Malawi, known as ‘the warm heart of Africa’, is landlocked between Zambia, Mozambique and Tanzania. Lake Malawi, at the southern end of the Great Rift Valley, dominates the geography of the country.
More than 75 per cent of Malawi’s population is rural and depends on agriculture. The famine of 2001–2002 affected 3 million families in Malawi, though most have now recovered thanks to government intervention. Still, the number of families without enough food or permanently reliant on food aid remains significant.
Many factors prevent families from producing enough food, such as prolonged illness, droughts, floods, environmental degradation, climatic changes and increased pressure on land due to growing population.
Access to safe water and sanitation is another problem, with women and girls shouldering the burden of fetching water in rural Malawi. This can prevent children – especially girls – from attending school, despite free primary education.
Although the government of Malawi is making efforts to provide life-enhancing anti-retroviral drugs for people living with HIV, poor nutrition can compromise their effectiveness.
Pressure on rural families is driving children to live on the streets of Malawi’s two main cities, Lilongwe and Blantyre. Others are forced to beg or work on the streets if they lose one or both parents to AIDS-related illness.