Will cheap fertilizers restore food security in Malawi?
Despite its abundant natural resources, a good policy environment, and the involvement of the majority of its population in agriculture, Malawi remains food insecure.
About 90% of Malawi’s population — or around 4.2 million farming households — is involved in some form of agriculture, primarily growing maize, tobacco, rice, tea, pigeon peas, sugarcane, ground nuts and cotton. Since gaining her independence in 1964, Malawi has prioritized agriculture in its policy frameworks, recognizing the sector as the country’s economic backbone.
Yet for a country that was once one of the world’s foremost maize producers, with cassava and sweet potatoes as its substitutes, Malawi continues to face significant food insecurity challenges. One of the causes for this is attributed to climatic shocks, such as the recent cyclone Idai. The cyclone resulted in flooding that affected about 975, 600, representing 5.4% of the country’s total population.
According to various analysts, Malawi’s substantial investments in agriculture enabled the country to achieve food self-sufficiency from as early as the 1970’s.
Some of the conducive policies introduced by successive governments range from preferential lending to agricultural sector, provision of extension services, active research in agricultural technologies, farm inputs subsidy programs, and enhanced International trade policy actions.
An agricultural professor Henry Mloza Banda, explains in this article, why the country now fails to feed itself compared to the 1970’s where it used to produce above the minimum requirements.
Among the factors associated with decreasing agricultural production in recent years are poor fertilizer uptake, low adoption of improved farming techniques, unfavorable rainfall and weather patterns, and market failures.
The policy environment has also been faulted for failing to provide the necessary incentives to farmers, especially those who are most vulnerable to these challenges. For instance, the farm inputs subsidy program introduced around a decade ago only targets selected farmers. Another contributing factor to growing food insecurity is said to be Malawi’s over-reliance on maize, both as a food, and cash crop.. Maize is not only less resistant to drought than indigenous staples, such as cassava or sweet potato, it also exhausts soil nutrients quickly. This means that greater fertilizer use is needed to maintain yields.
Unfortunately, access to enough fertilizers is a challenge for most subsistence farmers in the country.
In this article, I highlighted how the country is making strides towards greater diet diversification, and promoting more sustainable crop choices. Two national programs, AFIKEPO and KULIMA, are at the center of this drive towards nutrition-sensitive agriculture, which also seeks to contribute to greater food security, and improved livelihoods for farmers.
Notwithstanding, we cannot run away from the fact that maize is still the country’s main food crop. This is the reason why the agriculture expert, Tamani Nkhono Mvula, once said the country’s food security is measured in terms of access to maize.
Malawi’s efforts to enhance agricultural inputs
Currently, Malawi has an estimated annual food gap of between 500 and 600 thousand tons maize. This is attributed, among others, to low crop productivity due to insufficient farm inputs, such as fertilizers. Despite attempts by each of the six presidents to date, the southern African nation continues to struggle to address these gaps. .
The closest that Malawi came to rediscovering the glory days of the 1970s was during the tenure of the country’s third president, Professor Bingu wa Mutharika(2004 to2012). He was highly praised for introducing policies that turned the country’s fortunes around to become a net agriculture exporting country once again. President Mutharika is credited with leading an agricultural transformation that helped ensure sufficient maize reserves to reduce chronic hunger, and periodic extreme famine in the country.
One of the transformative policies introduced during this period was a fertilizer, and seed subsidy program, targeting smallholder farmers. The program was administered through vouchers and coupons that enabled households to purchase fertilizers, hybrid seeds and pesticides at reduced prices.
Since then, his predecessors have maintained the policies, even though no meaningful improvements have been registered in the sector.
In a quest to improve productivity in the sector, the leadership of the newly elected president Dr. Lazarus Chakwera, has brought in a new twist to the way the program is run.
Since its inception in the country, the farm inputs subsidy program has been targeting selected vulnerable farmers within a village community.
The newly introduced Affordable Inputs Program (AIP), has scaled up its target base. All smallholder farmers, regardless of their vulnerability, will now benefit from the program.
One of the main measures taken to ensure this broad rollout was slashing fertilizer prices by around 80%, from around MK20,000 (about 27.21 US$) to MK4, 495.00 (about 6.12 US$) per 50 kilo-bag. This will benefit 4.2 million farming households, whereby each farmer will be allowed to buy at least two 50kg bags.
This move is in line with the objectives of the Abuja Declaration on fertilizer. Malawi is one of the signatories of the 2006 African Union declaration, which urged member states to aim at a 6% annual growth in agricultural production, in order to enhance economic growth, food security, and rural development in Africa.
A number of associated steps have been taken to achieve the Abuja Declaration target of raising fertilizer use on the continent three-fold, to 50kg nutrient per hectare (the global average is 120kg per hectare).
The Africa Fertilizer Map 2020, for example, seeks to increase awareness on the appropriate use of fertilizers, and their potential to increase farm productivity and transform agriculture.
Will Malawi’s new fertilizer policy work?
The affordable farm inputs program coincides with the onset of Covid-19, when a lot of people are struggling financially. At the same time, prices of maize have significantly increased, leaving a lot of households with little or no food.
According to Pamela Kuwali, National Director of Malawi’s Civil Society Agricultural Network, the reduction of fertilizer prices will greatly contribute to this year’s maize productivity.
However, Kuwali hinted on how such programs costs the government lots of money in the long run.
“Although subsidies are beneficial in the short term, in the medium- to long-term they are expensive and unsustainable.”
“As a country we need to explore sustainable ways of making fertilizer accessible to all farmers at an affordable price, and exploring domestic production is one of the ways of achieving that policy goal,”Kuwali adds.
Concurring with Kuwali, a Lilongwe based commercial farmer Kate Zgambo faulted the program saying it is a raw deal, even for the targeted subsistence farmers.
“It is very unrealistic to give farmers a 50kg bag each of UREA and NPK, regardless of how big their farming land is,” she argued.
She explained that, optimally, an acre (0.405 hectares) of maize requires 3 bags of NPK and 3 bags of UREA.
“The government is offering a bag each of UREA and NPK fertilizers to the subsistence farmers at a reduced price but still is not enough and will automatically translate to low yields unless if the farmers have other sources of income to be able to top up from the subsidized one,” explained Zgambo.
According to Zgambo, the program is not really benefiting the country but simply milking government money being invested into it.
“It has been noted that most subsistence farming households do not secure enough maize for themselves that can last them the whole year unto the next growing season. Each and every year, the Malawi Vulnerability Assessment report shows that a lot of people remain food insecure being at mercy of the government again and also humanitarian organizations for assistance, this is a clear indication that we are not making strides in agricultural production despite having programs like those to support farmers”, she said.
Zgambo is of the view that empowering commercial farmers could transform the country’s food security status saying they have the right technology, machinery and also technical knowhow in the trade.
Zgambo calls for greater support for indigenous fertilizer producing companies in order to reduce the high costs of fertilizers.
Despite decades of policy interventions, Malawi currently ranks 104th, out of 113 countries in the Global Food Security Index in terms of affordability, availability, and quality of food. This shows that the country has failed to meaningfully address its food insecurities. Are cheap fertilizers indeed the solution? Only time will tell.
Written by Nellie Kanyemba Kapatuka
This article is part of Covid-19 Food/Future, an initiative under TMG ThinkTank for Sustainability’s SEWOH Lab project (https://www.tmg-thinktank.com/sewoh-lab). It aims at providing a unique and direct insight into the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on national and local food systems. Also follow @CovidFoodFuture, our Video Diaries From Nairobi, and @TMG_think on Twitter. Funding for this initiative is provided by BMZ, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
