MALAWImVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017

Surplus cereal production lowers prices across the country
Key points:
Food consumption improves for households who rely on their own production
Maize grain prices have fallen far below April levels
Lower cereal prices see purchasing power increase across the country
Negative coping levels are lowest in Blantyre, Mwanza, Neno and Balaka
Negative coping levels are stable across households headed by men and women,
and among wealth groups
New admissions of malnourished patients continue to fall

WFP/Gregory Barrow
Situation UpdateFood security is good following surplus cereal production. Recent resultsfrom the third round of the agricultural production survey show that 3.5
million mt of maize have been produced against a national requirementof 3.2 million mt – this is a 44 percent increase in production compared
to last year. Rice production is estimated at 121,079 mt, a 46 percent
increase from last year. The production of potatoes, sweet potatoes,
millet and sorghum has also increased. As expected, household foodstocks and market supply of staple foods is substantially higher.

The government’s grain marketing body ADMARC (AgricultureDevelopment and Marketing Corporation) has been provided with MWK5
billion to purchase maize grain from farmers at MWK170/kg, as per theMinistry of Agriculture’s minimum price floor directive. The export banon maize and related products is still in place to promote food security inthe country.

Head of household:
16%
84%

FemaleMale

Number ofInterviews:
1795

42Meanage ofrespondents

Wall type:16%
57%

Unbaked Brick 15% MudBaked Brick
11% Cement1

mVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017MALAWI

Negative coping levels are lowest in Blantyre, Mwanza, Neno and Balaka
In May the national median reduced Coping Strategies Index (rCSI) was 13 – significantly below the February score1 (Figure 1). This low and stable rCSI isattributed to the strong recovery of cereal production this year, especially maize and rice, as a result of good weather conditions and the increased availability of wetlands
for rice production. The wetlands dried up during the previous season because of El Niño weather patterns.
Map 1: Median rCSI by district aggregation

The lowest rCSI (9) was observed in the aggregated districts of Blantyre, Mwanza, Neno and Balaka
while highest (16) was recorded in the aggregated districts of Mangochi and Machinga, andChikwawa and Nsanje (Map 1). Stress levels are lower in the south as most households in theSouthern Region finished harvesting in May. The harvest in the Central Region began in early May,
while in the Northern Region it began at the end of May.
Figure 1: National median rCSI, February to May 2017

Source: mVAM, May 2017

The use of all of food-related coping
strategies has been stable since March,
thanks to increased consumption of own
production.
However,
80
percentofhouseholds were still consuming cheaper but
less preferable food (Figure 2). Given thegood harvest, negative coping levels are
expected to remain stable in the comingmonths.

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 1: Percentage of households using negative coping strategies, February to May 2017

1

This bulletin only uses data collected using live voice calls, not data collected via SMS as in previous bulletins.

Source: mVAM, May 2017

2

mVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017

MALAWI

Negative coping levels stable across different household profiles
The wall type of a household’s dwelling is a proxy indicator of their socio-economic status. Negative coping levels remained stable in May even for the worst-offhouseholds (those with mud or unbaked brick walls). This is because most households are consuming from their own production during the harvest period. Food accessis also better thanks to low cereal prices (Figure 3).
Negative coping levels were also stable and lower than in February for households headed by women and those headed by men: rCSI fell from 19 in February to 15 inMay for households headed by women, and from 16 to 14 for households headed by men (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Median rCSI by sex of household head

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 3: Median rCSI by wall type

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Food consumption improves for households who rely on own production

WFP/Photographer

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 6: Inadequate food consumption amonghouseholds reliant on own production, April and May

Figure 5: Inadequate food consumption acrossMalawi, April and May 2017

Source: mVAM, May 2017

As seen in Figure 5, the proportion of households
reporting poor food consumption fell from 15 to
12 percent across Malawi in May. The biggest
improvement was among households who rely on own
production as their main food source (Figure 6). This
clearly shows the positive impact of the harvest on foodsecurity.

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mVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017

MALAWI

Maize grain prices fall steeply
Maize prices have been falling since early 2017 and have been below 2016 levels since February 2017
(Figure 7). The low prices have been driven by the increased cereal production in 2017compared to the drought-reduced output of 2016 and the flood-reduced output of 2015. The exportban on maize and related products has also increased domestic supplies. Looking ahead, the 2017
agricultural output is likely to sustain the downward pressure on food prices.

