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This paper analysed how advocacy groups and consumers influenced government, telecommunications regulators, and mobile network operators to reduce the cost of internet data. The study used a case of Malawi as an example of a low-income country with high cost of internet. Transnational advocacy network theory was used to analyse secondary data from online databases, websites of regulatory organisations, online news, and social media posts. The findings showed that transnational advocacy network drew members from international, regional and local organisations. Consumers also participated in the transnational advocacy network. Information sharing was crucial in highlighting the high cost of internet data in the country. Local network actors used information, symbolic, leverage, and accountability politics to persuade government agencies, the telecommunications regulators, and mobile network operators to reduce the cost of internet data. The study provides insights into the understanding of issues related to internet data affordability in the context of a developing country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the evolution of monetary transmission mechanism in Malawi between 1981 and 2010 using a time varying parameter vector autoregressive (TVP-VAR) model with stochastic volatility. We evaluate how the responses of real output and general price level to bank rate, exchange rate and credit shocks have changed over time since Malawi adopted financial reforms in 1980s. It is becoming clear from literature that financial reforms can change the monetary transmission by changing the overall impact of the policy or by altering the transmission channels overtime. Therefore, the impact of monetary policy on price stability and output growth can vary and portray delayed effects overtime. The paper finds that inflation and real output responses to monetary policy shocks changed over the period under the review. Importantly, beginning mid-2000s, the monetary transmission performed consistently with predictions of economic theory partly due to stable macroeconomic conditions and positive structural changes in the economy. However, the statistical significance of the private credit supply remains weak and this calls for more financial reforms targeting the credit market which can contribute to monetary transmission and promote further economic growth in Malawi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper investigates the inhibitors and enablers of supply chain integration (SCI) across multiple tiers in the supply chains of manufacturing-based small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Malawi. Design/methodology/approach: Following a qualitative approach, data were collected through face-to-face interviews across three supply chains, each consisting of a focal manufacturer, a major supplier and a retailer. Findings: The research identified interpersonal relationships, supplier cost transparency and joint supply chain management (SCM) investments as key enablers of SCI. Concerning the inhibitors of SCI, the study found that a lack of external integration inhibited internal integration by acting as a source of disruption to intra-firm processes and relationships. Further, the research found weaker links between manufacturer–-retailer dyads than in manufacturer–supplier dyads, which constrained the ability to achieve multi-tier supplier–manufacture–retailer integration. The study also revealed that resource and infrastructural deficiencies, a culture of fear and intimidation within and between firms, corruption in sourcing transactions and a lack of inter-firm trust inhibited SCI. Research limitations/implications: The paper extends earlier evidence that internal integration is a prerequisite for external integration demonstrating that a basic level of external integration is necessary to prevent disruptions to internal integration. Originality/value: This study is one of the few to go beyond the focal firm perspective and explore the inhibitors and enablers of SCI across multiple supply chain positions, and provides new evidence on the role of external integration in achieving internal integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES The use of traditional site selection methods for potential irrigation schemes is so common in Malawi. The overdependence of these methods has had significant consequences on the environment such as pollution, siltation, and land degradation and soil erosion. Traditional selection of irrigation sites is a complex task which is time-consuming, costly and involves collection of a lot of data sets. However, advances in Geographic Information Systems present an opportunity to easily integrate complex systems involving a lot of data sets. The objective ofthis study was to identify potential areas for irrigation farming in Kasungu district in Malawi using hybrid spatial datasets. METHODS: Multi criteria decision analysis approach was used in Arc GIS 10.8 to analyze datasets such as slopes, rivers, land use, soil types, soil depths, water quality, water quantity and drainage patterns. A questionnaire was used to solicit expert views on factors to consider when siting feasible irrigation areas. FINDINGS: This study observed that the use of Geographic Information System in irrigation site selection is flexible and time efficient due to its ability of handling complex and huge volume of datasets. Moreover, the produced maps enhanced an easy understanding ofthe identified areas hence providing an aid to making right decisions in environmental management. The study found that in Kasungu district, 36.9% of the land is highly suitable, 20.7% is moderately suitable, 33.1% is lowly suitable and 9.3% is not suitable for irrigation. CONCLUSION This paper provides good information on promoting the utilization of GIS to solve site selection problems in a bid to reduce soil erosion, pollution and improve land management. The study recommends the promotion of using GIS in government agencies for better decision-making in sustainable irrigation development. The scientific approach used in this study can also be extrapolated in the assessment and evaluation ofwater resources in Malawi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper applies a modified Hausmann, Rodrik, and Velasco (HRV) growth diagnostics framework to analyse Malawi's growth challenges. The study finds five critical binding constraints affecting productive investment and output growth in Malawi. These include land administration, taxation, customs and trade regulations, political governance, and cost‐of‐finance. Land constraints are evidenced by highly urban and rural population growth, an inverse co‐movement between the rural population and investment per capita, and low land administration indices. Tax constraints are evidenced by the negative growth of investment per capita. Customs and trade regulations constraints are evidenced by nontariff measures, such as high costs and the time it takes to export and import. Political governance constraints are evidenced by rising government debt and the low score on transparency, accountability, and corruption based on the World Bank's Public Transparency Scale. Lastly, high cost‐of‐finance constraints are evidenced by monetary policy challenges, such as high real interest rates, inflation rate, uncompetitive exchange rate, and foreign aid ineffectiveness. Therefore, we recommend that the formulation of crucial policy strategies to alleviate these five significant binding constraints be encouraged. The government should base such an approach to sound growth therapeutics that fully account for each challenge's root causes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article identifies the challenges of developing active citizens based on the latest revised social studies curriculum in Malawi (2015) in the context of Malawi's secondary school classrooms. By using collected data from interviews with teachers and students and classroom observation, the paper examines the extent to which social studies empowers students to express their opinions. The analysis identifies three issues: 1. both teachers and students perceive social studies teaching as 'easy'; 2. teachers expect students to be active in classroom practices but to be obedient outside classes and 3. individualistic values in textbooks could conflict with the values of "Umunthu" in Malawi. The paper concludes that classroom practices might dissuade students to be critical thinkers, thereby fostering obedient citizens and limiting students' potential power to tackle social issues.

