id21 viewpoint: Poverty, AIDS and hunger: breaking out of Malawi’s poverty trap

The United Nations Millennium Development Goals, the British Africa Commission and the ‘Make Poverty History’ campaign all follow a ‘big plan’ approach to preventing hunger and reducing the prevalence of disease. In ‘Poverty, AIDS and hunger: Breaking the poverty trap in Malawi’, we propose a different model.

Using examples fromMalawi, which reached millions of people, we show that significant, widespreadchange is possible, affordable and reliable. The key is using poor people’sskills and knowledge to help them solve problems, rather than imposing ‘bigplans’ on them. Our model also focuses on responsibility, equality and humandignity, giving Africans the opportunity to express themselves as equals, notsupplicants.

Malawi has manyproblems:

• Agriculture is constrained by economicisolation, high transport costs, growing environmental degradation and depletedsoils.
• Malariaand other communicable diseases are major problems. The country is also grippedby AIDS; in 2004, the Malawi NationalAIDS Commission estimated that 900,000 Malawians were infected with HIV and170,000 people needed anti-retroviral therapy.
• Malawi experiencesclimatic problems. In 2002, a drought-related famine led to an emergencyfeeding programme for 3.2 million people. Also, food production has not kept upwith population growth.
• Povertyand hunger reduce people’s faith in politicians. This sets back prospects fordemocracy in Malawi, as elsewhere in Africa.
• Hungerforces people into impossible choices just to survive – children are taken outof school, women are forced into high-risk sexual behaviour.

We argue that agriculturaltransformation must come from developing new technologies. These include morenutrient-efficient and higher yielding crop varieties, practices that enhancesoil fertility and practices to reduce crop losses from pests and diseases. Farmersmust adopt these through a ‘Green Evolution’, based on high quality, reliable sciencedirected to the needs of farmers. Farmers experiment with differenttechnologies themselves and develop farming systems best suited to their needs.This contrasts with prescriptive ‘Green Revolution’ efforts, which haveuniformly failed in Malawi and most of Africa.

Achieving change willbe tough. Nearly half the population is under 15 years old, and normallyproductive adults are often affected by HIV and AIDS. The villages and urbanslums of Malawi are populated by under-employed or unemployed young adults, andmalnourished children. Many are orphans, traumatised by the loss of parents andcarers, and whose education and personal development has been neglected.

In this challengingenvironment, our book shows opportunities for change if:

• Policymakersbase their decisions on evidence. We illustrate how the compelling evidence forusing the ‘starter pack’ programme to improve food security amongst poor peoplewas discounted, affecting the most vulnerable people in Malawi.
• The energyand enthusiasm of young people is exploited. Young people in Africa show greatinitiative and enthusiasm for developing new entrepreneurial activities. Anexample is the growth of mobile phone servicing and supplying industries, despitelittle formal training or support in most cases.
• Changes mustcome through focused, well implemented consultations and collaboration between alllevels of public and private sectors. The humanitarian response to the famineof 2002 shows the power of this approach. In this case, government agencies, non-governmentalorganisations, donor agencies and the private sector combined to achieve aneffective crisis feeding programme for one third of the population.