Map 2: Maize prices (MWK/kg), 2 May to 15 May 2017

Maize prices fell by 29 percent between April and May, to reach an average price of MWK98/kg. Thisis 20 percent lower than the three-year average and 45 percent lower than the price at the sametime last year (Figure 7).
Beans were 3 percent cheaper in May than in April, while cowpea prices were up 9 percent and pigeon
peas by 11 percent, primarily because the harvest season had not yet started. In May, beans retailed
at an average MWK669/kg, cowpeas at MWK484/kg and pigeon peas at MWK401/kg (Figure 8).

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 7: Average maize prices

WFP/Photographer

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 8: Pulses prices by region, 8 May to 13 May

Source: mVAM, May 20174

mVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017

MALAWI

Continued decrease in new admissions for malnourished clients
Nutrition monitoring continued in Malawi in May in the 70 sentinel sites. Figure 9 shows the trends in new admissions for malnourished children and adults from January
2016 to May 2017, while Figure 10 compares new admissions between May 2016 and May 2017 for the original 41 sentinel sites 2.
The preliminary results of the Standardised Monitoring and Assessment of Relief Transitions (SMART) survey conducted in May 2017 have been published. The nutrition
situation has improved with global acute malnutrition (GAM) currently at 2.2 percent compared with 4.1 percent in December. Severe acute malnutrition (SAM) has also
fallen from 0.8 percent in December 2016 to 0.3 percent in May 2017. A comparison of the SMART results for May 2016 and May 2017 reveals a slight improvement. In
2016 GAM was 2.5 percent and SAM 0.5 percent, which is within the ‘acceptable’ range of less than 5 percent prevalence, as defined by the World Health Organization.
In line with the SMART survey, mVAM data from May shows that admissions to the Community Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) and Nutrition Care Support andTreatment (NCST) programmes continued to decline from March through May 2017. As shown in Figure 10, compared to May 2016 (in the 41 original sites) admissions ofchildren with moderate acute malnutrition (MAM) were 11 percent lower in May 2017, while those of children with SAM dropped by 23 percent. This is explained by animprovement in food consumption amidst a stabilizing food security situation as households are able to consume foods from their own production. By contrast, adultadmissions increased by 19 percent between May 2016 and May 2017. This is attributed to the scale-up of screening and referral of adults at community level by otherpartners with UNAIDS support.

2Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 10: Trend in new admissions 2016 vs. 2017 – 41 sentinel sites

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 9: Trend of new admissions

A total of 41 sentinel sites were tracked from January to June 2016, while from July 2016 onwards, 29 more sites were added and 70 sites were tracked. This was in response to the scale-up of the emergency response.

Methodology
WFP/Photographer

Details on methodology are available online at the mVAM monitoring site: http://vam.wfp.org/sites/mvam_monitoring/malawi.html

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mVAM Bulletin #17: May 2017

MALAWI

Purchasing power increases across the country
The average national manual labour wages rose from
MWK600/day in April to MWK900/day in May, reflecting
increased demand for casual labour during the peak of
the harvest season and the start of the marketing season
for maize, rice, pulses and potatoes. Consequently,purchasing power (measured in kilograms of maize thatcan be purchased with wages from a day of labour)
increased significantly across the country.

Source: mVAM, May 2017

Figure 11: Purchasing power by district (kg of maize per day’s labour)

As in the previous round, the highest purchasing power
was observed in southern districts of Machinga andPhalombe while the lowest was in the northern district ofKaronga (Figure 11).

In the words of the respondents
Figure 12: Word cloud“I don’t face any food challenges” – Male respondent, Blantyre“There is lack of lands to grow crops” – Male respondent, Chiradzulu“I didn’t harvest enough due to lack of fertilizer” – Female respondent, Lilongwe“The crops were destroyed by worms”– Female respondent, Salima

For further information
Mietek Maj

mietek.maj@wfp.org

mVAM Resources:

Arif Husain

arif.husain@wfp.org

Website: http:/ / vam.w fp.org/ sites/ mvam_monitoring/

Jean-Martin Bauer

jean-martin.bauer@wfp.org

Blog:mvam.org

Andrew Odero

andrew.odero@wfp.org

Toolkit:

http:/ / resources.vam.w fp.org/ mVAM*

This is the last monthly bulletin, after this bulletins will be released on a quarterly basis.

Source: mVAM, May 2017

“Heavy rains affected growth of food in the area. There is a lack of fertilizer which
contributes to low production in the area” – Female respondent, Zomba