Globalisation is increasingly affecting universities worldwide. In African contexts, language policies exhibit an inheritance situation in which countries continue to implement policies which favour colonial languages in education. This paper investigates the Malawian higher education context and the ways in which staff engage with multilingualism. It examines the implementation of language policies by staff in their classrooms and explores the attitudes of staff members towards the current monolingual language policy and practices in higher education in the country. The paper draws on a 4-month ethnography carried out in eight Malawian universities. Findings indicate that the language 'rules' imposed by staff are highly variable and that diverse language 'policies' are implemented and enforced by staff, some of whom operate strictly monolingual approaches while others adopt multilingual approaches. Staff display a range of attitudes towards multilingualism, influenced by competing pressures of ensuring students comprehend the subject matter while also seeking to improve their English skills against the broader backdrop of language practices and expectations in the country.

Malawian culture was denunciated and demonized as irrational and unbiblical by the early Catholic missionaries from the West. However, this negative attitude toward Malawian culture largely succeeded in hindering Catholic expansion during its nascency in the country. In this paper, I argue that contextualization of the gospel can provide a fertile ground for proliferation of Christianity in any cross-cultural setting and that effective contextualization is expediated by local leaders. To buttress my argument, I mull over the history of Catholicism in Malawi from 1889 to 2000. Catholicism faced fierce resistance in Malawi during its inception but later surged exponentially to become the dominant force in terms of demographics in the country. I argue that the Roman Catholic Church surged in Malawi because the converts could appropriate Catholicism in a meaningful way to their culture. That is authentic contextualization. My main contribution in this paper is that Christian witness in a new setting is more effective when indigenous people are agents of contextualization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cadernos de Estudos Africanos is the property of Instituto Universitario de Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Africanos do ISCTE and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Student teachers' perspectives on how their teacher educators act as exemplars of using technology appropriately (or fail to do so) could create a basis for teacher educators' technology professional development (TPD). However, there is a dearth of research on student teachers' input into teacher educators' TPD, as research is dependent on self-reports of teacher educators' own competencies. This study explored teacher educators' TPD based on perspectives of student teachers. The study involved policy analysis, a survey, and interviews with student teachers in a university-based teacher education programme in Malawi. Findings indicate that student teachers have a stake in what it means to be a professional teacher educator in Malawi. The case study has also shown the contribution of student teachers' perspectives in strengthening teacher educators' TPD. The contribution includes clarifying the image of a technologically competent teacher educator and student teachers' co-learning with teacher educators. The paper discusses scholarly and practical implications of these findings. For instance, it is suggested that teacher educators should make the co-learning process more explicit to the student teachers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores household variation in land tenure security and drought shocks across villages to investigate the extent to which land tenure systems matter in households' capacity to cope with adverse impacts of weather shocks for agricultural dependent households in rural Malawi. Our findings reveal that land tenure security cushions the effects of drought regimes on food security. Further, we establish access to credit facilities for farm investment purposes as the underlying channel that mediates the impact of drought shocks on food insecurity. The results of this study reinforce the growing consensus that property rights through land tenure security are associated with improved agricultural productivity and consequently household food security. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender mainstreaming in sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services like family planning in Malawi remains a significant approach in development. Yet, the expected gender related changes in gender mainstreaming focused SRH projects have been inadequate. The central aim of this paper is to expose the salient reasons behind the inadequate gender relations changes in the family planning (FP) SRH projects implemented by the local organisations. The study employed an exploratory design with more qualitative focus and a bit of quantitative approach. The empirical data for this article was collected in gender focused SRH projects implemented in selected communities in the last five years by three organisations in Malawi.4 The findings show that, the way project staffs understood the gender mainstreaming strategy affected how they designed and introduced the strategy. Subsequently, this affected the realization of the gender related changes from the projects. Furthermore, it was found that gender related changes were compromised where gender analysis had not been done. Further, the involvement and inclusion of men and women during the family planning projects implementation was mere tokenism. Therefore, the paper recommends that, a systematic process need to be in place when introducing gender mainstreaming in SRH projects for the organisations to achieve gender related outcomes. This entails ensuring that gender analysis is done prior to the SRH projects implementation to understand gender needs and before the staff involves men and women jointly during the projects cycle stages. This paper will contribute to the discussion on the determinants of gender mainstreaming strategy in SRH programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on our experiences as an anthropologist and a researcher-activist working with a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) rights NGO in Malawi, this paper presents reflections on the ethics of engaging LGBTI-identified Malawians in research and other projects. While community engagement is normatively discussed as a tactic for creating meaningful dialogue and collaboration between researchers and the researched, this paper advocates a broadening of the term ‘research’ to encompass NGO work and activities with LGBTI persons in order to complicate normative discussions of harm - rooted in biomedical research or clinical trial contexts - that cast it primarily as visible bodily or mental suffering that befalls research participants. First, we discuss some less obvious risks faced by LGBTI-identified volunteer peer educators as they go about their work, and, second, we show how seemingly minor benefits such as provision of per diems for attending workshops generate patron/client relations and mostly unfulfilled expectations for future financial or other support that might be construed as a form of harm. Throughout, we emphasize how LGBTI people learn to navigate an ‘economy of harms,’ a network of social relations that hinge on transactions and obligations that are simultaneously risky and potentially profitable. A more capacious interpretation of harms and benefits - from the perspective of those on the front lines of projects - that arise through modes of engagement can nuance our thinking about the ethics of engagement with key populations living in impoverished and rights-constrained settings such as Malawi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: A major concern for developing economies is a dependence on commodities when their prices are volatile as a major change in the international commodity price can have important implications for economic