Rice

Covering the valley areas of the Zambezi and Luangwa River systems mostly in the southern parts of Western and Southern Provinces, north-western parts of Eastern Province, as well as southern and eastern parts of Lusaka Province. The region is characterized by low rainfall of 600-800mm per annum, frequent drought spells and risk of floods, high mean annual temperatures above 30 degrees Celcius and a short growing season of 80-100 days for rainfed crops. The region is predominated by Arenosols, Lithosol-Cambisols and Cambisol-Luvisol soil types with patches of Acrisols and Fluvisol-Vertisols. Mopane woodlands and Termitaria are the main vegetation types covering the region.

Covering the northern half of Zambia. The region is characterized by mean annual rainfall of 1000-1500mm, a long crop growing season of 130-150 days, high humidity during the rainy season, moderate mean annual temperatures of around 26-28 degrees Celcius, and highly leached Ferralsols, Lithosol-Ferralsols, Acrisols, Lithosol-Cambisol and Arenosols bearing strong acidity and severe aluminium toxicity and pockets of Gleysols. The vegetation types found in AER III are Miombo woodlands, Montane forests, Swamp forests, Riparian forests, Kalahari woodlands, Grassland and Terminalia.

Covering the eastern, central and western parts of Western Province. The region is predominated by the Zambezi floodplain and characterized by Kalahari sands, mean annual rainfall of 800-1000 mm, a growing season of 100-120 days with relatively long sunshine hours, and with Podsols and Arenosols as major soil types. The Kalahari woodlands, Savanna woodlands and Grassland are the main vegetation types found in AER IIb.