Our Experience

Zambia AgResults Maize Biofortification Pilot

Project Description

The five-year AgResults Maize Biofortification Pilot is a results-driven project designed to introduce biofortified provitamin A (PVA) “orange�? maize meal into Zambian commercial markets, as a way to combat vitamin A deficiency. Focusing on private sector development, the pilot targets millers as market catalysts to create consumer demand for biofortified PVA maize meal. The Zambia Pilot objectives are threefold: 1) reduce vitamin A deficiency in Zambia (biofortified maize provides consumers an additional 124μg of vitamin A per day, or 24 percent of their average daily requirement); 2) stimulate sustained demand for smallholder farmers to grow biofortified PVA maize and for millers to produce and commercialize biofortified PVA maize meal; and 3) generate an innovative new product introduction model.

This is the second project managed by ASI as a part of the larger

Project Approach
Through an innovative “pull mechanism�? that awards millers up to $2.25 million in performance-based grants, the pilot incentivizes millers to purchase PVA maize meal from commercial and emerging farmers to then market and sell to consumers. By working with millers, the pilot aims to stimulate production of over 60,000 MT of biofortified PVA maize meal per year by the fourth year.

Impact and Accomplishments

The pilot is administered through performance-based grants to millers (implementers) who mill, market, and sell the PVA maize. The performance-based grant “pull mechanism�? is staggered along three distinct thresholds:

• During the first year, interested millers submit a marketing and sales plan explaining how they will market and sell biofortified PVA maize meal. The promising plans will be awarded a grant of up to $50,000 each to contribute to the initial costs of implementing their sales and marketing plans to achieve market penetration.
• At the end of the first year of the Pilot, the participating millers are eligible for subsidies on a per-unit basis. Each miller is guaranteed a $50 payout per ton of biofortified PVA maize meal sold after selling an initial threshold of 1,000 metric tons of PVA maize meal.
• In the subsequent three years of the Pilot, millers jointly strive to achieve yearly thresholds to share a $2,250,000 pool of funds disbursed over three years. To ensure sufficient PVA orange maize market penetration, millers need to collectively sell a minimum target of biofortified maize meal before receiving the grant funds.

For more information on AgResults, visit www.agresults.org.

» Back to main Our Experience page.