Malawi

This publication provides an overview of the key continental, regional and national frameworks and policies to promote sustainable and resilient food value chains (VC) in Sub-Saharan Africa, and it examines their effectiveness. The study looks at six VCs: livestock (including meat and dairy products), rice, cassava, maize, pulses and mangoes in several dryland countries. »

This article explores the reasons why farmers chose not to implement conservation agriculture (CA). Despite more than three decades of promotion, CA has not been widely adopted by smallholder farmer in sub-Saharan Africa. »

This report provides an analysis on the impact of cross-border remittances on the lives of households in Malawi, Lesotho and Zimbabwe, and the role that access to financial services plays in shaping that impact. Authors argue that remittances play a complex role in poverty alleviation. »

This focus note explores opportunities and emerging models in digital value chain finance. Particularly it looks at new technologies that can break down barriers to delivering financial services to a greater number of smallholder farmers. The authors identify three key use cases for digitizing financial services in agricultural value chains. »

This article analyzes the impacts of adopting fertilizer trees such as Gliricidia sepium and Faidherbia albida on household food security. Agroforestry is increasingly regarded as an important adaptation and mitigation strategy against climate change. In particular, the use of fertilizer trees has been promoted as a practice that contributes to improved soil fertility through nitrogen fixation. »

This article measures farmlevel postharvest losses for three main crops—maize, soy, and groundnuts—among 1,200 households in Malawi. To optimally design interventions targeted at reducing losses, it is important to know where losses are concentrated between the farm and fork. Farmers answered a detailed questionnaire about losses during harvest and transport, processing, and storage. The findings indicate that fewer than half of households report suffering losses conditional on growing each crop. »