Malawi

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Malawi is a land-locked country in southeast Africa with a largely rural population of over 20 million (World Bank, 2022).

COL’s work in Malawi is in the areas of higher education, open schooling, and gender equality and women’s empowerment through skills development for livelihoods (GIRLS Inspire and Empowering Women and Girls) and benefits from programmes offered by COL’s regional centre, the Southern African Development Community Centre for Distance Education (SADC-CDE). Learners from Malawi are also participating in COL’s free online courses and benefitting from other openly available resources.

Participation rate of youth and adults in formal and non-formal education and training in the previous 12 months, 15-64 years old¹
15.3%		20.7%
Female (2020)		Male (2020)

Completion rate, lower secondary education for the school year ending in 2020¹
22.8%		23.4%
Female		Male

Gross enrolment ratio for tertiary education for the school year ending in 2022¹
2.3%		3.3%
Female		Male

Proportion of teachers with the minimum required qualifications in secondary education¹
77.8%		60.7%
Female (2013)		Male (2013)

1. UNESCO Institute for Statistics Data Centre, retrieved in May 2023

Highlights

Ministry of Education developed a draft national policy on ICT in Education that also includes Open Educational Resources (OER).
Over 5,600 women and girls in Malawi have been trained in livelihood skills.
National guidelines for delivery of open, distance and eLearning (ODeL) programmes developed by the National Council for Higher Education.

Partners

Partnerships are fundamental to COL’s work. Strategic partnerships allow COL to broaden its reach and engage at global, regional and national levels, while implementation partners support COL’s work in communities and institutions across Commonwealth Member States. Partners include multilateral organisations, regional bodies, national governments, government agencies, foundations, civil society organisations, public and private (not-for-profit) institutions and the private sector. COL partnerships assist in improving and extending teaching and learning services to people in the developing Commonwealth.

COL’s partners in Malawi include:

Ministry of Education
Bvumbwe Agricultural Research Station
Centre for Research and Development Initiative (CERADI)
Concerned Youth Organisation (CYO)
Malawi College of Distance Education
Mzuzu University
National Council for Higher Education
University of Malawi (UNIMA)

Literacy rate (2021)¹
63.7%		71.2%
Female, Adult (15+)		Male, Adult (15+)

Economic Activity – Labour Forces Participation (2020)¹
64.7%		74.5%
Female, Ages 15-64		Male, Ages 15-64

Political Decision Making (2019)¹
20.7%
Share of seats held by women in national parliament

Life expectancy (2023)¹
68.9		62.3
Female		Male

1. COL gender country profile October 2023

24	60
Individuals using the internet (%)¹	Mobile-cellular subscriptions per 100 inhabitants¹

0.068	39
Fixed-broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants¹	Active mobile-broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants¹




1. International Telecommunication Union (ITU), retrieved in May 2023.

Malawi

Highlights

Partners

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Country Data Sources