[imagesource:amarulaglobalbrand]

There are heaps of things that we can find fault with here in South Africa.

There’s corruption, lack of service delivery, high unemployment levels, the high cost of living, sewerage in our seas, potholes, and load shedding, to name but a few.

Meanwhile, a very specific subset of people have taken it upon themselves to protest the ludicrous decision to not bring vegan Amarula Coconut liqueur into our local market.

I don’t see a petition decrying Eskom and co. for stage fokol light load shedding, but some people have started one to make Distell Group Limited sell its plant-based Amarula inside South African borders.

It is honestly unbelievable that we aren’t marching the streets and burning more tires in a bid to get our electricity back on track, instead just sort of accepting our fate, laughing in the dark or something.

If only we had the energy of vegans to mobilise our sluggish government. Perhaps there’s something to swapping a choppie for an ‘I’ll take you down if you don’t make space for my way of life’ attitude.

We can take a page out from Toni Brockhoven’s book, who, tired of begging friends or family to purchase Amarula’s Vegan liqueur duty-free at the airport for her, launched an online petition demanding the sale of the drink locally, too:

“This Plant-based, vegan-friendly coconut-based liqueur from Amarula is suitable for those with dairy, gluten, and nut intolerances, also certified by the Vegan Society but is not available for sale in South Africa. It makes no sense whatsoever, especially as there are three other dairy-based variants on the shelves,” reads the petition.

“We want to be able to purchase the currently only plant-based South African cream liqueur, in South Africa!”

The petition is only aiming for 500 signatures, and so far, as of writing this, it has 420 willing supporters:

“Ridiculous that a local company doesn’t sell its own products in its own country,” wrote Dipen Patel.

Rhona Fourie showed even more passion, commenting:

“It’s totally ridiculous that South Africans are not allowed to support a South African product! Proudly South African? Amarula, not so much, they prefer to be proudly international only”.

While Jessie Farmery simply let everyone know “I am vegan”, Kobus Korff used more words and said, “I want Vegan Amarula at my local Bottle store”.

Natasha Knoesen went all out with her support:

“It is ludicrous not being able to buy a South African product in South Africa as a South African citizen! Why can we not buy a proudly South African product in our own country?
We have to ask friends to buy it at the duty free shop, which is ridiculous. It doesn’t make sense at all. There is a huge market for this is South Africa and not only for us vegans, but a lot of citizens not consuming dairy or with a cluten intolerance will buy this.
So please explain why is this product not sold to its own citizens??”

Apparently, Distell says the reason it was not sold in the country was linked to SA’s alcohol regulatory framework.

Not good enough. Do better, Distell. The Vegans have spoken.

[imagesource:timeslive]