Company ProfileAgriserve Agro Limited

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Agriserve Agro is an agri-input retailer and wholesaler with close to 8 years market experience. In Addition to their agri-input lines, they also sell, train and install solar solutions, fuel generators, and biogas units. Their main focus is animal health products and they have recently developed and introduced their own brand of animal medicament to the local market. They currently have two fully operational branches serving Lusaka and outlying areas and are in the final stages of establishing a third.

The ultimate goal of this initiative is for Agriserve Agro to offer financial support to selected individual business people or farmers in the targeted areas to enable them to become owners/managers of an outlet -the project is aiming to set up a network of 8 (eight) agro shops across Zambia -expanding their market and reach by 1,250 smallholder farmers per shop opened and to offer veterinary and livestock training to smallholder farmers.

Project Description

With support from ENTERPRISE Zambia Challenge Fund, Agriserve Agro aims to;

1. Integrate 12,480 smallholder farming households, with the help of the Dairy Association of Zambia (DAZ), Zambia Diary Transformation Programme (ZDTP), and Mercury Logistics. This is expected to increase incomes and food security for at least 12,480 households and create a minimum of 707 net equivalent jobs. It aims to do this by increasing production in the livestock sector, especially dairy. There will be a range of products made more available and accessible to smallholder farmers through the project, but the real focus of the project is expanding its services reach and offering.
2. Train farm managers or lead smallholder farmers on how to resolve basic animal health and care issues themselves e.g. issues with overgrown hooves.
3. Integrate smallholder farmers as suppliers for them, for products like sunflower cakes and other inputs for livestock feed. Micro nutritional packages can then be blended with these products and sold for a discount to supplying farmers and even other smallholder farmers given there will be no transport cost on the feed.

Impact on people and the environment;

Agriserve is well positioned in its market and understands its customers well. Their USP is a combination of being the only company stocking certain vaccines, Brazeed, and other climate-smart pastures; being the only player on the market with its own brandof animal health products and a toll manufacturer producing their custom-designed products in appropriate quantities for smallholder farmers. Their major competitor does not supply any in-field services, which Agriserve does; and finally, they manufacture their own animal handling equipment locally -all other players import theirs at a premium, Agriserve Agro has managed to position their brand well in the local market throughout a broad spectrum of the Agri supply lines.

In supporting their social responsibility and growing green economy goals, Agriserve Agro has established a nursery on their leased training farm and all seedlings produced here are given away to the community to plant in order to counter deforestation. The farm itself has planted 220 trees to showcase it to the community. Of a 400-hectare farm only 10 hectares have been cleared for cash crops, the rest is shaded pasture to show this works well for their Brazeed pasture which does well in shade.

Agriserve have tailored their manufactured animal health products and their quantities to smallholder farmerneeds and means and allowed for smallholder farmersto pay on lay-bye. Furthermore, they are constantly tweaking their products and coming up with new ones as they receive more feedback from smallholderfarmers and learn more about this market segment needs and means.