Email
media@itswild.org
Phone Number
+260971583282
COMACO is a social enterprise that supports wildlife conservation and small-scale farmers in Zambia.
Conservation can work when rural communities overcome problems of hunger and poverty. These problems are often related to wrong farming practices that exhaust soils and drive deforestation and biodiversity loss. To solve these problems, we help small-scale farmers adopt a completely different way to farm that restores soil health and boosts production. We turn their food surplus into a commercially viable range of value-added products under the brand It’s Wild!. Revenues from this brand recycle back to the community to reward local compliance to these farming practices. As food and income security improve, families become organized into cooperatives and learn a broader range of livelihood skills that reinforce their commitment to conservation, which lead to new market opportunities. Today we have become a social enterprise of 113 cooperatives representing over 335,230 families across 84 chiefdoms that make conservation profitable.
It began in Zambia’s Luangwa Valley over 30 years ago. Elephants and other wild animals were being slaughted by local poachers. Most were people who could not support their families as farmers and lacked alternatives for a better life. Instead of trying to arrest them, we trained them to farm and provided a market where there was none. It was a slow start, but it opened our eyes to the need to extend this approach to other farmers who were vulnerable and represented potential threats to their local environment. Access to their communities was often across rough and challenging terrain. Over time we have forged a partner with over 335,230 small-scale farmers who are leading local efforts to protect their natural resources. 2,183 poachers have surrendered their firearms and have taken up the plow instead. The story continues because problems remain, but now there is hope that conservation can succeed.
It’s Wild! products are uniquely and proudly Zambian. They are sourced from the thousands of small-scale farmers who farm without chemicals by using nitrogen-fixing trees and organic matter in soils to promote microbial growth for the natural transfer of nutrients to crops. The result are nutritious, tasty, high-quality food products and farmers incentivized to care for their land.
We take a multi-faceted approach to improving livelihoods and conservation in Zambia
People We Helped on 2018
0
k
Dollars We Collected
0
bil
Energy
In partnership with CQuest, COMACO has distributed 97,463 fuel-efficient cookstoves that are monitored annually for their use and maintenance.
Energy
Women’s Empowerment
52% of COMACO farmers and half of all cooperative leaders are women, figures that would have been unimaginable twenty years ago.
Women
Manufacturing as a Tool for Conservation
We supply over 8,000 tons of nutritious food products to Zambia’s cities and towns annually under the brand It’s Wild!.
Manufacturing
Carbon Project
We worked with local chiefs to establish Community Conservation Areas designed to safeguard Zambia’s forests and the wildlife within them.
Environment
Cooperatives
We helped establish 103 community-run cooperatives in 84 chiefdoms across Eastern, Central and Muchinga Provinces of Zambia.
Conservation Farming
Transformed Poachers
COMACO started operating in Luangwa Valley with a mission to help wildlife poachers learn new skills to fulfil their livelihoods and protect wildlife.
Poaching
Agroforestry
In the 2020/2021 season, we partnered with 72,000 farmers in Eastern and Muchinga provinces to plant over 46 million Gliricidia Sepium trees.
Conservation Farming
Beekeeping
We work with over 7,000 farmers in the Luangwa Valley not only to protect landscapes and forests, but also to improve household nutrition and income.
Beekeeping
COMACO’s market-based engagement with small-scale farmers to influence conservation is new. As such, it requires a rigorous commitment to data to assess COMACO’s cause and effect relationships between improved livelihoods and conservation and the many other factors that come into play. Our research team maintains an annual program of monitoring and data analysis to test the strength of these relationship and identify weaknesses where improvements to the model can be found. It is an iterative process that has led to an improved understanding and appreciation of small-scale farmers as a solution to many of Zambia’s environmental challenges..
Years of Operation
0
Established and Partnered Cooperatives
0
Farmers We Work With Who Have Signed the Conservation Pledge
0
Total Number of Transformed Poachers
0
Cumulative Total of Surviving Gliricidia
0
Environment
Events
COMACO COMMENDS GOVERNMENT’S CONFERENCE OF PARTIES (COP27) APPROACH
Lusaka, Zambia/Africa – The Community Markets for Conservation (COMACO) has commended government for
Uncategorized
COMACO AT COP27 – Farmers, Carbon Markets, and A Model Scaling for Climate Solutions
In a few days, #COP27 in Egypt will bring Heads of State and thousands of people together to decide the future
Environment
COMACO Delivers Multimillion Dollar Carbon Credit Transfer/Project to Nine Chiefdoms in Zambia
Lusaka, Zambia/Africa – The Community Markets for Conservation (COMACO) is enabling a multimillion-dolla
Subscribe.
