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Bumper Harvest Expected Again This Year
"What the government did - to reduce fertiliser [prices] to enable the poor buy cheap fertiliser - has increased food production. It is my sincere hope that government will continue implementing the programme, so that Malawi does not suffer from hunger any longer"
- Amos Banda, a farmer on the outskirts of the capital
Lilongwe, Malawi - Farmers in Malawi are attributing the abundant harvest they are looking forward to - a total of 3.2 million metric tonnes of maize this year - to a combination of good rains and subsidised fertiliser, although there are still remaining pockets of vulnerability.
With a 22 percent increase over last year's production - 73 percent higher than the average for the last five years, according to government estimates - Malawi's agricultural sector seems to be recovering after a drought in 2005 left almost five million people in need of food aid.