to a complete disaster despite receiving R500 million to revamp the facility.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":848054,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[24535,21639,24536,22710,24534,24537,20147,3796,21638],"class_list":["post-848053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-agricultural-research-council-arc","tag-agriculture-minister","tag-athol-trollip","tag-auditor-general-ag-2","tag-foot-and-mouth-disease-fmd-2","tag-good-manufacturing-practice-gmp","tag-john-steenhuisen","tag-national-treasury","tag-onderstepoort-biological-products-obp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=848053"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848053\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":848072,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848053\/revisions\/848072"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/848054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=848053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=848053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=848053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}