With small holder agriculture employing more than 80% of the rural labour force in Malawi, increasing smallholder agricultural productivity is recognised as one of the key routes to rapid and sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction. Poor access to land and environmental degradation due to population density has hindered this development.

In 2003 a new Land Policy was approved to ensure land tenure security and equitable access to land. This provided the general policy framework for implementation of the Malawi Land Reform Programme. The EC have supported this through the development of the Support to the Implementation of Malawi Land Reform programme (SLRP) with the overall objective to contribute to the sustainable use and management of land and land based resources, in order to improve the livelihoods of those particularly in rural areas. A significant part of this programme is directed at addressing inadequate institutional capacity.

Mokoro provided a team leader, Principal Consultant, Martin Adams, to assess the impact of the Malawi Land Reform Programme on the livelihoods of rural communities and advise the government of Malawi, the EC and other stakeholders on the strengths and weaknesses of the programme.