growth. While some cross‐country studies exist, there is lack of country specific studies that take into account the different characteristics of low‐income economies. This paper contributes to the growing literature by considering the case of Malawi and the macroeconomic impact of price shocks in its major export crop of tobacco. Using a structural vector autoregression (SVAR) approach on quarterly Malawian data from 1980:1 to 2012:4, the paper establishes that a positive tobacco price shock has a significant positive impact on the country's gross domestic product, decreasing consumer prices and inducing real exchange rate appreciation. The results are robust to alternative specifications of a SVAR on difference stationary data and cointegrating VAR. The cointegrating VAR confirms the existence of a long run‐relationship among the variables and causality that runs from tobacco prices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Efficient utilisation of surgical resources is essential when providing surgical care in low-resources settings. Countries are developing plans to scale up surgery, though insufficiently based on empirical evidence. This paper investigates the determinants of hospital efficiency in district hospitals in three African countries. Methods: Three-month data, comprising surgical capacity indicators and volumes of major surgical procedures collected from 61 district-level hospitals in Malawi, Tanzania, and Zambia, were analysed. Data envelopment analysis was used to calculate average hospital efficiency scores (max. = 1) for each country. Quantile regression analysis was selected to estimate the relationship between surgical volume and production factors. Two-stage bootstrap regression analysis was used to estimate the determinants of hospital efficiency. Results: Average hospital efficiency scores were 0.77 in Tanzania, 0.70 in Malawi and 0.41 in Zambia. Hospitals with high efficiency scores had significantly more surgical staff compared with low efficiency hospitals (DEA score<1). Hospitals that scored high on the most commonly utilised surgical capacity index were not the ones with high surgical volumes or high efficiency. The number of surgical team members, which was lowest in Zambia, was strongly, positively correlated with surgical productivity and efficiency. Conclusion: Hospital efficiency, combining capacity measures and surgical outputs, is a better indicator of surgical performance than capacity measures, which could be misleading if used alone for surgical planning. Investment in the surgical workforce, in particular, is critical to improving district hospital surgical productivity and efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crop yield is related to household food security and community resilience, especially in smallholder agricultural systems. As such, it is crucial to accurately estimate within-season yield in order to provide critical information for farm management and decision making. Therefore, the primary objective of this paper is to assess the most appropriate method, indices, and growth stage for predicting the groundnut yield in smallholder agricultural systems in northern Malawi. We have estimated the yield of groundnut in two smallholder farms using the observed yield and vegetation indices (VIs), which were derived from multitemporal PlanetScope satellite data. Simple linear, multiple linear (MLR), and random forest (RF) regressions were applied for the prediction. The leave-one-out cross-validation method was used to validate the models. The results showed that (i) of the modelling approaches, the RF model using the five most important variables (RF5) was the best approach for predicting the groundnut yield, with a coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.96 and a root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.29 kg/ha, followed by the MLR model (R2 = 0.84, RMSE = 0.84 kg/ha); in addition, (ii) the best within-season stage to accurately predict groundnut yield is during the R5/beginning seed stage. The RF5 model was used to estimate the yield for four different farms. The estimated yields were compared with the total reported yields from the farms. The results revealed that the RF5 model generally accurately estimated the groundnut yields, with the margins of error ranging between 0.85% and 11%. The errors are within the post-harvest loss margins in Malawi. The results indicate that the observed yield and VIs, which were derived from open-source remote sensing data, can be applied to estimate yield in order to facilitate farming and food security planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Producing reliable estimates for childhood mortality rates is essential to monitor progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and correctly evaluate policies designed to reduce childhood mortality rates. Different model-based approaches have been proposed to assess levels and trends in childhood mortality indicators. In this paper, we propose a design-based complement that accumulates birth histories across different household surveys to increase the precision of childhood mortality rates estimates. We accumulate birth histories across different cross-sectional Demographic Health Surveys/Multiple Cluster Indicator Surveys collected in Senegal and Malawi and estimate pooled childhood mortality rates based on calendar years. We show that accumulating birth histories smoothens fluctuations in time series for national and sub-national mortality rates, establishes more stable and reliable time trends, and results in estimated standard errors of the cumulated rates that are about 50–60% lower than their counterparts from separate surveys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Elephant Marsh lies on the floodplain of the lower Shire River, in southern Malawi. It is both a cultivated, seasonal floodplain and a wetland, characterised by a complex mosaic of meandering channels, marshland and shallow lakes. In 2016, the Marsh was granted RAMSAR status based on a series of supporting studies, including the modelling of eco-social options for managing its ecological condition. This paper describes two-dimensional (2-D) hydrodynamic modelling using RMA2, in support of this eco-social assessment. The hydraulic model was parameterised using mostly existing data but augmented with bathymetric channel and lake surveys. Calibration and verification used water level data from the hydrometric network for the period 1999 to 2009. Generally, observed water level time-series are well replicated in the model, but there are large discrepancies prior to this period. These are due to temporal changes in hydraulic controls, mainly sedimentation, but also breaching of an embankment at the downstream end of the Marsh. Selected hydraulic-habitat variables (based on daily hydrological time-series 1976 to 2009) provide the indictors of hydrological and hydraulic change used to inform a DRIFT eco-social assessment. The Marsh displays moderate flood attenuation characteristics, but the importance of this will likely increase under continued sedimentation and predicted climate futures, which include more severe storms. The 2-D modelling contributes to an improved understanding of the Marsh's hydraulic behaviour, particularly regarding anthropogenic influences since the early 1900s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overshooting theorem as pioneered by Rudiger Dornbusch has facilitated the creation of effective monetary policies in the past years. This paper re-examined the validity of the overshooting phenomenon based on the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bound test approach. To achieve the main objective the paper firstly examined if the United States/Malawi Kwacha (USD-MWK) exchange rate overshoots or undershoots its long run exchange rate. In addition, the research paper has prior tested if there exist any significant fundamental macroeconomic fluctuations that may dictate spot exchange rate movements. In a theoretically derived price-flex model. The study has used a forty-one-year span of yearly nominal (USD-MWK) exchange rate data and that of monetary fundamentals data. Furthermore, empirically it has been found that only the inflation rate differential is economically significant in triggering spot rate rapid movements in the Price-Flex model. Conclusively, exchange rate overshooting has tested to be evident in Malawi. Solely attributed by the significant inflation rate differential where the other fundamentals are not statistically significant at 5% level of significance. This has been accounted to the constrained workability of the specified Price-Flex mathematical model in our economic environment. The study also discovered and concluded that inflationary pressures (irdif) emanating from the money market might be the key contribution of currency instability, fluctuations, and extreme exchange rate overshooting in Malawi. The limitation of this theoretical examination was that the overshooting theorem was tested on a single significant macroeconomic fundamental. The reason can be that the Price-Flex mathematical model has constrained full workability in our economic environment in explaining spot-exchange rate fluctuations. Further studies may want to improve on this. