Malawi: Community based rural land development project

1. Key development issues and rationale for Bank involvement

Malawi's economy is agro-based. Agriculture contributes around 36 % of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), provides 85% of employment and contributes 90% of foreign exchange earnings. Over 90% of the total agricultural value-added comes from about 1.8 million smallholders who on average own 1.0ha of land. Land pressure is particularly high in the southern region of Malawi where per capita average landholding sizes are less than 0.2 ha. About 1.1 million hectares of land is held in some 30,000 estates, with an average landholding size ranging from 10 to 500 hectares.

One of the key constraints to smallholder productivity in Malawi is the small land holding size. The Poverty and Vulnerability Assessment (PVA) indicates that average cultivable land holding is less than 1 hectare (0.90 ha) and just about 0.2 ha per capita. About 58 percent of the farmers cultivate on less than 1 ha, of which about 11 percent are near landless. Only 13 percent cultivate on more than 2 ha and the majority of these are in the north where population density is still very low (about 50 people per km2).

However, such pressure exists in the face of underutilized land in both the estate and customary sector. Land distribution is sharply unequal and overcrowded arable land exists next to underutilized leasehold land. Based on estimates from land utilization studies undertaken in 1996, about 2.6 million hectares (about 28 percent) of suitable agricultural land under estate and customary tenure remain uncultivated or underutilized. Current Government estimates however indicate that approximately 600,000 hectares are currently idle, and it is this land that has been the target for redistribution under the project.

The major policy issues for the land sector in Malawi evolve around equity of access, security of tenure and sustainability of land use and use of land-based resources. The Government has been piloting the Community-based Rural land Development Project (CBRLDP) since 2004, in an attempt to introduce policies and strategies that will improve land use efficiency by bringing idle land into production using non-distortionary approaches. The CBRLDP is piloting a 'transparent, voluntary, legal and resource-supported approach to land redistribution. Its key principles include being market-assisted, community- driven and focusing on rural areas, where poverty is most pervasive.