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Climate change is no longer a distant threat – it is here with us, and in Malawi, its scars are everywhere, writes Emmanuel Harawa
From Cyclone Idai in 2019 to Cyclone Freddy in 2023, each disaster has torn through our communities, destroying homes, sweeping away crops, and leaving families without food, water, or shelter.
These are not isolated weather events; they are part of a pattern, and they reveal how climate change is fast becoming the greatest public health challenge of our time.
What frustrates me most is that our responses often feel cosmetic, designed more for visibility than for impact.
Tree-planting campaigns are the perfect example. Every rainy season, schools, communities, and officials gather to plant thousands of seedlings. Politicians deliver speeches.
Donors take photographs. Yet months later, when the rains stop, those same seedlings are left to wither in the sun, grazed by goats or uprooted by careless footsteps.
In Mchinji District, under the government’s Climate-Smart Enhanced Public Works Programme, many trees simply never stood a chance. Without aftercare – watering, weeding, or protection — the survival rate is painfully low.
This cycle of waste cannot continue.
For a country already grappling with poverty, food insecurity, and fragile health systems, pouring millions into failed climate adaptation projects is not just inefficient – it is unjustifiable.
The truth is that tree-planting, while noble, is not a magic bullet. Planting is the easy part; sustaining growth is the real test.
If we are serious about protecting Malawians from the health consequences of climate change, we must change how we approach adaptation.
Communities must be placed at the centre of climate action, not treated as passive beneficiaries.
When people own the problem, they also own the solution.
I find hope in initiatives like the Malawi Liverpool Wellcome (MLW) Research Programme’s Climate Change and Health project.
Using a participatory method called photovoice, MLW gave communities cameras to document their lives after Cyclone Freddy.
The results were raw, heart-wrenching, and unfiltered: children learning under collapsed classrooms, women walking hours for clean water, and families losing livestock and fields to floods.
These stories remind us that climate change is not abstract. It is hunger in a child’s belly. It is the spread of cholera in crowded camps.
It is the trauma etched on the faces of families forced to start over again and again.
Most importantly, the testimonies show that women and girls pay the heaviest price.
When water sources dry up or become contaminated, it is women who walk further and risk harassment to fetch it.
When food runs out, it is mothers who sacrifice their own meals. Climate change, therefore, is not gender-neutral – it compounds existing inequalities.
This is why adaptation must go beyond planting trees or building dams. It must be holistic, inclusive, and gender-sensitive.
We need strategies that empower communities, support women, and protect the vulnerable. We need policies that do more than tick boxes for donor reports.
And we need leaders who measure success not by the number of seedlings planted, but by how many trees survive, how many children remain healthy, and how many families are spared from hunger and disease.
Climate change is the greatest development challenge of our generation.
It demands honesty: the courage to admit that what we are doing now is not enough, and the vision to pursue innovative, community-driven solutions.
The fight against climate change is not a responsibility we can outsource.
It belongs to all of us: individuals making sustainable choices, governments enforcing climate-resilient policies, and the international community honouring its promises on climate finance and technology transfer.
Only through collective, inclusive action can Malawi safeguard its people, protect its future, and contribute to Africa’s Agenda 2063 and the Sustainable Development Goals.
Anything less would be a betrayal – not just of our environment, but of our health, our dignity, and our children’s right to a safe and sustainable future.
