AFRICA | Malawi can end hunger after the September 16 2025 elections, if bold steps are taken to transform food systems

Yet, democratic elections haven’t translated into economic prosperity, nor into strong economic institutions. Malawi remains the world’s poorest conflict-free nation. At the last count in 2019, 70% of Malawians lived below the international poverty line of US$2.15 per day. More than half of Malawi’s residents are deprived in many, overlapping ways.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Malawi has also endured a series of shocks: global food price hikes caused by the war against Ukraine, climate disasters like cyclones and droughts, and a sudden reduction in development assistance from the US.

In the first three months of 2025, a quarter of the population relied on food aid. This was because the 2024 harvest was hit hard by an El Niño-induced drought.

It is against this backdrop that Malawians head to the polls on Tuesday 16 September 2025. The race pits seasoned political heavyweights against each other: incumbent Lazarus Chakwera of the Malawi Congress Party faces off against former president Peter Mutharika of the Democratic Progressive Party and 15 other candidates. The poll will be hotly contested and if no candidate secures over 50% of the vote, a runoff will follow within 60 days of the first round result.

Whoever takes office will be tasked with steering a country whose food systems – and broader economy – are under intense strain.

From our research into Malawi’s food systems, we identify four forces holding the country back:

• a severe and protracted macroeconomic crisis

• volatile and unpredictable agricultural markets

• a reliance on subsistence farming that no longer meets the country’s food security needs

• farm sizes that are shrinking and too few jobs outside agriculture.

Because the problems are many, there won’t be a single easy solution that the post-election government can put in place. Instead, progress will require a series of well-sequenced, difficult and comprehensive reforms.

Yet, the need for action is urgent, and the stakes for Malawi are high. Without reform, shortages of essential items will persist, poverty will deepen, and malnutrition will scar the health and potential of future generations.

What the government will need to do

The government must first acknowledge that the kinds of disruptions Malawi has faced in recent years are likely to become more frequent and more severe, as climate change intensifies and the global political order grows more unstable. To manage them effectively, Malawi must both accelerate economic growth and build systems that can absorb shocks such as climate disasters and global market volatility. Our research suggests several steps that the government can take:

1. Boost exports

Malawi imports more than three times as much as it exports. This imbalance contributes significantly to making essential items – like fuel, medicine, fertiliser or spare parts – either scarce or expensive. The consequences are seen and felt in daily life: drivers queue for fuel while farmers struggle to buy fertilisers for their crops.

An important driver of Malawi’s weak export performance is its exchange rate policy. Malawi keeps its currency, the kwacha, at an artificially high value, well above the market rate. An overvalued currency makes formal exports expensive in dollar terms, and therefore uncompetitive on global markets. It also makes it less profitable to export through formal channels, since traders get more kwacha per dollar on the informal market than at the official exchange rate.

This discourages formal trade, creates foreign exchange shortages and drives both exporters and importers into informal channels.

To address this, Malawi needs to unify its multiple exchange rates at a level where the supply of dollars from exports meets the demand for imports. This will require a well managed and transparent transition towards a more flexible exchange rate regime – one that builds confidence among exporters, allows time for adjustment, and supports macroeconomic stability. At the same time, it will be important to mitigate inflationary pressures that could arise during the transition and provide support for the poor.

2. Make agricultural markets predictable

The government has wide-ranging discretionary powers in agriculture. It sets farm gate prices and imposes import or export bans on crops and foods. This is often well intended. But it is also unpredictable and so creates uncertainty, discourages investment and leads many smallholder farmers to focus on subsistence farming instead of growing crops to sell in volatile markets.

A better approach would be to limit government interventions to transparent, rule-based mechanisms. This would help build trust, encourage market participation, and foster a more resilient food system.

3. Spend smarter on agriculture

Malawi’s current strategy for food security relies heavily on smallholder farming and maize production. Between 30% and 50% of the budget for agriculture over the past five years was spent on the fertiliser subsidy programme. This left little funding for other investments needed to boost agriculture.

Despite the subsidy, only 17% of farmers produce enough maize to feed their households even with good rains. And each year between two million and five million Malawians require food assistance, typically free maize, beans and cooking oil.

The post-election government must reassess how it spends on agriculture, and consider adopting a more cost-effective approach that is able to support a bigger range of agricultural priorities.

4. Invest beyond farming

Perhaps the biggest development conundrum in Malawi is that four out of every five Malawian households farm, but farming will not be the primary route out of poverty for most. This is because the average household cultivates just 0.7 hectares of land – not enough to generate meaningful income. Yet, jobs and small business opportunities outside agriculture are very scarce. Malawians are unable to live off their land or to leave it.

The population of Malawi is expected to double over the next 30 years. If, by then, the same share of households still depends on farming, they will be doing so on even less land – an estimated 0.35 hectares per household. To maintain and improve people’s welfare, the government must support a shift away from farming.

It will need to invest – and attract finance to – the rural non-farm economy. The economies of cities and secondary towns need support to become engines of growth and job creation.

What’s needed for Malawi to achieve its vision

Malawi has laid out a bold and thoughtful vision for its future in the Malawi 2063 plan. This was developed by Malawi’s National Planning Commission and endorsed by all major political parties. It aspires to transform the country into an upper-middle-income economy by 2063, and is broadly aligned with many of the policies suggested in this article. What’s needed now is consistent and effective implementation of this plan.

Joachim De Weerdt, Senior Research Fellow & Malawi Country Program Leader, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) ; Gowokani Chijere Chirwa, Associate Professor of Economics, University of Malawi; Jan Duchoslav, Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) ; Joseph Nagoli, Senior Research Coordinator for IFPRI and Policy Hub Leader for the Consultative Group on International Agriculture Research (CGIAR) in Malawi, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) , and Lara Cockx, Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.