Thais Cavinatto, Country Director, raises a toast to Zambian Breweries’ beloved beer brands and its efforts to help local farmers, combat illicit consumption, and grow the business sustainably.
CHEERS TO ZAMBIAN BEERS
“Beer is always fun to talk about. We have very exciting products that everyone loves, bringing happiness and cheers to people’s lives.”
Sparked by a true passion for the art of crafting beer, Zambian Breweries blends tradition, creativity, and sustainability to produce an unmatched, award-winning selection of beverages.
It is the biggest brewery in Zambia, with over 95 percent market share, and one of the largest consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies in the country.
Over 800 members of staff are employed across two breweries in Lusaka, the capital, and Ndola, the third largest city in Zambia in terms of size and population.
“We’re the only brewery in Zambia that has its own brewing facilities, whereas all our competitors import their products,” continues Thais Cavinatto, Country Director at Zambian Breweries.
“Unlike other breweries in Zambia, we’re the only one that is actually producing beloved beer brands and generating jobs, so we’re truly ingrained in the country.”
LOCAL BREWER
As part of AB InBev, the world’s largest brewing company, Zambian Breweries offers established brands such as Corona, Budweiser, and Stella Artois alongside its beloved local favourites.
These include Mosi, an iconic national symbol and the most popular beer in Zambia, and Eagle, which was launched in 2017 and is made from locally-sourced cassava, a nutty-flavoured root vegetable, providing a boost for the country’s agriculture sector.
Using cassava grown by small-scale farmers in Luapula Province, the drink’s growing market share is likely to help make agriculture one of the major contributors to Zambian GDP.
As a local brewer, the company depends on high-quality agricultural crops to produce the best beers and support the livelihoods of farming communities across Zambia.
It therefore proudly works with over 2,000 direct farmers in Luapula Province to grow natural ingredients, including cassava and sorghum, whilst barley is largely grown in Central Zambia in the Mkushi farming block.
“We have a programme that helps organise the small-scale farmers into cooperatives, buy from them at a fair price, and provide agricultural inputs such as better-performing varieties, fertilisers, and technical extension services support,” Cavinatto informs us.
“We’re not just here to produce and sell beer – we help farmers harvest cassava to provide a high-quality and wide range of products for our consumers to choose from.”
In Lusaka, Zambian Breweries recently undertook an expansion project and added the capacity to brew innovative beers made with locally-sourced raw materials.
The USD$100 million project completed in 2023 also included efficiency and safety improvements and has created new jobs in the community.
“We didn’t have a demand problem – we had a supply one. We’re lucky to have products that are loved by consumers who wanted to buy more than we had to offer, so we decided to invest in our Lusaka brewery,” outlines Cavinatto.
“We invested to ensure we could optimise our production with a brand new, super-efficient line and guarantee we had sufficient supply. As a result, we had volume growth of over seven percent in 2024.”
COMBATTING ILLICIT CONSUMPTION
Another important project for Zambian Breweries, in partnership with the government, concerns the illicit consumption of alcohol.
70 percent of the alcohol consumed in Zambia is illicit, which negatively impacts government taxation, retailer margins, and, worst of all, people’s health – “illicit alcohol kills,” Cavinatto cautions.
Innovation in brewing continues to drive Zambian Breweries forward.
In September 2024, the company launched Eagle Extra – a cassava-based beer with eight percent alcohol – offering consumers a high-quality product crafted through rigorous brewing standards and regulations.
“By choosing Eagle Extra, consumers can enjoy a beer that meets strict quality processes,” she emphasises.
Commercially, the success of Eagle Extra will further strengthen Zambian Breweries’ market share in the affordable beer segment.
WATER QUALITY AND FOOD SECURITY
Since 2018, the company has partnered with WWF to secure improved water quality in the Kafue Basin.
As water is a key ingredient in beer production and a critical resource, Zambian Breweries optimises all water use at its plants. At the Ndola brewery, it even pumps clean water from the Itawa Springs to nearby communities.
“Infrastructure has been put in place to pump water from the springs to a reservoir, which then reticulates into the communities,” explains Cavinatto.
“We’ve built kiosks in those communities to make sure people don’t, for instance, go to the springs to do their laundry.”
In Lusaka’s George Compound, a highly water-stressed area, Zambian Breweries has also installed boreholes and piping to pump clean and safe water to local people.
Zambian Breweries has also teamed up with the World Food Programme (WFP) to drive food security in drought-exposed communities in Southern Zambia.
“We’ve had droughts over the past year, predominantly in the south where our sorghum is grown, so in order to improve food security, we’re helping farmers in the area to grow resilient varieties,” Cavinatto tells us.
It is therefore working with the Zambia Agricultural Research Institute (ZARI) to develop sorghum that is more resistant to climate change.
These are then given to the farmers, who are taught by Zambian Breweries how to prepare the land, manage the crop, and ultimately generate commercial value.
RESILIENCE IN CHALLENGING TIMES
However, the droughts, coupled with other domestic challenges related to raw material imports, load shedding, and the depreciation of the Zambian kwacha, meant the company had to find creative ways to stay on top of things.
“We have a lot of challenges in Africa, not just in the brewing industry, that we need to understand to make the business profitable and sustainable. When you hire the right people with the right mindset, you can build a team that is excited and engaged to grow,” recognises Cavinatto.
“We are consistently growing our products, increasing access to new points of sale, and updating our technology and systems to drive future sales through e-commerce. This is something AB InBev has done in many countries, including South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda, so we want to do that in Zambia,” she concludes.
“2024 was the year of change, and this year will be about making sure all the new changes and processes we implemented will give us the expected results. We’re on the right path and excited by what we see ahead of us – now it’s time to accelerate.”
