Brewed in the Heat: How Climate Change Is Threatening South Africa’s Rooibos Industry

Rooibos is more than tea. It is a legacy. It is a livelihood. In the Cederberg Mountains of semi-arid Western Cape, it's also a battleground for the climate. As the world heats up, this distinctively South African commodity grown only in the Cederberg area grows increasingly difficult to cultivate.

The same warming climate responsible for draining Cape Town's reservoirs and changing rainfall patterns across the country is also withering rooibos fields, straining farmers, and imperilling long-term sustainability. The rooibos industry, producing around 12,000 tonnes per annum half of which is sent abroad provides a job for around 4,500 individuals. This positions it as a cornerstone of rural jobs, states Lynley Donnelly in the article "Rooibos: A South African treasure" from the Mail & Guardian in October 2012.

For hundreds of years, rooibos grew richly on the mountain strip north of Cape Town. Yet this drought-requiring crop, once considered drought-resistant, is now wilting under the heat. Farmers have been reporting smaller harvests, lower germination levels, and more pests and disease all on the backs of a changing climate. The South African Agricultural Research Council has warned that these weaknesses are being reinforced by prolonged stretches of drought as well as unreliable patterns of rain.

Climate on the Brink

Rooibos (Aspalathus linearis) is a shrub which evolved in the fynbos biome, which is an international biodiversity hotspot. But despite having roots in a tough environment, rooibos is extremely sensitive to its surrounding environment. It requires acid sand soils and a narrow range of climatic conditions—most of which occur only in the Cederberg area.

In 2014, David Richardson and his team at the University of Cape Town wrote an article in the South African Journal of Science titled "Preserving the ecological future of rooibos". Their article highlighted how rooibos' shallow root system renders it especially vulnerable to heatwaves and erratic rainfall, which are becoming more frequent in the region.

Also contributing to this growing body of evidence is the work of Dzikiti, Lotter, Mpandeli and Nhamo in the journal Agricultural Water Management in 2022. Their article, "Energy and water balance modelling of rainfed rooibos crops in a semi-arid environment," revealed how prior seasonal water shortfalls were putting additional pressure on rooibos crops.

This is echoed by a 2023 thesis by University of the Western Cape student Sibusiso Mkhanzi titled "Optimizing Water Productivity in Rooibos Farming under Climate Stress," highlighting the need for more efficient strategies of water usage to sustain the crop.

In 2021, researcher Malibongwe Bopape and others wrote an article in Science of the Total Environment titled "Climate change impact assessment and adaptation options for rooibos farming in South Africa". They used climate models to forecast rooibos viability under future conditions and concluded that by 2050, large tracts of land currently viable for rooibos will no longer be viable if high emissions continue.

Studies thus paint a stark and frightening image: rooibos is highly vulnerable to climate change due to its ecological specificity and superficial root physiology. Studies by entities like the University of Cape Town, Scientific Reports, and Science of the Total Environment consistently prove that rising temperatures, soil moisture variability, and advanced seasonal droughts are decreasing rooibos yields and resilience.

Young plants, particularly, are struggling to survive with the most recent climate extremes. The key point is that rooibos cannot easily adapt to even small changes in temperature or rain. This renders long-term production more and more uncertain unless radical adaptation measures, such as better soil management, climate forecasting, and selective breeding, are implemented on a large scale. The research not only confirms the necessity for intervention but suggests a road map for what those interventions must be.

Struggling to Adapt

Farmers are doing the best they can, but rooibos is a poor transplant crop, and breaking new ground often involves intruding on delicate ecosystems. Some farmers have begun to use water-saving irrigation equipment and soil mulch crops, but such innovations are costly, especially for small-scale farmers operating on thin profit margins.

A key example is from the Suid Bokkeveld region. On 12 September 2022, WWF Nedbank Green Trust published an article titled "Small-scale organic rooibos farmers become climate smart". It described how smallholder farmers are increasingly going climate smart through farm practices like trial fields, seasonal calendars for tracking weather patterns, and workshops to train farmers. These practices are being applied to build bottom-up resilience.

Despite these efforts, small farmers are most vulnerable. Even where larger commercial farmers can afford to invest in the application of drip irrigation and other technology, they're also more likely to be monoculture farmers. These practices, as the 2023 Arcadia Fund publication "Rooibos and Climate: Environmental Change and Ethical Trade" has already discussed, are depleting soil nutrients, reducing biodiversity, and intensifying the environmental toll of climate change.

Scientific Insights and Environmental Stewardship

Rooibos is exported to over 30 countries by South Africa. In the aforementioned Mail & Guardian article, Lynley Donnelly reports that the industry earns over R600 million and employs thousands of people in the rural areas where they are in short supply. In 2021, rooibos was recognized by the European Union with geographical indication (GI) status, which means only tea grown in the Cederberg can be labelled as "rooibos."

If climate change forces production elsewhere, the label and the industry's identity would be lost. For Khoisan people, rooibos is more than a commodity. It's a symbol of cultural heritage and ancestral knowledge. After a long legal battle, these people secured a share of rooibos profits in 2019. But with the crop under threat, this hard-won victory now faces renewed uncertainty.

