Evaluation of rural development experiences in Africa: the case of Malawi

Abstract

The republic of Malawi is a land-locked country in south-east Africa with common borders with Mozambique, Zambia and Tanzania. The country is long and narrow, 901 km from north to south and varying between 80 and 161 km east to west. Of the total surface area of 118,484 km2 about 20 per cent is taken up by Lake Malawi and other smaller lakes. The remaining land area of 9,408 km2 is divided between customary land (30 per cent), public land (18 per cent) and estate (private) land (3 per cent). Between (971 and 1986. there had been a loss of over 13 per cent of woodland and an increase in cultivated land, particularly for permanent crops, and other land indicating that estate land-holdings must have grow, substantially.