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Data that capture implementation strength can be combined in multiple ways across content and health system levels to create a summary measure that can help us to explore and compare program implementation across facility catchment areas. Summary indices can make it easier for national policymakers to understand and address variation in strength of program implementation across jurisdictions. In this paper, we describe the development of an index that we used to describe the district-level strength of implementation of Malawi's national family planning program. Methods: To develop the index, we used data collected during a 2017 national, health facility and community health worker Implementation Strength Assessment survey in Malawi to test different methods to combine indicators within and then across domains (4 methods—simple additive, weighted additive, principal components analysis, exploratory factor analysis) and combine scores across health facility and community health worker levels (2 methods—simple average and mixed effects model) to create a catchment area-level summary score for each health facility in Malawi. We explored how well each model captures variation and predicts couple-years protection and how feasible it is to conduct each type of analysis and the resulting interpretability. Results: We found little difference in how the four methods combined indicator data at the individual and combined levels of the health system. However, there were major differences when combining scores across health system levels to obtain a score at the health facility catchment area level. The scores resulting from the mixed effects model were able to better discriminate differences between catchment area scores compared to the simple average method. The scores using the mixed effects combination method also demonstrated more of a dose–response relationship with couple-years protection. Conclusions: The summary measure that was calculated from the mixed effects combination method captured the variation of strength of implementation of Malawi's national family planning program at the health facility catchment area level. However, the best method for creating an index should be based on the pros and cons listed, not least, analyst capacity and ease of interpretability of findings. Ultimately, the resulting summary measure can aid decision-makers in understanding the combined effect of multiple aspects of programs being implemented in their health system and comparing the strengths of programs across geographies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at the relationship between the likelihood of being in regular wage employment and parental education for Malawian youth. It uses data from the third integrated household survey (IHS3). Only a mother's education is found to have a statistically significant effect on the likelihood of being in regular wage employment for young females and males. It is established that the effect of a mother's education on young males is significantly larger than that for young females. The paper also finds that, regardless of gender, a mother's education complements/reinforces the positive effect of a youth's own education on the probability of being in wage employment. The evidence from this paper points to the existence of an intergenerational poverty trap; with children of uneducated mothers or mothers with low education finding themselves outside regular wage jobs. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Building on postcolonial critical organization and development studies, this paper explores the neo-colonial drive of a global development initiative. The New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition (NA) was launched in 2012 and provides a governance framework for partnerships between donors, governments, and companies that applies principles and practices of market-led growth as means to the end of inclusive development. Through an in-depth, multilevel analysis that juxtaposes the NA's stipulated framework with the lived experiences of smallholder farmers in Malawi, one of ten African countries to participate in NA, the paper shows how local consequences are decoupled from global goals through governance gaps in both the horizontal and vertical dynamics of implementation. This decoupling of intention and consequence, we argue, happens at the national level of translating global principles into local practices. On the basis of this analysis, we suggest that vertical and horizontal governance must be integrated in one framework. Thus, we contribute to ongoing efforts to improve the theory and practice of the organization of development by introducing a framework of transglocal governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite many papers written on the adoption of e-government services in developing countries, authors have not approached their articles empirically. For those that have, obvious constructs critical to the development of e-government in developing countries were overlooked. This paper extends the technology-organization-environment (TOE) framework with a decomposed theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the technological acceptance model (TAM); it is guided by stimulus-organism-response (SOR) in its attempt to develop a successful model that can be used to study factors affecting the adoption of e-government services in Malawi, while taking into account missed constructs. Donor support was hypothesized to moderate the effect of e-government funding on perceived behavior control. Data were collected from 259 Malawian public servants, and structural equation modeling was used to evaluate factors affecting e-government services adoption. The study reveals that there is a need for the Malawian government to fund e-government projects to reduce over-reliance on donors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explains the methods that were used to study environmental health problems in Karonga, a rapidly growing secondary urban centre in Malawi. The study used existing information from hospital records and consulted local health officials and academics on how best to use it. The aim was to position the hospital as a disease surveillance site by using its records to generate disaggregated health data at the intra-urban scale. This paper identifies the strengths and limitations of using hospital data to inform joint urban planning and public health interventions. It also provides a summary of the key findings, including a discussion of the implications for enhancing urban health intelligence and urban policy formulation in Malawi and other rapidly urbanizing countries. This paper is intended to show researchers how existing information in low-resource settings can be used to generate needed health data for urban populations, with a particular interest in secondary centres. