Secure wage solutions: protecting agri-workers from the risks of cash theft

Retaining and protecting farmworkers’ earnings is essential – those who feed the nation shouldn’t fear payday. That’s why our secure, cashless wage payment solutions have been tailored to meet the real challenges agri-businesses face, ensuring workers are paid safely, quickly, and transparently.

The risk of cash payments for agribusiness and workers

Despite economic advancements, many farmworkers still receive wages in cash. This exposes both employers and employees to theft, loss, and mismanagement.

Farm managers often endure the time-consuming, high-risk process of withdrawing, transporting, and distributing large sums of cash. For workers, walking home with physical notes in their pockets makes them prime targets for crime, sometimes before they even leave the farm gate.

In addition to this, cash payments come with hidden operational costs: manual reconciliation, high error margins, and zero traceability. As farms scale, these inefficiencies multiply.

Traditional banking falls short when paying rural workers

While digital banking might seem like an easy fix, the reality on the ground is more complex. Formal banking is often financially unsustainable for low-income, rural workers. Monthly fees, transaction charges, and minimum balance requirements quickly erode already modest wages.

Additionally, limited financial literacy presents a major barrier. Many workers struggle with forgotten PINs, blocked cards, and missed banking windows; problems that often fall to the farm’s admin team to resolve, draining resources better spent elsewhere.

Trust in banking institutions is also low. After years of dealing with complicated fees, poor support access, and lengthy processing times, many workers are skeptical of banks or simply don’t see banking as worth the trouble.

The economic pressures faced by agribusinesses and farmworkers

According to GlobeNewswire’s South Africa Agri-Business Market Report 2025, the industry is under pressure from rising input costs, commodity price fluctuations, and persistent labour skill shortages and disputes.

In this context, safeguarding the earnings of workers forms a critical part of overall risk management, contributing to the financial and operational stability of agribusinesses while helping to retain skilled labour.

Additionally, although farmworker wages increased by 4.4% in 2025, Grain SA points out that’s a significant drop from the 8.5% increase in 2024, leaving workers more vulnerable than ever to inflation and theft.

A single incident of wage theft can wipe out a week’s earnings, erasing the impact of wage increases and damaging worker morale.

Safe, card-based wage payments with PayCentral

To address these payment problems in the agri-sector, we have partnered with farms and other agribusinesses to provide them with a secure, cashless payment system that simplifies wage distribution while enhancing safety and financial inclusion.

We enable agricultural employers to pay farmworkers without cash, using reloadable Mastercard cards managed through a self-service platform.

With a few clicks, agri-business owners can:

• Load wages remotely onto worker cards.
• Instantly distribute wages to both permanent and seasonal staff.
• Monitor transactions and download financial reports.
• Issue, block, or reassign cards as workers rotate.

With these fintech solutions, there’s no need to travel to banks, handle cash, or face the risks associated with physical currency.

This system gives businesses transparency, control, and speed which are all critical factors for farm operations.

Protecting workers, empowering agribusinesses

When using our fintech solutions, safety is no longer optional. Workers no longer need to carry cash or store it in their homes. With our cards, they also gain the freedom to shop at any Mastercard-accepting retailer or withdraw cash when they choose, safely and on their terms.

When theft or card loss occurs, employers can immediately block cards through the online platform, issue new cards to workers and transfer funds from blocked cards to new cards, minimising disruption and preventing financial loss through theft.

The transition to safer wage solutions

Every farm and agri-business, whether small or commercial, benefits from enhanced wage security.

Our secure, cashless wage payment solutions and card-based system helps the agricultural industry address long-standing risks associated with unbanked, permanent and seasonal worker payments. In doing so, our solutions contribute to a safer, more efficient agricultural economy, one where wages are protected, time is saved, and theft no longer casts a shadow over payday.

To learn more about our secure, card-based solutions for businesses in the agriculture sector, read our blog, Cashless payment solutions for the agricultural industry.