More than half of South Africa’s children continue to live below the poverty line, where poor dietary intake, food insecurity and poor quality of essential services prevail. According to UNICEF South Africa, chronic malnutrition is an underlying cause of half the childhood deaths in SA. Of those that survive, one in three are stunted due to malnutrition. As corporate South Africa, it is our duty to step up and assist.

On Friday, 9 September, JSE-listed REIT, Octodec Investments Limited, visited the ACFS Kagiso centre on the West Rand for the official opening of the NPO’s first vegetable garden where Octodec has provided much needed shade netting and water tanks to help ensure the success of the project.

The team were heartily welcomed with performances by the choir, gumboot dancers and drum majorettes from the youth development programme.

Support provided

This is the third community in which Octodec has assisted in making the food garden more sustainable by providing shade netting and water tanks. 

Caregivers, grandmothers and other volunteers use the food from the communal vegetable gardens to prepare meals for the children. The centre also assists parents in growing their own vegetable gardens so that they can feed their own families.

Malnourished children and even those experiencing short-term hunger have limited capacities to learn. To mitigate this, the ACFS Kagiso Centre supports over 215 children from preschool to Grade 12 per day and reaches over 1200 people from disadvantaged backgrounds in the area.

The Kagiso Centre is also the first centre where Octodec sponsored the youth economic empowerment programme by supplying the necessary equipment and apparel for a band, choir and traditional dance groups, both male and female. The group of 67 girls and 32 boys involved perform and speak at schools in the area to promote and expand the initiative.

The NGO – African Children’s Feeding Scheme (“ACFS”)

As part of Octodec’s socio-economic development programme, they have identified NPOs that support underprivileged families and promote education. ACFS are championing this cause.

Established in 1945, the ACFS is a registered Non-Profit Organisation dedicated to developing and protecting children and their families by focussing on improving access to nutrition, health, early learning and stimulation, and skills development.

The Kagiso Centre is one of the nine community centres providing children with a meal after school and other programmes through the ACFS.

Why Octodec cares

School feeding programmes lead to greater enrolment in schools and improve the ability to learn. By preventing poverty in childhood, we can help prevent the reinforcement of poverty across generations.

As part of Octodec’s vision to ensure a positive impact on its communities and the environment in which it operates, supporting causes like the ACFS helps create a better social fabric for the communities within and around Octodec operating areas.

Global Credit Ratings (GCR) reaffirms Octodec’s A- credit rating with a revised stable outlook

On Wednesday, 22 June 2022 JSE listed REIT Octodec Investments Limited announced that Global Credit Ratings (GCR) had reaffirmed Octodec’s A- credit rating with a revised stable outlook.

Shareholders and noteholders are advised that Global Credit Ratings (“GCR”) has undertaken a credit rating review of Octodec, as guarantor of wholly-owned subsidiary Premium Properties Limited’s Domestic Medium-Term Note Programme dated 23 February 2015. On 21 June 2022, GCR re-affirmed the long-term national scale issuer rating assigned to Octodec of A-(za) and the short-term issuer rating of A2(za), with the outlook revised from Negative to Stable.

This revised outlook is indicative of the improved trading conditions for listed property owners with exposure to defensive sectors such as retail and residential in a post-Covid-19 environment and signals the prevailing positive sentiment for operators in the Tshwane and Johannesburg CBD’s.

GCR’s credit rating announcement is publicly available on GCR’s website at https://gcrratings.com/announcements/gcr-affirms-octodec-investments-limiteds-ratings-of-a-za-a2za-and-revises-the-outlook-to-stable-from-negative/.

Shareholders and noteholders can also contact Elize Greeff at elizeg@octodec.co.za to request an electronic version.

As Corporate South Africa, we can no longer ignore the plight of millions of children who go to bed hungry every night across South Africa.

On 16 August, Octodec, with the help of City Property staff, came together at 012central to pack over 129 000 meals for Rise Against Hunger which will feed 500 children with five meals a week for an entire year!

The Covid-19 pandemic halted many in-person CSI initiatives and operations, so we were excited to finally roll up our sleeves and get back to being part of the solution by packing meals with our partners from Rise Against Hunger.

3.1 million children experience chronic hunger daily which has a devastating effect on brain development. 90% of brain development happens before the age of five, and further one in five South African children under the age of six are developmentally delayed.

Beyond the facts and figures regularly used to explain hunger, understanding the full extent of starvation and malnutrition can be daunting. We applaud the work Rise Against Hunger does to end hunger by empowering communities, nourishing lives and responding to emergencies.

For over five years we have been committed to his project, providing almost 630 000 meals in that time.  The meals are highly nutritious and comprise of rice, soya, dehydrated vegetable mix and fortifying minerals and vitamins, specifically formulated to combat malnutrition – and complies with the UNICEF standard. 

As was done in the past, the meals will be distributed to early childhood development centres across Gauteng through the Rise Against Hunger network. This food drive serves as an imperative reminder of what can be accomplished when Corporate South Africa comes together for the greater good.