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the association between changes in mother's relative educational status and changes in early childhood nutrition focusing on the case of Malawi and the sizable improvements in early childhood height-for-age z scores (HAZ) that occurred between 2000 and 2015. Using Demographic Health Survey data, the paper shows that there were changes in the composition of mothers with higher relative educational status in the population, and also changes in returns to mother's higher relative educational status between 2000 and 2015. A Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition suggests that improved returns to mother's higher relative educational status were associated with playing an important role in improvements in early childhood HAZ between 2000 and 2015, although compositional changes in mothers with higher relative education appear to be less important. Supplementary descriptive analyses suggest these results might have to do with changes in selection into non-hypergamous unions over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Sustainable Development Goals on water and sanitation offer an opportunity for Malawi to examine new approaches to improving and sustaining rural household sanitation coverage by the year 2030. This paper assessed the impact of training rural pit latrine masons as sanitation entrepreneurs and the role of sanitation marketing. The paper used a tracer study of 76 masons from 15 districts in Malawi trained by Mzuzu University under a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) Malawi programme promoting the corbelled pit latrine design. The results from the study showed that pit latrines were being built by some masons, but that not all programme trainees had used their new knowledge. Masons were part-time and informal providers. Our results indicate a need to scale-up and train more pit latrine masons and the necessity to enhance the sanitation marketing programme component of the training. The registration of masons as sanitation providers, the identification of novel financing mechanisms appropriate for the masons and improved collaboration are also recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The colonial project for the partition of Africa in the second half of the 19th century, which culminated in the 20th century, led to the disgruntlements among African countries in the post-colonial period. One discontentment manifests itself in the interstate border disputes. This paper is a critique to colonial scholarship which maintains that African borders were defined by colonial treaties with great precision. While I acknowledge the colonial border treaties as the foundations of the modern African states, this paper argues that most of the treaties were imprecise, incomplete, ill-defined, used vague documentation, routinely ignored ethnic composition of the territories and did not reflect realities on the ground, and, consequently staked interstate conflicts and wars in post-colonial period. To advance this argument, this paper is situated in the normative theory to explain the Malawi-Tanzania border dispute in the Lake Nyasa area, which reflects an ill-fated legacy of colonial boundary making process. Data for this paper are mainly drawn from the archival sources accessed from the British National Archives in the United Kingdom, Bundes Archives in Germany, SOAS; and another documentary information accessed from various libraries – public and private. Findings divulge that the Anglo-German Agreement of 1890 which situated the boundary between Malawi and Tanzania contained some anomalies entrenched in the contradictions within the treaty, limits and exercise of sovereignty of the two powers and geographical realities. The paper sums up that the two countries cannot use the treaty as one and the only justification for situating the boundary either on the eastern shore or in the middle of the lake. The treaty may, however, provide the basis for the two nation-states to renegotiate and compromise their shared boundary and rectify the errors noted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of European Journal of Development Research is the property of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Background: Among the many barriers to evidence use in decision-making, weak capacity for evidence use has attracted a lot of focus in the last decade. The study aims to inform and enrich ongoing and future efforts to strengthen capacity for evidence use by presenting and discussing the experiences and lessons of a project implemented in Kenya and Malawi to strengthen individual and institutional capacity for evidence use within the ministries of health (MoHs).Methods: This paper draws on the internal and external evaluations of a 3-year project funded by the United Kingdom's Department for International Development, the Strengthening Capacity to Use Research Evidence in Health Policy (SECURE Health). To strengthen individual capacity, the project implemented a training and mentorship programme for 60 mid-level policy-makers in the two MoHs. To strengthen institutional capacity, the project conducted sustained advocacy with top leaders to strengthen structures that enable evidence-informed decision-making (EIDM), supported Kenya to develop research-for-health policies and priorities, supported Malawi to review the implementation of its health research agenda, developed EIDM guidelines for both MoHs, and supported bi-annual evidence dialogues to improve interactions and raise the profile of evidence. Internal evaluation included baseline and endline surveys (93 baseline and 92 endline interviews), 60 in-depth interviews, and intervention-specific evaluations (pre-post tests for training workshops, feedback forms for policy dialogues and tracking effects of advocacy efforts). The external evaluation was implemented alongside project implementation, conducting three annual evaluations.Results: The results show that training and mentorship programmes in EIDM were effective in improving competencies of civil servants. However, such programmes need to train a critical mass to be effective in enhancing EIDM practice at the MoHs. On strengthening institutional capacity for EIDM, while the project achieved some success, it did not realise long-lasting effects because of its limited time of implementation and limited focus on sustained political economy analysis, which meant that the intervention was negatively affected by frequently changing interests within the MoHs.Conclusions: Although training and mentorship are effective in improving EIDM competencies, they need to be incorporated in existing pre-service and in-service training programmes for sustainability. Strengthening institutional capacity for evidence use is complex and needs sustained political commitment and long-term investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines child labor response to parental education. Prior studies present anecdotal evidence with a causal interpretation of this relationship rarely explored. Hence, conditional on a range of parental characteristics and multigenerational co-residence, I use as a set of instruments grandparents' educational attainment to exploit plausibly exogenous variation in parents' schooling. I generally find evidence of a negative parental education impact on child labor outcomes. The effect of maternal education on household farm work, however, is not significant. With respect to potential mechanisms, the results suggest that engagement in nonfarm employment pursuits among educated parents may mediate these effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Injuries represent a vast and relatively neglected burden of disease affecting low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). While many health systems underperform in treating injured patients, most assessments have not considered the whole system. We integrated findings from 9 methods using a 3 delays approach (delays in seeking, reaching, or receiving care) to prioritise important trauma care health system barriers in Karonga, Northern Malawi, and exemplify a holistic health system assessment approach applicable in comparable settings. Methods and findings: To provide multiple perspectives on each conceptual delay and include data from community-based and facility-based sources, we used 9 methods to examine the injury care health system. The methods were (1) household survey; (2) verbal autopsy analysis; (3) community focus group discussions (FGDs); (4) community photovoice; (5) facility care-pathway process mapping and elucidation of barriers following injury; (6) facility healthcare worker survey; (7) facility assessment survey; (8) clinical vignettes for care process quality assessment of facility-based healthcare workers; and (9) geographic information system (GIS) analysis. Empirical data collection took place in Karonga, Northern Malawi, between July 2019 and February 2020. We used a convergent parallel study design concurrently conducting all data collection before subsequently integrating results