Summary:
- Agriculture is the backbone of Malawi’s economy, sustaining the livelihoods of over 80% of the population.
- Malawi’s reliance on rain-fed, smallholder farming renders it acutely vulnerable to climate variability. In recent decades, Malawi has faced increasingly frequent and severe extreme weather events, undermining agricultural productivity, deepening food and nutrition insecurity and exacerbating rural poverty.
- Malawi is increasingly recognising climate-smart agriculture (CSA) as a key pathway to achieving sustainable food systems, reducing emissions and enhancing adaptive capacity.
- Despite the numerous social, environmental and economic benefits of CSA, widespread adoption remains limited due to insecure land tenure, limited access to finance, poorly resourced extension services and high upfront investment costs, especially for smallholders.
- Addressing these barriers is important to unlock the full potential of CSA, which requires a shift towards longer-term resilience investment, improved access to rural finance and the scaling-up of digital advisory services.