This year’s Qualitè award ceremony of the annual South Africa Dairy Championships, the largest dairy competition in Africa, was presented as a virtual event for the first time in its 187th anniversary in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The judging of the competition took place on 27 February in Cape Town before the first coronavirus case was recorded in South Africa. However, according to Johan Ehlers, Chief Executive of Agri-Expo (Cape of Good Hope Agricultural Society), the organiser of the SA Dairy Championships since 1834, they had to think innovatively about presenting this year’s awards event.
We recorded the ceremony in a small theatre two days before our lockdown with only 5 people present and keeping our social distancing. On Thursday, 26 March 2020 we streamed the awards ceremony on our Facebook page. Johan welcomed everyone and Breyton Milford, Operational Manager – Agri-Expo, announced all the South African Champions, the Qualité winners and the Dairy Product of the Year!
“As this was the first virtual award ceremony after lockdown we’ve received enormous exposure in the media with which our sponsors where very. In such a way that we were able to retain more than 80% of our sponsorship monies that were dedicated to the actual event!” said Ehlers
Featured in cover image from left to right:
Johan Ehlers (Chief Executive: Agri-Expo), Isabeau Botha (Corporate Communication Manager: Agri-Expo), Dr Tertius Cilliers (CEO Synercore: Main Sponsor), Eunice Joubert (Marketing Manager: Agri-Expo) and Breyton Milford (Operational Manager: Agri-Expo)
