Our Mission
Our mission is to restore Africa’s rangeland ecosystems.
Our Vision
Our Vision is to see emerging farmers implement planned grazing and controlled burning with herders for rangeland regeneration and wildlife protection. Consumers buy sustainably produced livestock products that creates the demand for the continued regeneration of Africa’s rangelands, bringing together livestock farmers, NGOs, meat buyers, and stakeholders in a low carbon meat value chain.
Our Goal
Our Goal is to enable and incentivise restoration of Africa’s rangeland ecosystems through the development of low-carbon livestock product value chains that are exclusively owned by farmers who are driving restoration of their lands
Services the enable replication and scaling by NGO partners and government:
- Feasibility assessments (grazing, governance, market, and sustainability analysis)
- Project and proposal design and implementation support
- Training-of-Trainers and mentorship support
- Monitoring and Evaluation of ecosystem and social impacts
Services that enable sustainable value-chains:
- Carbon emissions calculations and bundling for unlocking carbon finance (jurisdictional, land, enteric fermentation, and energy consumption)
- Community butchery development and training
- Renewable energy guidance and installations for established butcheries and abattoirs operating in value-chains that Meat Naturally supplies into.
Meat Naturally, surprisingly was originally founded with the intent to address environmental degradation in South Africa. The nation’s rangelands are being devastated by the spread of non-edible invasive plants, poor grazing management and disruption of the predator-prey balance from killing of predators.
Meat Naturally is a farmer-owned social enterprise with core business functions of providing market readiness and market access to communal farmers as an incentive and long-term financial support for the adoption and implementation of regenerative grazing and improved productivity actions. We utilise grant and investment funding (blended finance) to develop farmer association businesses, provide technical support, and test innovative market solutions. We build partnerships with NGOs that support their goals and provide a sustainability
A good idea only becomes reality with sufficient support to grow. Meat Naturally evolved and could not exist without critical support provided by South Africa’s Department of Environmental Affairs; South African National Parks; Conservation South Africa; Environmental and Rural Solutions; the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership Programme Partners; Kruger to Canyon Biosphere; Peace Parks Foundation; UCLA Anderson School of Business; generous private funders and an award from Securing Water for Food (https://securingwaterforfood.org/). Each of these entities provided time, finance, and endless support that enabled Meat Naturally to develop its business model.
We would also like to say a massive thank you to: SAB Foundation, Mulago Foundation, Peace Parks Foundation, the Industrial Development Corporation, Nedbank Legacy Trust, and TASC
Business Entities of our Social Enterprise Network
Check Out Our History
Meat Naturally Business Model
Meat Naturally’s hybrid, fit for purpose business structure consists of two legal entities:
- Meat Naturally Pty Ltd (MNP) that conducts the business activities and services and. MNP was established in 2016 by Conservation South Africa as a social enterprise.
- Meat Naturally NPC (MN NPC), a Trust or not-for-profit company ownership structure that enables tax-efficient profit distribution on behalf of the farmers the business serves. 100% of the shareholding of MNP has been transferred to the MN NPC.
Through the business, individual farmers obtain income from the sale of their livestock products at mobile auctions and MNP serves as the intermediary for the products to market buyers. All profits earned by the business are transferred via the non-profit mechanism to support the Farmers Associations for various collective management activities such as vaccinations, breeding improvements and infrastructure as best suited for the local region.
In 2022, MN Kruger Meats was established for operations within the buffer zone of the Kruger National Park a non-for-profit company Meat Naturally Africa NPC (Reg: 2022/773339/08) was established to create a vehicle for new financing opportunities and replication across the continent.
