Malawi is a landlocked country in southern Africa, whose economy is predominantly agriculture-based, with the agricultural sector accounting for one third of the GDP and nearly 80% of employment. More than 80% of the country’s total exports are agricultural commodities, primarily tobacco, sugar and tea, with tobacco alone making up about 60% of Malawi’s total exports. According to the latest census of 2018, the population stands at 17.6 million, growing annually by a staggering 2.9%. Only 2% of the population has access to electricity, while more than 77% of households use firewood for cooking and 18% use charcoal. Only 4.3% of households own cattle, making the majority of the population—more than 3 million farming households – dependent on cropping only. The country faces various challenges including declining soil fertility, deforestation and forest degradation affecting smallholder farmers. The yields from farming are low and variable because farmers depend on rain-fed agriculture, and the soil is low in fertility. Climate change is exacerbating the problems through increased frequency of droughts, dry spells, excessive rains and rising temperatures.

World Agroforestry (ICRAF in Malawi)

ICRAF opened its national office in Malawi in 1988 and identified a decline in soil fertility as a major constraint to increasing maize productivity. The high population growth coupled with a decline in farm sizes exposes many families to frequent food shortages. Nutrition security and climate change are some of the new areas of focus. Currently, the office is run by international and local scientists, working on tree domestication, propagation, breeding, soil fertility, fodder trees, and tree germplasm supply. Several key policy and strategy documents of Malawi’s government were formulated from information generated by ICRAF or to which ICRAF contributed. These include the National Agriculture Policy (NAP), National Climate Change Investment Plan (NCCIP), National Agriculture Investment Plan (NAIP) and Malawi Forestry Landscape Restoration Strategy. These documents acknowledge and highlight the role of agroforestry in climate change mitigation and adaptation for soil fertility management and for the restoration of degraded forest and agricultural landscapes.