About
Making cartons in Lusaka since 1980
46 years of uninterrupted manufacturing, supplying leading brands across food, beverage, agriculture, retail and industry.
The plant from the yard — signage visible, wide, taken in flat morning light.
01Who we are
One site, four decades
Established in 1980, Industrial Cartons of Zambia is one of the country's most trusted and long-standing manufacturers of carton boxes and integrated packaging solutions. Over four decades of uninterrupted manufacturing have made ICZ a strategic supplier to leading brands across the food, beverage, agriculture, retail and industrial sectors.
Our success is built on consistency, innovation and affordability — a combination that lets us deliver packaging which protects products, strengthens brand presence and takes cost out of our clients' supply chains.
Board making, printing and converting all happen on the same site, which is why a repeat order matches the first one and why a problem can be traced to the shift that caused it.
46
Years manufacturing
10
Box styles
4
Print colours
6
Sectors supplied
The plant
Kasombola Road
Light Industrial Area, Lusaka
Vision
To become Africa's most trusted, innovative and sustainable packaging solutions provider.
Mission
To deliver cost-effective, high-quality and environmentally responsible packaging that supports the growth of businesses and communities.
02The group
A vertically integrated manufacturer
ICZ is also the holding company for Polycor. Together they form a resilient group with a national footprint.
Corrugated packaging
Industrial Cartons of Zambia
Board making, flexographic printing and converting — cartons, trays, sheets and pads for the food, beverage, agricultural and industrial trade.
You are here
Plastics
Polycor
Manufacturers of plastic sheets, films and bags for industrial and FMCG markets.
03The corrugator
A machine built in 1961,
still making board today
BHS Corrugated of Germany is the standard the corrugated industry measures itself against. In 1987 Harshad Patel brought one of its machines to Lusaka — the first in Zambia, and for four decades the only line of its specification in the country.
In 2018 BHS found it still running. Their area sales manager, travelling through Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana, asked a Zambian operator which corrugator was in service. The answer sent him to the company archives and then to Kasombola Road, where he found the glue unit in top shape and the transmission looking new.
They wrote it up in their business report under the heading “An example of longevity”.
“You would certainly not build such a corrugator nowadays. Even at the beginning of the 1960s, the corrugator was a model of true German engineering — made to last a very long life.”
“Broken parts are not discarded but kept alive with amazing ingenuity, and rebuilt by hand.”
04History
From a German foundry to a Lusaka factory floor
Six decades, two continents and one machine that was never replaced because it never needed to be.
- 1961
The machine is built in Germany
A corrugator is built at Hüttenwerk Weiherhammer and shipped, in two batches, to a manufacturer in Oudenbosch in the Netherlands. It is heavy, over-engineered for its task, and made to last.
- 1980
Industrial Cartons of Zambia is founded
Harshad Patel establishes ICZ in Lusaka, among the first carton manufacturers in the country.
- 1987
The corrugator comes to Zambia
Harshad Patel acquires the machine and brings it to Lusaka — the first BHS corrugator in the country, and for a long time the only plant in Zambia running German board-making equipment of that specification. No comparable BHS line followed it into the country for another four decades.
The machine still running today
- 2018
BHS finds it still running
On a visit through Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana, an area sales manager from BHS Corrugated asks a Zambian operator which corrugator it is running. The answer — a 1961 machine — sends him to the archives, and then to Lusaka. He finds the glue unit in top shape and the transmission looking new. BHS publishes the account in its business report under the title “An example of longevity”.
- Today
Still making board on Kasombola Road
Board making, printing and converting continue on the same site, now under an ISO 9001:2015 certified quality system, supplying beverage, protein, agricultural, food-service and industrial customers across Zambia and the region.
Dated facts on this page are drawn from the BHS Business Report 2018, “An example of longevity — 57-year-old corrugator at Industrial Cartons of Zambia”.
Two or three of the plant team at work, mid-task. Faces, not hard hats in a row.