From Kitchen to Community: Turqle Trading
From Kitchen to Community: Turqle Trading, South Africa and their Partnership with True Origin
When Pieter Swart and Rain Morgan founded Turqle Trading back in November 1997, they weren’t chasing trends or margins. They were responding to a reality they saw every day in South Africa: widespread unemployment, fragile livelihoods, and a trading system that often promised hope, but rarely delivered it sustainably.
Their goal was simple and quietly radical - to build a fair, sustainable food business that could make a real difference, even if it was a small one. Nearly three decades later, Turqle Trading remains a living example of what happens when good food, integrity, and long-term relationships come together, and True Origin are proud to work alongside them.
Choosing Food as a Way Forward
Before Turqle Trading, both Pieter and Rain worked in what was often called “alternative trade” well-meaning projects focused largely on crafts, driven by big hearts but constantly struggling for funding and stability. They wanted something different.
Food, they realised, was both deeply practical and deeply human. They loved cooking. They loved flavour. And they were willing to take on the steep learning curve required to turn a brilliant kitchen recipe into something that could be safely produced, consistently reproduced, and trusted by people they might never meet.
That trust still sits at the heart of everything they do.
Turqle’s products are unapologetically real. Real sweet potatoes. Real chillies. Real ginger. Real garlic. Whole spices you can see with no room for hidden nasties. Every grinder, jar, and bottle is made by people who genuinely care, and it shows.
As Pieter and Rain like to say, their products come packed with warmth, the kind only people who truly believe in what they’re doing can add.
Trading Fairly in a Changing World
The world Turqle started in no longer exists. Traditional Fair Trade as it was known 20 years ago is fading. The early supporters of the movement are aging out, while many younger consumers are under relentless pressure to buy the cheapest option at the lowest possible price. And yet, there’s hope.
Between millennials and Gen Alpha, a growing number of people are questioning endless consumption. They’re thinking about value beyond price, environmental impact, and what happens both before a product is made and long after it’s thrown away. The challenge? Expectations are broader, more complex, and different for everyone.
Turqle often faces misconceptions too, from being labelled “just middlemen” to assumptions about who should or shouldn’t be considered a “real” African producer. What those critics miss is this: doing business in South Africa requires extraordinary resilience, skill, and persistence. And Turqle has plenty of all three.
They’ve learned to run when they can, walk when they must, crawl when necessary and occasionally, as they joke, call an Uber. What keeps them going is belief: belief in their products, belief in doing the right things properly, and belief in the long-term relationships they’ve built with producers and customers alike, some stretching back nearly 30 years.
Why We Work Together
The relationship between True Origin and Turqle Trading began with simple exploratory conversations, many of them with True Origin’s founder, John Riches. What stood out immediately was a shared language of honesty, patience, and integrity.
At True Origin, we don’t believe good partnerships are rushed. Turqle didn’t either.
Trade has grown slowly, steadily, and with trust on both sides. As Turqle puts it, food is a covenant between the producer and the person who trusts them enough to eat what they make. That trust is something we value deeply, and something we work hard to protect.
True Origin isn’t just a route to market. Alongside selling food, we invest in long-term partnerships, capacity building, and resilience, sticking with producers through changing markets and unpredictable global conditions.
From Field to Table: Care at Every Step
Turqle’s product range reflects a beautifully complex supply chain. Some processes are simple and direct like harvesting salt, cleaning it, packing it, and preparing it for export. Others are intricate and exacting, especially in the spice trade, where sourcing export-quality spices that meet international standards requires deep expertise.
Some products are made directly on farms, by the same people who grow the chillies and peppers. Others like mustards, sauces, reductions, oils rely on highly skilled producers committed to excellence.
Across every product, quality and sustainability aren’t a checklist. They’re a constant practice, from ingredient sourcing and food safety, to paperwork, traceability, and relentless attention to detail. It’s hard work. And it’s work Turqle takes seriously.
What We Hope You Taste
When you choose a Turqle product through True Origin, you’re choosing more than great flavour although there’s plenty of that. You’re choosing food made by people who love what they do, who use the best ingredients they can find, and who infuse every step with hope, care, and pride.
And if Turqle had one request? Buy two. Give one away. Share something delicious with someone who could use a little joy.
Looking Ahead, Together
The landscape we all operate in is changing fast. Supply chains are fragile. Markets are unpredictable. Stability can feel elusive.
What Turqle and True Origin are working towards isn’t perfection. It’s resilience. Enough stability to absorb shocks. Enough growth to keep people employed. Enough momentum to keep doing good work, just a little better every year.
Success, for us, looks like this: Great food. Strong relationships. Producers who are proud of what they make. Customers who feel part of something bigger than a transaction.
And if, five years from now, we’re still here trading fairly, tasting great, and navigating the turbulence together we’ll be very happy indeed.
Jade and Nicola from True Origin had the pleasure of meeting Pieter, Rain, and the wider Turqle Trading team during their visit to South Africa in 2024 for the World Fair Trade Organisation Conference in Cape Town. Meeting in person was a valuable opportunity to deepen their understanding of what drives both organisations, strengthen relationships, and begin shaping plans for how we can work even more closely together in the future.
