The Cotton Association of Zambia (CAZ) - Lusaka - Zambia

The Cotton Association of Zambia (CAZ). The cotton industry in Zambia has developed into the country’s largest quasi-formal distribution network with some 300,000 smallholder farmers with an estimated one million dependents participating in various out grower schemes. This important agricultural sector relies almost solely on input pre-financing schemes operated by out grower/ginning companies, who after pre-financing the farmers’ crop buy the seed cotton produced and deducts the value of the pre-financed inputs from the money payable for the seed cotton.