In an article titled "Rooibos and Climate Change" that appeared on the website Klipopmekaar in September 2022, Travis Lyle discussed how the viability and predictability of rooibos farming are being impacted by climate change. He observes that unpredictable weather patterns have made cultivation riskier and less reliable, particularly when extreme droughts and heatwaves occur together.

The article further highlights how heavily dependent rooibos is on particular seasonal rainfall patterns, despite the fact that it is frequently thought of as drought-tolerant. Yields have significantly decreased as a result of severe heat events and decreased rainfall during crucial growth times. The financial stability of farmers and the larger rural communities that rely on rooibos as their main source of income is thus directly threatened.

Beyond the economics, Klipopmekaar underscores the cultural importance of rooibos as a uniquely South African product rooted in both place and tradition. The crop’s geographic identity, especially following its European GI recognition, links its global market value to the environmental health of the Cederberg.

The article argues that protecting rooibos isn’t just about securing jobs it’s about preserving a culturally iconic product that reflects South Africa’s biodiversity and agricultural legacy. This growing climate pressure reinforces the need for sustainable practices and collaborative adaptation to ensure the crop and its cultural relevance can endure.

India's Basmati rice industry is similar to rooibos in nearly all ways. It is GI tagged, has profound cultural connotations, and contributes to rural livelihood. But in the past few years, climate change has hit the crop hard. Erratic monsoons, excessive withdrawal of groundwater, and higher temperatures have led to yield loss and financial burden on small farmers. Lack of comprehensive climate adaptation assistance has led to out-migration from farming and erosion of traditional agricultural knowledge.

The contrast with India's Basmati rice industry emphasizes an important lesson: economically and culturally embedded crops are made victims of climate change overnight if they are not adequately cared for. Rooibos is not dissimilar as a commodity entrenched in place, heritage, and identity. The research uncovers that while rooibos is currently driving regional economies and maintaining ancient cultural traditions, its future is uncertain.

The GI status, as valuable as it is for branding, introduces dependency on one climatically sensitive region. When the Cederberg becomes unsuitable for production, the economic and cultural foundation of the rooibos economy will be lost. This highlights the need for adaptation mechanisms that protect not just the crop but also the people and culture it supports.

Industry's Response

The South African Rooibos Council has acknowledged the gravity of climate dangers. It mentioned in its 2016 Annual Report the need for sustainable agriculture and greater investment in biodiversity conservation. This initiative has been converted into a mass movement.

In 2023, the Council's Sustainability Report offered collaboration with conservationists to restore ecosystems and save species like the Clanwilliam Cedar. This was also reflected in a 2024 article by Zawya, "Rooibos Biodiversity Conservation Expands," where it offered collaboration between farmers, NGOs, and researchers. On February 15, 2024, Food For Mzansi published an article titled "Rooibos farmers lead ecological farming revival". It emphasized how regular farmers are revolutionizing rooibos farming to align with ecological practices, including organic pest control, habitat restoration, and creating ecological corridors.

Coffee production in Colombia, like that of rooibos, suffered greatly from increased temperatures and building disease pressure. To evolve, the Colombian Coffee Growers Federation introduced rust-resistance coffee types into cultivation, initiated national agroforestry and soil conservation training programs, and launched live climate alert systems. All three actions stabilized yields and reduced farmer exposure, especially for small-scale farmers. The coordinated, well-funded, science-based adaptation effort is an outstanding example of agriculture adapting to climate change.

In comparison to Colombia's coffee sector, it is clear that South Africa's rooibos industry has taken significant steps—but on a lesser scale and at a slower rate. Rooibos producers have started shifting to sustainable methods, and cooperative programs with researchers and NGOs have been successful. Nevertheless, the Colombian experience illustrates the potential of system-wide, proactive adaptation measures—through research, farmer training, resistant crop varieties, and institutional backing. For rooibos, large-scale scaling of such efforts can be game-changing.

The take-home here is that individual sustainability projects are useful but insufficient in the absence of large-scale institutional investment, cultivar improvement, and coordinated government support. Rooibos would benefit from a national plan along the lines of Colombia's coffee plan, integrating economic, environmental, and cultural sustainability.

A Hot Future

Rooibos illustrates the overall global challenge of keeping traditional, climate-sensitive crops in a fast-warming world. Scientists are testing heat-resistant rooibos varieties, but these technologies take years to come into being. In the meantime, the industry needs stronger policy support and more equitable access to adaptation finance. In 2022, the Department of Agriculture of South Africa asked for focused subsidies and expanded agricultural extension services to aid small farmers, yet implementation remains unequal.

For now, the future of rooibos hangs in the balance. Farmers’ plant and harvest, hoping the rains will come. But under every pot of red tea is a story of hope and fragile optimism that the earth and the farmers who work it can endure.

Written By: Tasneem Goga

Edited By: Nhlanhla Moshomo