Food Shortage in Malawi: Causes, Evaluation and Recommendations

This report analyzes the reasons behind food shortage in Malawi, evaluates the situation, and provides recommendations for eradicating the issue. It covers the subject of poverty and agriculture, course code and name not mentioned, and university not mentioned.

Running head: DEVELOPMENTS PROBLEM, POLICIES AND PROGRAM
Developments problem, policies and program
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Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Discussion/ Body.............................................................................................................................2
The analysis of the reasons behind food shortage in Malawi......................................................2
The Evaluation.............................................................................................................................5
The Recommendation and Conclusion............................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
Malawi is one of the least developed countries across the world and according to the Human
resource development index 2010, it is ranked 170 out of 187 countries across the world.
Chronic food insecurity along with chronic poverty is two factors that are closely related to
Malawi. The country is the residence of approximately 16 million people and 53 percent of the
total population resides under the poverty line (Sumberg et al. 2012). Not only that, survey states
that about 90 percent of the total population lives on less than 2 dollars per day. According to the
United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) the number of severely malnourished children in the
country is approximately 46,000 (Chirwa and Dorward 2013). One of the chief reasons behind
the shortage of food in the mentioned nation is several issues associated with agriculture in
Malawi. Poor agricultural practice has left the country with low crop yields and rampant food
shortages (Pauw, Beck and Mussa 2016). While sustainable living is gaining popularity in the
developed nation, poorer nations like Malawi struggle to practice agriculture without destroying
the environment. In this report, analysis of the reasons behind food shortage in Malawi along
with evolution of the mentioned aspect of poverty will be performed. Along with that, this report
will also contain recommendations for eradicating the mentioned issues.
Discussion/ Body
The analysis of the reasons behind food shortage in Malawi
One of the major reasons behind current food shortage in Malawi is the famine that took place in
Malawi in the year 2012. According to ActionAid, the mentioned incident has resulted in death
of more than 3000 individuals. 85 percent of the total population in Malawi is dependent upon

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agriculture as their primary source of income (Ngwira, Aune and Mkwinda 2012). The primary
crops grown by the Malawi peasants are wheat and potato. Due to the famine, in 2013, maize
harvest fell from 2.5 million to 1.7 million metric tons, which in turn, created a national deficit of
273,000 metric tons as a result of which a huge number of Malawi individuals were affected
(Jerven 2014). According to researchers, poor agricultural practices can be pointed out as a major
reason behind food crisis in Malawi (Chibwana, Fisher and Shively 2012). To a majority of
Malawi population, agriculture is not only the chief source of their income but also the chief
resource of their food. As a result of this, failure to grow crop due to natural disasters or adverse
climatic conditions like unreliable rain, poor and infertile soil, creates an extremely dire
situation. In such conditions, the families get entirely dependent on the hand outs from charitable
institutions and on other communities. In situations when no such facilities are available, the
Malawi people are left with no other option but to starve.
Being the 8th poorest country across the world, thee peasants of Malawi faces a huge
range of challenges (Jerven 2014). The two major reasons behind crop failure is the low nutrients
in soil and dry climatic condition. As discussed earlier, the chief crop grown by Malawi is
Maize, a plant that needs nutrient as well as heavy rainfall to thrive. A bad monsoon results in a
poor yield. Moreover, being the farmers of a poor country, Malawi farmers are not able to afford
irrigation systems for watering crops at that time of the year.
Another reason behind food shortage in Malawi is the lack of technologically advanced
agricultural tools in Malawi. Malawi farmers use to burn their fields in order to make way for the
next crop. Previously, this method was not as impactful as now since there was a lot of land to go
round. However with enhancement in population, this method has lost its viability (Ngwira et al.,
2014). Burning fields damages the fertility of the soil by depriving it of the organic matter which

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is needed to retain water as well as nutrients. Over-usage of land is another reason behind the
infertility of the soil which in turn has resulted in poor yields. Lack of measures taken by Malawi
farmer has produced a constant cycle that includes low productivity of crops due to over-
farming. Along with that, due to lack of viable farming areas and increasing population, plots are
split up into family owned sections which are often at great distance from their homes and miles
outside the villages.
It may seem that Malawi farmers themselves are responsible for their poverty since they
have not taken enough steps to deal with the mentioned issue (von Maltitz et al. 2016). However,
for a country with acute financial issues along with scarcity of food and education, it is quite
difficult for the Malawi farmer to deal with the mentioned issue. Apart from the famines, food
security and problems in the agricultural production there has been an economic differentiation
in the famine area and the failed famine policies of the government. Issues in the agriculture and
food security is connected with the macro economic and socio cultural contexts (Ngwira et al.,
2014). In Malawi there has been sudden decline in the livelihoods of the rural population from
the past decades. These are connected to the macro economic shocks, demographic pressures and
weather induced shortfalls in production. There has been several socio economic changes that led
to the increased vulnerability in the rural region. These include social capital erosion, deepening
of poverty, decreased access to the inputs of the agriculture, impact of AIDS pandemic and
neglect of smallholder agricultures.
Thus, the combination of increased frequency of the natural hazards and heavy reliance
on the agriculture which is rain fed has resulted in the vulnerable livelihoods in the Malawi
region (Ngwira et al., 2014). The destructive magnitude of the natural hazard together with the
decreased agricultural production effects the level of development of the Malawi people

