John Deere Africa Middle East | 2022 Award Ceremony

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the 2022 John Deere Awards in South Africa. The rules of the game change and we need to think out of the box. That's what you guys did in a very challenging year, and I tip my hat to each and every one of you. What we've experienced now, how we working together, that camaraderie, that good communication and trust, that is what we need to keep on leveraging. Doesn't matter what the crisis is in the first place. Bol Van Spurg, Afri Bethel. First place up before the first prize goes to Sias Humphreys of Marble Hall. We do so much in a year that we tend to forget to look back at the achievements that we' had and we don't celebrate those successes.

There's no moonshine and roses every day for us in the aftermarket and customer support space. Yet so many of us get up every single morning and we choose to serve and supply spare parts to our customers and fix what needs to be fixed. I'm standing here very proud of our John Deere team, very proud of our dealers in terms of what we achieved in 2022.

It's a privilege for us to be able to service our customers every day. Be bold and be prepared. Take on what is needed to get the customers satisfied, get them up and running as quick as possible, stay motivated. You'll definitely get there if you keep puncturing. I try to be a partner for my customer where he can trust me. If you can keep your client happy or technicians happy and your environment safe and everything is in place and everything is correct, the rest comes by itself. And to celebrate and just recognize and reward my own team and Adidas team, that is truly a privilege.