Impact Of Agricultural Market Reforms On Smallholder Farmers In ...

5.2.11 Storage Facilities
On average, in each EPA, there is an ADMARC or a private sector storage facility available for
rent. It is rare for farmers’ association to have storage facilities available for rent. Storage
facilities seem to be more available in the North and South than in the Center (see Table 5.81).
This is a little surprising since the Central region is more agriculturally oriented than the other
regions. The number of storage facilities has either increased or not changed much since 1995. In
the South for example, about 11-12 percent of the EPAs noted an increase in storage facilities
owned by ADMARC or associations. Furthermore, about 50 percent and 29 percent of the EPAs
in the Center and the North, respectively, noted an increase in privately owned storage facilities
since 1995.
5.2.12 Extension and Communication Services
Extension services are still widely available in Malawi. Each EPA has an average of 14 MOAI
extension officers, 2 NGO extension officers, and about one private company extension
representative. Among MOAI agents, 2 out of 14 agents are women. However, about 90 percent
of the EPA officers noted that the number of MOAI extension agents has decreased since 1995.
On the other hand, in 72 percent of the EPAs, the number of NGO extension officers has
increased, while the number of private company representatives has either increased (in 33
percent of the EPAs) or not changed at all. Therefore, it seems that the reforms, which have been
accompanied by budgetary cuts, have resulted in a lower number of government extension
officers (although their number is still high in Malawi compared to other African standards,
including Benin). Official extension officers are now being supplanted by NGO and private
company representatives.
On the telecommunication front, one can say that Malawi still lags behind many other developing
countries. There is on average, only 2 public telephones per EPA (about 3 per Northern EPA and
between 1 and 2 in the other 2 regions). The number of telephones has either not changed since
the reforms (69 percent of the EPAs), or increased in only 25 percent of the EPAs. More positive
changes were recorded in the Southern and Northern EPAs.
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