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(Coulibaly et al. 2015). Further more vulnerability often arises from the unsustainable
development and the political systems that put the life of the people at risk. In Malawi,
vulnerability and poverty has been increasing steadily for many years due to the consequence of
adverse climatic, economic, demographic and political stresses and shocks (Patel et al. 2015).
Some of the related contributing factors includes intensified land pressure and steady population
growth, degrading fertility of the soil, non agricultural income generating chances, impact of
HIV/AIDS and reduced labor force and policies of the government that favors the urban
populations are some of the factors contributing to the vulnerable nature ns state of the people of
Malawi (Patel et al. 2015).
The Evaluation
Malawi has been experiencing never ending shortages of food. In the year 2002, the
community people of south Africa faced a serious crisis of the food (Pauw, Beck and Mussa
2016). The famine of 2002 is expected to take away 300-500 lives though there lies no clear
statistics on the actual figure which died due to the hunger and starvation related diseases.
According to a recent survey, more than 65.5% of the population in Malawi is under the poverty
level and cannot afford their minimum requirements of food and basic necessities for living on
an annual basis (Fraser et al. 2016).
The constitution of Malawi states that adequate access and utilization of adequate safe
and nutritional food is the basic rights of each and every individual. This emphasizes the
essentiality of food to each and every human life. From the period march 2017, Malawi has been
facing serious hazard related security in food and emergency in the nutrition in the context of the
devastating flood of 2015 (Asfaw et al. 2015). Assistance for humanitarian relief was also
initiated since the people of the Malawi need humanitarian aid. Furthermore, it has been found

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that the vulnerability towards the insecurity of the food tends to operate at several levels (Patel et
al. 2015). Children and the old people often gets ill due to the lack of proper food and safe water,
they get weak and often die in hunger. The insecurity of the food and the vulnerability tends to
intensify in the absence of the social protection.
The changes in the climate tends to bring unexpected trends in the weather (Harou et al.
2014). There has been low rain fall in various parts of the country that tends to affect and
decrease the staple production of the food in the country. The main crop of the Malawi, the
maize is wilting. From the recent researches it has further been found that the food production in
the recent years and the upcoming years is expected to reduce by 50% (Pauw, Beck and Mussa
2016). Furthermore 20 out of 28 districts of the country maize fields has been affected by the fall
worms that resulted in the destruction of farming families since November 2017. The worm that
have spread to the community agricultural fields threats the Africa’s main crop, the maize.
The World food program of the United Nations stated that the floods were one of the
worst scenario in the memory of Malawi (Wise 2015). It washed away several of homes, food
stocks and drowning fertile land. The prolonged period of draughts was followed by the
torrential rains that reduced the yielding of the crops (von Maltitz et al. 2016). It can thus be
concluded that Malawi, the country whose economy is largely dependent or reliant on the
agricultural productions lost 60 percent of its harvest due to the natural disaster.
The Recommendation and Conclusion
Through out the past decades, the famine has been moving in to the cycles and the food
reserves have been receiving renewed attention through the world. Though there has been

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various declarations regarding the world food security, very little movement has been actually
done till now. One of the recommendation to address the situation is the technique of food
storage. This process is not knowing and there is historical evidence on the importance of food
storage and how the procedure ensures security of food through out the last decades. Adaption to
the technique will help the country to construct the warehouse for community storages. By this
process the farmers will be able to store the excess food crops in the warehouse and utilize it in
the lean season. The community warehouse is one of the essential tool for the ensurance of food
security. Some of the other important recommendations to avoid the crisis includes promotion of
diversification in the high valued crops instead of the maintenance of the current policies that
tends to promote the maize. Besides recognition of the uncertainty and inconsistencies in the
agricultural marketing operation is essential. Redefinition of the role of the national food reserve
agency (NFRA) and ensuring of the suggested policies should be done. It is furthermore
important to recognize the quality of agricultural stats in the Malawi, especially the figures of the
national crops which has deteriorated in the current years. The government of the country should
improve its regulations and policies and attract foreign aid to support the critical situation.
One of the least developed countries of the world, Malawi has about 16 million people
residing under the national poverty line. There are almost 46,000 children in the country, as
estimated by the UNICEF who are suffering from severe malnutrition. The main source of
income of the country is from the agricultural production and therefore degrading harvest and
destruction of the food crop results in crisis of food and a state of natural disaster. Erratic
rainfall, drought and devastating floods have tended to contribute towards life threatening
situations. Furthermore, failed harvest of the essential crops and soared process are some of the
adverse effect of the crisis situation. The above research analyses the possible causes of the crisis

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contributing to famine and death of the people in Malawi, the evidence of the causes regarding
the degrading and poor quality of harvest in the country followed by some of the
recommendations that can improve the situation and the lives of the residing people.

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References
Asfaw, S., McCarthy, N., Arslan, A., Lipper, L. and Cattaneo, A., 2015. Diversification, climate
risk and vulnerability to poverty: Evidence from rural Malawi. FAO-ESA Working Paper, pp.15-
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Chibwana, C., Fisher, M. and Shively, G., 2012. Cropland allocation effects of agricultural input
subsidies in Malawi. World Development, 40(1), pp.124-133.
Chirwa, E. and Dorward, A., 2013. Agricultural input subsidies: The recent Malawi
experience (p. 320). Oxford University Press.
Coulibaly, J.Y., Gbetibouo, G.A., Kundhlande, G., Sileshi, G.W. and Beedy, T.L., 2015.
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Malawi. Sustainability, 7(2), pp.1620-1636.
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Ngwira, A., Johnsen, F.H., Aune, J.B., Mekuria, M. and Thierfelder, C., 2014. Adoption and
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