Company ProfileKamano Seed Company Limited



Kamano Seed is an indigenous Zambian Seed business and is registered with SCCI, a regulatory wing of the Ministry of Agriculture that supervises the production and distribution of seed in Zambia. It has been operating since 2004. Kamano’s focus is on the production and supply of climate-smart resilient seed products. Kamano works with smallholder farmers at the village level, particularly women and youths, through training in agro-business, seed supply, as well as out-grower schemes which have dedicated field officers to offer agronomy advice. Kamano has 8 seed crop products that it offers to the market. Legumes include groundnuts, soya beans, cowpeas, beans  while cereals include white maize and Bio Fortified Vitamin A, sorghum, rice, and millet.

With support from ENTERPRISE Zambia Challenge Fund, Kamano Seed Company Ltd aims to integrate 700 additional smallholder farmers through an out-grower scheme with an estimated 830 additional hectares being brought under Climate Smart Practices management. These smallholder farmers will be seed multipliers and suppliers to Kamano. All Kamano’s smallholder farmers are contracted and are supplied with inputs from Kamano on credit with no interest and Kamano buys their seed and deducts the amount owed by the smallholder farmers from payments due to them. These smallholder farmers receive extensive support from field officers. In addition, Kamano pays for the smallholder farmers SCCI registration and does the administrative work required. They also supply fertiliser inputs at subsidised rates to farmers, offer extension services, host and fund demonstration days, train and support lead farmers and offer free pick-up facilities. The majority of smallholder farmers are contracted with a renewal percentage of between 90-95%.

Marketing, impact on people and the environment;

Kamano uses reliable market information to forecast price changes in the market and respond pre-emptively. The organization’s product range is wide enough to distribute or minimize its sensitivity to price fluctuations. Furthermore, Kamano has four channels to market and 5 types of customers. Channels to market include direct sales (retail), Wholesale (NGOs), Consignment (Agro dealers) and Corporate/public (FISP). Kamanos sales are fairly equally spread across the country.

Kamano offers services to smallholder farmers as suppliers and has incorporated them into the input supply section of their value chain. Additionally, Kamano serves people at the base of the pyramid (BoP), as customers who buy their seed either directly through them or via third-party distributors (agro-dealers). Accordingly, an indirect benefit will be the increased availability of good quality highly nutritious legume seed on the market throughout Zambia and this will assist those at the BOP with food and nutrition security.

Climate Smart Agriculture training is the most significant environmental impact Kamano have and this will be increased and enhanced during the project. The drought-resistant and climate-specific seed varieties, as well as the hybrids they supply, are also climate-smart and will enhance the smallholder farmers climate resilience.


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IN BRIEF

Sector: Legumes

Target Smallholders: 1,500

Target Jobs: 15 full time jobs