for interpretation. For each delay, a matrix was created to juxtapose method-specific data relevant to each barrier identified as driving delays to injury care. Using a consensus approach, we graded the evidence from each method as to whether an identified barrier was important within the health system. We identified 26 barriers to access timely quality injury care evidenced by at least 3 of the 9 study methods. There were 10 barriers at delay 1, 6 at delay 2, and 10 at delay 3. We found that the barriers "cost," "transport," and "physical resources" had the most methods providing strong evidence they were important health system barriers within delays 1 (seeking care), 2 (reaching care), and 3 (receiving care), respectively. Facility process mapping provided evidence for the greatest number of barriers—25 of 26 within the integrated analysis. There were some barriers with notable divergent findings between the community- and facility-based methods, as well as among different community- and facility-based methods, which are discussed. The main limitation of our study is that the framework for grading evidence strength for important health system barriers across the 9 studies was done by author-derived consensus; other researchers might have created a different framework. Conclusions: By integrating 9 different methods, including qualitative, quantitative, community-, patient-, and healthcare worker-derived data sources, we gained a rich insight into the functioning of this health system's ability to provide injury care. This approach allowed more holistic appraisal of this health system's issues by establishing convergence of evidence across the diverse methods used that the barriers of cost, transport, and physical resources were the most important health system barriers driving delays to seeking, reaching, and receiving injury care, respectively. This offers direction and confidence, over and above that derived from single methodology studies, for prioritising barriers to address through health service development and policy. Using a mixed-methods approach, John Whitaker and colleagues examine barriers to seeking, reaching, or receiving care in the injury care health system in Karonga, Northern Malawi. Author summary: Why was this study done?: Injuries represent a vast and relatively neglected burden of disease affecting low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). While evidence suggests that many health systems underperform in treating injured patients in LMICs, most assessments have not considered all elements of the healthcare system for injured people. Innovative mixed methods approaches to holistic health system assessment including community and facility perspectives are therefore needed. What did the researchers do and find?: To examine the injury care health system in Karonga, Northern Malawi, we integrated the findings from 9 different methods: (1) household survey; (2) verbal autopsy analysis; (3) community focus group discussions (FGDs); (4) community photovoice; (5) facility care-pathway process mapping and elucidation of barriers following injury; (6) facility healthcare worker surveys; (7) facility assessment surveys; (8) clinical vignettes for care quality assessment of facility-based healthcare workers; and (9) geographic information system (GIS) analysis. We graded the strength of evidence each method provided as to whether a given barrier was important in inhibiting access to timely quality injury care. We found 26 barriers evidenced by at least 3 of the 9 methods with the barriers "cost," "transport," and "physical resources" having the strongest evidence that they were important barriers delaying seeking, reaching, and receiving care, respectively. What do these findings mean?: By comparing the findings from the perspectives of 9 different methods, we were able to gain an in-depth understanding of the health system for trauma care. This approach can allows researchers and planners to know the barriers consistently shown to be important and prioritise health service development and policy interventions accordingly. This study, to our knowledge, represents a novel and innovative approach in terms of both the number and types of methods mixed, serving as an example other researchers could use in similar contexts. The way we graded evidence strength for comparison across methods was somewhat subjective and other researchers may have made different judgements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Health information management (HIM) is at the core of health organisations, providing essential information. In Malawi, there is a substantial deficit of qualified personnel, specifically health information managers, who can properly manage health information in electronic and paper-based formats. The nation has no higher education institution offering an academic programme in HIM. Objective: To investigate the need for HIM professionals in Malawi government health facilities, to determine the kinds of data managed by data users; competencies of HIM workers and challenges associated with the current HIM system. Method: A cross-sectional research design was adopted, with a qualitative approach to gather data from data users and key informants, using two focused interview guides. Data were collected from 13 participants from 6 government health facilities representing the primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare delivery levels. Data were analysed thematically. Results: Data users handled a diverse range of data, the majority having moderate skills in HIM. Both data users and key informants reported experiencing challenges in dealing with the existing HIM system. Findings also revealed key challenges associated with the absence, or inadequacy, of a well-trained HIM professional workforce in Malawi health facilities. Conclusion: Introducing a training programme in HIM would improve data management in health facilities in Malawi. Well-managed data would improve the delivery of health care services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the main barriers to adopting smallholder agricultural mechanization in developing countries is the mismatch between the economies of scale of machines and farm size. Private sector‐led mechanization services hold a promise to address this challenge, but there is a lack of evidence on demand for smallholder mechanization services. This study estimates the farmers' willingness to pay for mechanization services using the double‐bounded contingent valuation method and data from 1512 households. Results show that, on average, farmers are willing to pay 11%, 33%, and 5% more than prevailing market rates for land preparation, maize shelling, and transportation services, respectively. The amounts farmers are willing to pay for the mechanization services vary by sex, age group, size of cultivated land, the value of farmer assets, market access, and agroecology. Men are willing to pay 26%, 25%, and 11% more than women for land preparation, maize shelling, and transportation services. Moreover, 40% of female and 90% of male farmers are willing to pay more than or equal to the prevailing market rate for land preparation services. The high demand for mechanization services among smallholder farmers points to the need for making the machinery available to rural communities through mechanization service providers or machinery hiring centers run by the private sector. The paper concludes by discussing the contextual factors and policy options for promoting smallholder mechanization in Malawi. [EconLit Citations: O33, Q11, Q13, Q16]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recognizing the significance of data for policy change to improve population health, many developing countries and Health Partners have invested for decades in Health Management Information System (HMIS). Despite huge investments in technologies and capacity building to support the management of routine health data, there is still a problem in trying to make substantial improvements on gains made so far. A number of researchers have reported on lack of motivation, ownership, data use and work overload as some of the reasons explaining the persistent problem with routine health data quality. However not much has been reported on how legitimacy seekers and providers negotiate for the legitimacy of data quality management practices. We drew on this gap to explore how gaps are negotiated