Malawi Families Break the Cycle of Poverty with Empowered Worldview

By Trinity Kubalasa.

Communications and External Engagement Manager, World Vision Malawi.

Just before last year, Jane, a 43-year-old woman from Mzimba District, was an ordinary villager with no dreams or hopes of doing better in life. Despite owning land, a house, and other assets, Jane used to think that she was too poor to prosper. Together with her three children, they used to eat one meal a day, as they could not manage to harvest enough food. On bad days, the family would have a meal every other day. These were the most challenging days for Jane, as she felt like a mother who was failing her children.

‘’I used to rent out our land to other people who could hire us to do piece works on our own farm. At the end of the season, they could harvest enough food before our eyes, while we starved,’’ recalls Jane. 

For a long time, she continued to face numerous challenges to support her children financially as she did not have any skill that would enable her make a sustainable income.  

“As a single parent it was not easy for me to take care of my three children. I could not make enough through piece works to pay school fees for my children. Life was hard,’’ says Jane.

All this was before she was enrolled as a participant of World Vision’s Empowered Worldview training in 2023 which focused on changing her mindset to start looking at her life through entrepreneurial lenses using principles of the bible.

Empowered Worldview is a holistic approach that interrogates certain beliefs and cultures that tend to keep people in the cycle of poverty. It is designed to enable men, women, and children to change their mindset to ensure sustainability and positively reinforce resilience capacities to absorb shocks, adapt to change, and transform risks into opportunities.

Area Sponsorship Officer for World Vision Malawi, Chrissie Chimbereko says the training empowered the people to realize that they were the main agents of change for their lives and that following the training many people started building on the resources that they already had to improve their lives.

Chrissie says Jane turned to her farm and stopped renting it out.

 ‘’For the first time Jane cultivated on her land and stopped wasting time doing piece jobs,’’ said Chrissie.

Jane used to cultivate a small portion but that after the training she cultivated a big area where she planted maize and groundnuts. 

She says after being trained, she has managed to harvest 200 tins of groundnuts as well as 150 tins of maize when in the past she could only harvest few tins of harvest.

 ‘’World Vision taught me to use my head to think, and my heart to appreciate the need for my pockets to have money.’’  Says Jane.

In preparation for the next growing season Jane has used the proceeds from this year’s harvest to purchase 10 bags of fertilizer as she plans to venture into tobacco farming. She has also bought cement for her house and used some of the money to send her children to school.

‘’My first born is currently in Standard 8 at Bunga Boarding School where I am ably paying for his school fees and providing all other needs, I have also bought two goats and a pig,’’ she explains with a smile. 

Jane adds that all her children are living happily as all of them are able to go to school and dress nicely.

One of her kids is Agness who is in Standard 5. She says there is a lot of improvement in the way they are living now as compared to the past.

‘’We can now afford to eat three meals in a day because there is a lot of food in the house,’’ said Agness with a basin of groundnuts in her hands.

She says if this season will be as profitable as was the last, she plans to relocate to the boma where she wants to build a new house and start new businesses.

Janes’ story is similar to that of the family of Lameck Chirwa of Mpangavisoti village of the same traditional authority Jaravikuba. 

His family used to be one of the poorest in the village. With his four children, Lameck says they used to survive on piece works which could not sustain his family.

‘’We used to abandon our farm and spend much of our time working in other people’s gardens. This impoverished our family as we could not harvest enough for food and selling,’’ Lameck explains.

However, his fortunes changed when he attended the Empowered Worldview training which transformed his life in both economic and spiritual sense. 

He said during the first year of training they cultivated groundnuts, a crop which does not require fertilizer. Lameck said last growing season they have harvested 14 bags of groundnuts and 28 bags of maize.

“The training taught us to work and plan together as a family and draw our vision on paper,’’ said Lameck adding that his children are now doing better in class because they are having enough food. 

He says since he learnt about the value of family during the Empowered Worldview training, his family has achieved a lot as they do everything together. 

“World Vision has transformed my family and we are sure as a family that our children will have a brighter future because of its Empowered Worldview initiative,’’ Lameck says.