Malawi - Women in Development (WID) Project

The Women in Development (WID) project was approved in October 1992 in order to respond to the need to improve the socio-economic well-being of Malawians especially the rural Malawian women. The WID Project is critical in creating opportunities for improving the livelihood of Malawian women and also in enhancing GOM’s ability to create an enabling environment for this to happen. It aims at strengthening and building the capacities of rural women in adult literacy and income generation aspects. To this effect, the project adopted a two-pronged approach in addressing these limitations: (i) by reducing the adult illiteracy among rural women. To facilitate this, training of trainers courses will be organized by the project for key field staff including Community Development Assistants (CDAs) and literacy instructors. and (ii) by equipping them with functional and business development skills with credit support for undertaking income generating activities. The project will also permit for the provision of adequate logistical support, such as learning materials, vehicles and motor cycles to the field staff so that they can carry out their roles in an effective and efficient way. In addition, the capacities of concerned Government Departments will be targeted for strengthening for the creation of enabling environment women empowerment and the long-term sustainability of the project’s interventions.