between the legitimacy seekers and the legitimacy providers when seeking legitimacy of data quality management practices in HMIS at micro level. Using institutional theory pillars: institutionalization and legitimation, we framed our qualitative study in soft systems methodology (SSM). We collected data using observations, semi‐structured interviews, and study of artifacts to answer our question based on the Malawi's District Health Information System (DHIS2) use case. Our findings revealed three factors shaping the gap negotiation: coercive approach, technical support and social relationship and moral judgment. The paper's contribution is two‐fold, (a) from a practical perspective we identify the pertinent context issues that come into play when negotiating a gap between the data cadres and the managers (from the Ministry of Health and partners) in the course of seeking legitimacy of data quality management practices; (b) theoretically we promote the application of SSM models with an institutional perspective in making sense of complex situations relating to legitimation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The late Tom Lodge's magisterial Red Road to Freedom will surely become the standard text on communism in South Africa, definitively re-assessing the sociological development and historiographically-contested political arc of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA). The book, nevertheless, is squarely focused on the South African public realm, eliding the important private experiences of individual CPSA members and significant transnational interchanges with the broader Southern and Central African region. Early CPSA leaders were often strikingly restrictive about the kinds of relationships available to members; had a complicated, often hostile, relationship with immigrant workers; and were opposed to organising across colonial borders. For marginalised groups, these examples prompt difficult questions about what 'freedom' meant to communists and where the early CPSA's Red Road was ultimately headed to. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses wave 4 the Tsogolo la Thanzi survey of n = 1349 Malawian women aged 16–26 to explore the prevalence and predictors of self-reported fertility impairments (difficulties conceiving and/or difficulties carrying a pregnancy to term) and help-seeking strategies. Using descriptive statistics, logistic regression models, and graphic displays, the correlates of self-reporting an impairment and patterns of help-seeking strategies are examined. Nearly 13% (n = 117) of those who had ever tried to conceive reported experiencing a fertility impairment. Age was positively associated with reporting an impairment, while there was a negative association with education and with parity. Of women who reported an impairment, 85.5% sought help. Visiting a hospital or clinic was the most common response, followed closely by going to a traditional healer. Around one-quarter employed multiple help-seeking strategies, highlighting the need for various help-seeking behaviours to be viewed in tandem rather than in isolation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the years, several frameworks and lesson observation protocols have been developed to ensure objectivity and consistency when determining the quality of a mathematics lesson. Frequently, the frameworks do not agree on the benchmarks for assessing and describing the quality of a lesson. This puts mathematics education researchers in a dilemma when deciding the appropriate framework for analysing mathematics lessons. Instead of treating the frameworks as mutually exclusive, we are of the view that each framework has some unique aspects that contribute to the story about the quality of a mathematics lesson. In this paper, we examine how the Mathematical Quality of Instruction framework and the Mediating Primary Mathematics framework, as lenses, help us to see and describe various aspects of instructional quality from one episode of a mathematics lesson in Malawi. We notice that the two frameworks share some common criteria for describing the quality of a mathematics lesson, such as the focus on making mathematical connections and using multiple representations, but they also differ on other areas of emphasis, such as the use of artefacts in the Mediating Primary Mathematics framework, and the emphasis on errors in the Mathematical Quality of Instruction framework. As such, we conclude that both frameworks can be useful for discussing the quality of a lesson in a professional development setup. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the first comprehensive analysis of the present‐day stress from boreholes near an active continental rifting zone in the Moatize Basin, Mozambique. The state of present‐day stress in this area that is located ca. 100 km away from the Eastern African Rift System (EARS) is poorly understood, and most of our knowledge is from earthquake focal mechanisms that provide stress information from the deeper part of the lithosphere, and to a lesser extent from surface geological features in the Malawi region. Considering the limited reliability of earthquake‐derived stress orientations near plate boundaries, poor coverage of low to moderate magnitude earthquakes in eastern Africa, and ambiguity about the latest activity of geological structure; other well‐established methods are required to shed light on the active tectonics of EARS. In this study, we analyse stress orientation using log data from 95 vertical boreholes in a mine site to investigate the neotectonic stress pattern of the region. Analysis of 17.9 km of televiewer logs resulted in interpretation of 1188 stress‐related borehole failures. The results indicate a mean regional trend of 045° ± 31° for the maximum horizontal stress (SHmax). Our investigation reveals that the regional state of stress in the study area is controlled by superposition of stress sources that act at very different spatial scales. The consistency between our results and predictions by plate‐scale geodynamic models of stress orientations confirm that the regional pattern of stress in this area is mainly controlled by first (>500 km) and second (distances between 500 and 100 km) order stress sources (i.e., large tectonic forces and lateral density variations). However, high‐resolution data used in this study reveal that third (between 100 and 1 km) and fourth (<1 km) order stress sources from stiffness contrasts, rock fabric and geological structures have a great impact on the stress perturbations at smaller and local scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the causes, processes and systemic factors that have been central to Malawi's post-independence foreign policy and its implications for national development policy options between 1964 and 1993. The paper argues that Malawi's post-independence foreign policy and development direction were mainly adopted in reaction to the failure of Kamuzu Banda (the first president of Malawi) to win international support (at an Organisation of African Unity summit) for his quest to interact economically with more countries. From a historical institutionalist perspective, it can be argued that this rejection "carved out" a future foreign policy direction that was deliberately meant to "rebel" against the Organisation of African Unity's prescriptions. Subsequent development policies (for instance, maintaining ties with Israel and the apartheid South African regime) were actually more of an aftermath of this "carved-out" foreign policy direction. In other words, foreign policy dictated the development policy options. The findings are drawn from available documentary sources (new and old) and a review of existing literature. Through a re-examination of the existing evidence in the context of historical institutionalism, it provokes and recasts a new and fascinating debate on Malawi's post-independence foreign policy architecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community-based group interventions are a cost-effective way of delivering programs in low-income settings. Design features may influence behaviors beyond those targeted by the intervention. This paper studies spillover effects of a participatory community health intervention in rural Malawi, implemented through a cluster randomized control trial, on an untargeted outcome: consumption smoothing after crop losses. While crop losses reduce consumption growth in the absence of the intervention, households in treated areas compensate for this loss and perfectly insure their consumption. We rule out better self-insurance and labor supply adjustments as drivers, indicating that informal risk sharing must have improved. Suggestive evidence shows that health improvements cannot explain the whole effect and that instead social interactions, which may have alleviated contracting frictions, had a role to play. