A looming dry spell is set to hit 19 districts mostly in the Southern Region and parts of the Central Region within the next seven days, the Department of Climate Change and Meteorological Services (MET) has warned.
This raises fresh alarm over this year’s rain‑fed cropping season.
The warning comes at a time some districts have gone for over a week already without rains, raising concerns on this year’s rain fed farming season.
In a statement yesterday MET director Lucy Mtilatila said the warning follows an extended period without rain in many areas and is linked to Tropical Storm Fytia, which developed over the Mozambique Channel.
The affected districts are Chikwawa, Nsanje Blantyre, Thyolo, Mwanza, Neno, Zomba, Phalombe, Mulanje, Balaka, Machinga, Mangochi , Salima, Dedza, Ntcheu, Lilongwe, Mchinji, Dowa and Ntchisi.
“The position and movement of Tropical Storm Fytia are contributing to dryness in the Southern Region. As the system moves away, dry conditions are likely to persist for several days. We are anticipating longer dry spells of around seven days,” she said.
Mtilatila added that MET will issue a fuller rainfall outlook next week.
Agriculture expert Felix Jumbe said the prolonged dry spell, with scorching temperatures, threatens the country’s food security.
He said the timing of the dry spell is worrying considering that it is at the critical time when the country’s staple grain, maize is tasselling and the maize cobs are supposed to come out.
He, however, thinks there some crops that farmers can plant such as cowpeas which can do better and help in salvaging the situation.
“Maize is at an advanced stage when we look at the districts affected. It is at a stage which requires more moisture and the dry spell will be costly if it persists beyond the projected days. The warning means other districts may go up to two weeks without rains. Let us hope that the situation will not go beyond the said period, otherwise it is really a serious threat to the country’s food security. In the long term, stakeholders should promote the use of drought tolerant crops which can survive the unreliable weather patterns,” said Jumbe.
Another expert Tamani Nkhono Mvula agrees that the country’s food security is at threat considering that some parts of the country were also affected by floods that washed away crops.
Mvula said the dry spell compound the desire for good harvest with the dry spell expected to add the water stress for most crops that are at an advanced stage.
“When crops suffer from water stress at a critical stage leads to failure in development of grains for example in maize. At this stage we cannot talk of replanting because time has passed. That is why we encourage farmers to use manure because they help in keeping moisture,” he said.
The threat to food security is coming at a time when Malawi is sitting on maize deficit of 600,000 metric tonnes after only 2.9 million metric tonnes were realised in the 2024/2025 growing season against a requirement of 3.6 million metric tonnes compelling authorities to import maize from neighbouring Zambia.
In the past five years, Malawi has experienced climate-induced disasters, namely, Cyclone Idai, Cyclone Gombe, Tropical Storm Ana and Cyclone Freddy and more recent Elnino.
This has put Malawi among the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change.
These disasters have left huge economic loss that will take a little while to recover as Department of Disaster Management Affairs estimate beyond K2.5 trillion in recovery.
