Malawi to host National Development Conference from Feb 2-3

Malawi is set to hold the 2023 National Development Conference (NDC) under the theme: ‘Malawi 2063 One year on: Forging Concerted Efforts on the journey to Wealth Creation and Self Reliance’.

Briefing journalists in Lilongwe on Tuesday, National Planning Commission (NPC) Director General, Dr. Thomas Chataghalala Munthali, said the conference will take place from February 2 to 3 at Bingu International Convention Centre (BICC) in Lilongwe.

Munthali said President Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera will preside over the event.

“The conference is very important event in the sense that every year we do have NDC but this one coming down the line after launching the first 10 year implementation plan for Malawi 2063. It will take stock of the progress made for the first year and what have been the challenges on the way and how can we work together to accelerate progress,” he said.

However, Munthali admitted that the first 10 year implementation plan for Malawi 2063 faced a number of challenges which need to be addressed.

He said the first year the country had experienced issues of natural calamities like cyclones and flooding and the war in Russia–Ukraine which contributed to the rise in food prices and shortages on the market.

But the NPC boss emphasized that the planned conference will help Malawi to come up tangible interventions to recover from the existing shocks so that we should progress.

Munthali pointed out that the set milestones of Malawi 2063 of graduating into a middle income economy by 2030 and meeting the targets of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) should on course with the implementation.

He added that this would require a lot of efforts by each one of us because external factors are pressing hard on us to slow down our implementation efforts.

He said the conference would bring a number of experts to brain storm on a number of issues which need to be taken into t consideration in implementing Malawi 2063 by providing priority areas for acceleration.

Munthali hinted that a lot of financing are coming from private sector and the centrality of Malawi 2063 is worth creation.

He said the private sector need to be central in financing the plan and there was need to grow the sector so that that we are minimize informality within.

“Our report progress which will be shared during the conference is indicating there is to focus more on productive sectors. We need to make some improvements in sectors of mining, energy, tourism, ICT and strategic roads,” Munthali noted.

He said this sector would help to generate more revenues which could be used to fund the implementation of the plan.

Malawi University of Business and Applied Sciences (MUBAS) Economics Professor, Betchani Tchereni observed that there several parameters the country has missed in its implementation of the plan which need to be looked into carefully.

He said the implementation plan had a component of development cooperation but it is not there this means that the pillar of industrialization is going to suffer and investment too.

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