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focussing on the experiences and perceptions of parents and volunteer caregivers of children with disabilities, this paper reports on a study that explored the provision of early childhood development and inclusive education for children with disabilities in rural Malawi. Drawing on a community-based participatory research (CBPR) design, ten local community researchers and two Malawian researchers collaborated to interview forty caregivers and parents of children with disabilities attending ten Community Based Care Centres (CBCCS) in Southern Malawi. Findings are reported through four key themes: experiences of disability, inclusion, learning and developmental progress; factors influencing non-enrolment and absenteeism; barriers to learning and progress; and accountability and support channels. Five key components were highlighted: 1) relevance of peer interactions for learning outcomes and wellbeing; 2) the importance of the CBCC as (a model for) a safe space against discrimination; 3) relevance of quality education and pre-school teacher training; 4) necessity of material support to decrease absenteeism; 5) the need for greater community and state support for children with disabilities. The implications of the study's findings are discussed, including the importance and relevance of considering the perspectives of community based actors in program and policy design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper critically examines the extent to which Malawi's economic and political developments, leading to the country's Third Republic, have contributed to the country's quest towards achieving the basic attributes of a democratic developmental state. An analytical framework is developed to examine this covering the post-independence political and economic regimes. The analysis reveals that despite experiencing some episodes of high growth rates, the country has been marred by autocratic tendencies, rampant corruption and nepotism. Oftentimes the political and economic system remained fragile as the performance of the different governments pre-2020 had been hardly inspiring in relation to peoples' expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a vivid scientific debate on how climate change affects stability, resilience, and conflict dynamics of human societies. Environmental security and collapse theory are theoretical approaches that claim severe negative impacts of climatic disasters on political stability, allegedly through the vector of food insecurity. Yet there is a disconnect between this work and the rich body of knowledge on food insecurity and society. The literature is fairly unanimous that (a) drought does not necessarily lead to famines, since (b) famines have a political context that is often more important than other factors; in addition, (c) famines and the distribution of suffering reflect social hierarchies within afflicted societies, and (d) even large-scale famines do not necessarily cause collapse of a polity's functioning, as (e) food systems are highly interconnected and complex. As an illustrative case, the paper offers a longitudinal study of Malawi. By combining environmental history and analysis of Malawi's idiosyncratic (post-)colonial politics, it discusses the possible connections between droughts, food insecurity, and political crises in the African country. The single-case study represents a puzzle for adherents of the "collapse" theory but highlights the complex political ecology of food crises in vulnerable societies. This has implications for a formulation of climate justice claims beyond catastrophism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of European Journal of Development Research is the property of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of European Journal of Development Research is the property of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Malawi FISP resurrected debates about the role of subsidies in African agricultural policy. Recent literature has highlighted the social and political interests that influence the distribution of input-subsidy vouchers, often tending to reduce the efficiency with which such programmes contribute to poverty reduction. Taking the FISP as a case study, this article examines the political incentives that have driven programme implementation. Two streams of rents associated with the FISP were used to generate support for the first-term government of President Mutharika (2005-9), with very different implications for programme efficiency. One then stopped abruptly in 2009. The Malawi case demonstrates both the importance of political incentives in determining subsidy outcomes and how they can change dramatically over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The political economy of agricultural policies - why certain interventions may be preferred by political leaders rather than others - is well recognized. This paper explores a perspective that has previously been neglected: the political economy of the agricultural statistics. In developing economies, the data on agricultural production are weak. Because these data are assembled using competing methods and assumptions, the final series are subject to political pressure, particularly when the government is subsidizing agricultural inputs. This paper draws on debates on the evidence of a Green Revolution in India and the arguments on the effect of withdrawing fertilizer subsidies during structural adjustment in Nigeria, and finally the paper presents new data on the effect of crop data subsidies in Malawi. The recent agricultural census (2006/7) indicates a maize output of 2.1 million metric tonnes, compared to the previously widely circulated figures of 3.4 million metric tonnes. The paper suggests that 'data' are themselves a product of agricultural policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Food aid and other agricultural policies can create incentives/disincentives in local agricultural production. This paper provides empirical evidence on the disincentive effects of both food aid and some agricultural policies in Malawi. In contrast to previous studies, this paper analyses the impact of food aid on the proportion of land allocated to cereal crops and the interplay of both food aid and other agricultural policies in creating disincentive effects. Data were analysed using the logit transformation regression. It was found that, in addition to the disincentive effects of food aid, agricultural policies including price controls and sustained reliance on imported cereals were also undermining incentives to sustain local agricultural production. Therefore, both food aid and agricultural price policies need to be aligned to farmers' incentives to optimcally allocate land to food production. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper critically examines underlying political economy dynamics of the expansion of sugar cultivation in Malawi within the framework of the Green Belt Initiative (GBI). This is being promoted in the context of a protracted legislative impasse in land reform efforts, targeting primarily land that belongs to smallholder farmers. The paper argues that the promises of employment, technology transfer and infrastructure development, as outlined in the GBI concept paper and touted in the outgrower sugar cane project, remain rhetorical. Communities in the investment sites are experiencing a destabilisation of social relations, precipitated by persistent violent confrontations with a coalition of elites. Corporate and elite interests have coalesced to press on with the GBI experiment, even though the welfare of smallholders is being undermined, and despite the growing resistance through both legal and extra-legal means. This political economy of sugar must be understood in relation to Malawi’s elite politics, a pattern that has persisted across successive regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]