On behalf of the United Nations Country Team (UNCT) in Malawi, I invite you to read this report, which details progress of our work in the country in 2021.

Together with our partners, we supported the Government of Malawi in undertaking various catalytic interventions to contribute towards the achievements of the national priorities and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The report further presents the challenges tackled and lessons learned during the year and provides an overview of our priorities for 2022.

After the unprecedented COVID-19 outbreak in the previous year, 2021 came as a year of hope to heal from the impact of the deadly virus and foster efforts tackling climate change, addressing inequalities, and ending poverty.

The UNCT worked side-by-side with the Government in fighting the pandemic and its socio-economic impact and enhancing Malawi’s progress to achieve the SDGs.

With our support, the Government developed and launched the Malawi 2063 as the country’s longterm development vision as well as the Malawi 2063 First 10 Year Implementation Plan (MIP-1) that replaced the Malawi Growth and Development Strategy (MGDS) III as the country’s new medium term development strategy to operationalize the vision and help turn Malawi into a middle-income economy and achieve most of the SDGs by 2030.

To ensure Malawi builds back better and faster from COVID-19, the UN also assisted the Government to develop and launch the 2021-2023 COVID-19 SocioEconomic Recovery Plan (SERP) – a key blueprint for reviving the country’s economy with strategic interventions.

In support of Malawi’s COVID-19 response and recovery, the UN System mobilised 78.7 million for the response intervations. With these and other resources, we assisted Malawi to have a robust health response to the pandemic, effective rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, continuity of education for children and protection of vulnerable groups such as women and persons with disabilities.

In 2021, about 2.6 million people in Malawi also faced acute food insecurity during the lean season.

The UN reached more than one million of these people with cash and in-kind food assistance to save lives and livelihoods. Some 600,000 learners in vulnerable communities also received cash-based take-home rations to enable them to continue with school. In addition, 3.9 million accessed emergency and non-emergency education services. Out of these, more than 1 million benefited from direct COVID-19 related response services).

COVID-19 continued to impact on violence against women and girls during the year, and the UN family once again joined forces with national institutions, NGOs and other partners to strengthen nationally led and community-driven efforts to eliminate sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), child marriage and child abuse under programmes like the Spotlight Initiative. We actively supported capacity building for more than 1,000 essential service providers handling SGBV cases; conclusion of about 3,000 SGBV court cases; nullification of over 700 child marriages; and graduation of 11,440 mentees on safe space mentorship sessions to protect and keep girls in school.

Over 1.81 million children between 6 and 59 months old received vitamin A supplements. Besides, 29,008 children (52%) with severe acute malnutrition were admitted for treatment under the Community-based Management of Acute Malnutrition programme. Out of the admitted children, 92 percent recovered.

One enabler for SDG acceleration that the UN in Malawi promoted in 2021 is peace. We helped the Government to finalise consultations on strengthening of its infrastructure for peace, leading to completion of the draft Peace and Unity Bill for Parliament’s approval. We look forward to further collaboration with different partners on Malawi’s efforts to create national institutions such as the Peace and Unity Commission that the bill proposes to establish to promote lasting peace in the country.

In the face of the devastating effects of the climate crisis, we also took concreate steps to promote climate change mitigation and adaptation in Malawi in 2021. More than 200,000 smallholder farmers gained knowledge and skills in climate smart agriculture

Source: UN Resident Coordinator for Malawi