Relief
Inputs delivered to address an immediate shortfall. Distribution is the deliverable and the season ends the intervention.
- High visibility, immediate relief
- Little or no measurement
- No local capacity retained
- Recurrence expected
Data-Driven Agricultural Development. Sustainable Rural Livelihoods.
Zambia-Iowa Agricultural Partners equips smallholder farmers with measured, field-tested agronomy: weed timing that protects soil moisture, precise input spacing, and delayed urea application that reduces losses to a single season of rain. We teach the method, record the results, and leave behind the record-keeping skills to keep improving.
Why we exist
Relief ends. Capacity does not.
Most agricultural aid in Zambia is designed to be consumed in a single season. Seed is distributed, the harvest is measured, and the following year begins from the same starting line. Farmers are left with an outcome rather than a method.
ZIAP works differently. We operate demonstration plots, measure what each practice returns against the cost of the inputs that produce it, and teach farmers to run those same calculations on their own fields in a simple spreadsheet they keep. The goal is not dependence on a program. It is a farmer who can make a defensible input decision in the absence of one.
Every practice we teach is one a smallholder can execute with a hoe, a string line, and a record book.
A field record that a farmer keeps is worth more than a recommendation a farmer forgets. Our obligation is to leave both the practice and the paperwork behind.
Zambia-Iowa Agricultural PartnersProgram philosophy
Measured outcomes
Results we can defend in a field review
Figures below are drawn from field demonstration records and partner reporting for the 2025-26 program year. Full methodology and source data are published in the annual impact report.
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Smallholder farmers trained
Across 37 field demonstration plots and 9 districts.
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Mean maize yield gain
Treated plots versus farmer control plots, 2022-26 average.
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Microloans disbursed
USD equivalent, administered through village savings groups.
0%
Repayment rate
Rolling twelve-month figure, verified by group treasurers.
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Districts with active demos
Central, Southern, and Eastern provinces.
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Trainers accredited
Local agronomists certified to run ZIAP curricula.
Sample figures shown for demonstration layout. Replace with audited program data before publication.
The core methodology
Relief, rehabilitation, development
Three models operate in the same villages. Only the third changes what a farmer is able to do next season without us.
Rehabilitation
Existing systems are repaired so that delivery can continue. Useful where a functioning channel has degraded.
- Restores a working channel
- Depends on the external partner
- Builds no measurement habit
- Sustainable only if funded
Development
Skills, records, and decision frameworks are installed so the farmer, not the program, makes the next input call. This is ZIAP's operating model.
- Practice plus measurement
- Local trainers accredited
- Spreadsheet retained by the farmer
- Verified year over year
Conventional input distribution
- Seed and fertilizer issued on a fixed calendar
- Application rate assumed rather than measured
- Urea applied at first rain regardless of forecast
- Yield outcome reported as a single village average
- No record remains with the household
ZIAP field protocol
- Inputs paced to measured soil moisture and weed pressure
- Even seed and fertilizer spacing set with a string line
- Urea delayed until rainfall probability supports uptake
- Yield reported per plot with a paired control
- Household keeps the cost and return ledger
Field-tested practices
Four techniques that carry the program
Each is low-cost, executable with hand tools, and documented with a cost-benefit comparison farmers can repeat themselves.
Timely weed control
Early weed removal during the critical moisture window cuts evapotranspiration competition. Measured as the single highest-return practice on demonstration plots, using no purchased input beyond labour.
Even seed and fertilizer spacing
String-line placement regularises plant population and root access to moisture. Farmers abandon the customary broadcast habit after seeing the paired-plot difference.
Delayed urea application
Nitrogen applied after the crop is established reduces the volume lost to leaching and volatilisation. Application timing is set against measured rainfall probability, not calendar date.
Spreadsheet-based farm records
Farmers keep a simple cost and return ledger, then compute their own margin before the next input purchase. Financial tracking instruction is delivered alongside agronomy, not after it.
Governance
Led by agronomists and engineers
A volunteer board of research agronomists, soil scientists, and civil engineers governs the organization and reviews program design annually.
Maria Maixner
Board President
Long-horizon governance and program oversight, with a focus on whether field practice matches the evidence presented to donors.
Jim Maixner
Treasurer
Financial controls, disbursement reconciliation, and the audit relationship behind the organization's 501(c)(3) accountability.
Dr. Brian Meese
Agronomy Lead
Research agronomist responsible for field protocol design, demonstration plot methodology, and the yield data published by the program.
Tax status
501(c)(3)
Public charity, donations tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
EIN
99-2864574
Use for verification on IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search.
Latest report
2026
Annual impact report with program and financial statements.
Contact
info@ziap.org
Program inquiries, research collaboration, and audit requests.
Fund the next season of field records
Every gift funds demonstration plots, training packets, and the microloan capital that lets a farmer buy inputs on a measured margin rather than on hope.