What is the name of your organization?
Credorsave Services
What is the name of your solution?
Credorsave Services
Provide a one-line summary or tagline for your solution.
Credorsave provides irrigation equipment financing, quality inputs and agronomy support whose repayments are tied to crop cycles
In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?
Lusaka, Zambia
In what country is your solution team headquartered?
Zambia
What type of organization is your solution team?
Hybrid of for-profit and nonprofit
Film your elevator pitch.
What specific problem are you solving?
Rain fed subsistence agriculture, widely practiced in Zambia, is increasingly under pressure from erratic rainfall patterns, and has failed to significantly raise crop productivity, or to smoothen out seasonal cycles of hunger and food insecurity.
Over 60% of Zambia’s population depends on agriculture, yet less than 6% of 2.75 million hectare of high agricultural land is irrigated. Without irrigation, nearly 6 million small-scale farmers rely on rain-fed farming, producing food only during the three-month rainy season.
Key barriers include high upfront cost of irrigation systems, lack of collateral to access loans, limited access to markets, and limited agronomic services—particularly in remote areas.
Most of the irrigated area in Zambia services large-scale commercial farming enterprises, while small-holder farmers are yet to benefit from significant investments in the sector. And while large-scale farms have a significant role in terms of overall production and job creation, their direct contribution to poverty alleviation has proven insignificant.
With good weather and fertile soils, Africa’s lack of irrigation facilities greatly hinders it potential. 95% of agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa is rain-dependent and over 500 million smallholder farms feed 2 billion people Solving this challenge locally contributes to building resilient food systems worldwide.
What is your solution?
Credorsave provides bundled solar-powered irrigation and digital agronomy service designed for smallholder farmers in Zambia. We install solar-powered mini-irrigation systems, which include a borehole, solar water pump, elevated storage tank, and drip irrigation system. Each installation is equipped with IoT-enabled soil moisture sensors that monitor water levels in real time. This data informs irrigation schedules, helping farmers use just the right amount of water, improving crop yields while conserving resources.
Our digital platform delivers support via SMS, WhatsApp, and a web-based portal. Farmers receive agronomic advice, financial literacy lessons, and alerts through WhatsApp and SMS. They can also reach trained agronomists for remote or in-person consultations, especially in cases of pest or disease outbreaks.
Through our user friendly web platform, farmers apply for services and input financing. Applications are vetted by their local cooperatives, and repayments are made gradually—only after harvest—via mobile money. This approach eliminates upfront costs and builds farmers’ financial history. Lastly, we courage farmers to aggregate their crops and then connect them to verified buyers through the platform, ensuring they access fair market prices and empowered to bargain for favourable prices.
Our services have increased crop growing cycles from one a year to four cycles.
Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?
We serve smallholder farmers in rural Zambia, with a strong focus on women and youth who cultivate less than two hectares of land. Our pilot is currently active in Rufunsa and Chongwe districts in Zambia, home to a combined population of 394,000. These communities are remote, with no access to formal banks or financial institutions. Farmers cannot secure online loans due to a lack of banking history or acceptable collateral, leaving them dependent on predatory lenders who offer high-interest loans in small amounts—insufficient for meaningful investments like irrigation.
Because their precarious incomes, farmers are unable to save enough to purchase irrigation systems upfront. Repayments are made after each harvest, aligned with crop cycles. Thus, greatly increasing affordability for all.
Through our mobile and web-based platforms, farmers receive guidance from agronomists and market linkage. We recommend high-value crops suited to soil types and location, including capsicum, tomato, fortified beans, and orange-fleshed sweet potatoes and encourage harvest aggregation.
As a result, farmers have increased their crop cycles from one to four annually, improved yields by 500%, and boosted savings by 230% and improved household food security. The ripple effects increased social spending, poverty and financial history.
