Africa has lost its face. A month ago Komla Dumor was all over the BBC and thus the world with coverage of the funeral of the most famous African of all time, Nelson Mandela. Today he lies dead at 41 in London, his rich baritone stilled forever.

Komla reached out to SA with his coverage of the Soccer World Cup in 2010 and last month’s funeral and we’ll miss his weekly presence on Focus on Africa. Which is something SA wine producers desperately need to do. The whole continent takes 10 million litres less SA wine than Sweden does and heaven knows they don’t have African climate excuses for a chilled Sauvignon Blanc or a cool Chenin .

If charity begins at home then wine exports should do, too. How cool for WOSA’s new broom Siobhan Thompson if she could get one African country into the top ten export destinations for SA wine in her first year. From oil rich Nigeria and Angola to tourist rich Kenya and Tanzania to neighbours Mozambique and Namibia, there is no shortage of targets. We’ll be doing our bit, shipping a few cases of Lemoenfontein 2013 dry rosé to the Taj Hotel in Lusaka.