Bountiful Harvest: Improved Farming Techniques Change Lives in Malawi
When Malawian farmer Ifijenia Kamlaza relied on groundnut crops for a living, she had trouble supporting her family on a yield of five bags of groundnuts per acre of land. In Malawi, where 85 percent of the population lives in rural areas, farming is the backbone of local and the national economies. But an ongoing food crisis in Malawi – exacerbated by drought, a pandemic of HIV/AIDS, and economic instability – has left millions hungry and unable to lift themselves from poverty. Farmers like Ifijenia have asked for sustainable, long-term solutions to help improve their incomes, including from cash crops.
Responding to these needs, the Clinton Hunter Development Initiative (CHDI) began working in Malawi at the invitation of the government to encourage sustainable economic growth. Often working in rural areas, CHDI partners with local communities, farmers, and entrepreneurs to increase their access to farming inputs such as fertilizer, seeds, and irrigation that improve harvests and incomes. With a mission to promote agricultural self-sufficiency, CHDI pursues this work through local institutions to ensure that improvements are sustained locally and replicated.
For example, in the Mchinji District of Malawi, CHDI has joined with local partners to establish a major commercial farm that includes 300 hectares of soy. Leveraging economies of scale, this farm has secured bulk-pricing for soy seed, fertilizer, and other inputs, and has made these resources available to 250 surrounding smallholder farmers, including Ifijenia.
Through this program, Ifijenia joined the Tiyanjane Club, a group of smallholder farmers who learned advanced farming techniques for planting and harvesting soy instead of groundnuts. Ifijenia’s yield increased from 5 bags per acre to 20 bags. With bulk sales of the harvest negotiated by CHDI, Ifijenia is earning nearly double what she would have under the traditional trader system. Her success after just her first year of growing soy has encouraged her to buy more seed for next year’s crop and to encourage others in her community to do the same.
Ifijenia’s improved harvest is reverberating throughout her community and benefiting future generations in Kapalamula village. By farming soy instead of nuts or tobacco, Tiyanjane Club farmers are able to make nutrient-rich foods for their families from their crops. With her improved income, Ifijenia is realizing her long-standing dream of putting an iron roof on her home and paying the tuition for her eldest daughter, Esinter, to complete secondary school without having to borrow money. Living debt-free for the first time in years, Ifijenia now also is able to pay for her youngest daughter, Felista Kamlaza, to go to secondary school. Working with farmers like Ifijenia, CHDI is helping more farmers in Malawi to lift themselves from poverty and sustain these improvements.
