The Luangwa valley of Zambia is a hotspot of African megafauna, sometimes known as the country’s “honey pot.” Despite access to fertile land, farmers growing subsistence crops such as rice, beans, or peanuts have historically lacked appropriate agronomic training or economic resources to prevent soil degradation and invest in healthy crop production. With reduced yields and limited access to quality markets for their products, communities were forced to resort to illegal wildlife poaching in order to survive.
Community Markets for Conservation (COMACO) was formed in 2003 to incentivize conservation by providing training in sustainable agricultural practices and creating a market for local farmers. Through this model, COMACO helps more than 250K farmers in the area increase their incomes and unlock sustainable livelihoods. Beyond market access, COMACO provides regenerative agricultural training and coordinates carbon credit programs for farmers, promoting practices that protect the local environment while boosting farmer incomes.
In 2020, COMACO received its first loan from a CSAF member through a line of working capital from MCE Social Capital with 40% of the loan co-financed by other lenders. Altogether, this work brought in $2M in funding for the business to enable it to buy more products from farmers and pay them on time for their crops. After the success of the initial loan, MCE extended co-financed funding again in 2022 to help COMACO continue to grow. Then, in 2023, MCE made a third loan to the business through their newly launched MESA fund.
Working through its majority-women-led, communitybased cooperatives, COMACO pays premium prices to farmers and produces a local line of nutrient-rich goods such as peanut butter, fortified grains, and dried fruit. In 2021, the enterprise’s promotion of regenerative agriculture and energy efficiency resulted in the planting of 46 million trees and the sequestration of over one million tons of carbon dioxide. With reliable, conservation-linked financing, COMACO is helping hundreds of thousands of farmers preserve nature and improve their own livelihoods.