Only 10.3% Have Permanent Jobs – How Malawi’s Workforce Could Transform Your Business

Key Business Points

• Only 10.3 percent of Malawian workers have permanent jobs, as most employment is informal and self-driven, mainly in agriculture.
• 61.2 percent of working-age adults are unemployed, with women and youth facing the highest exclusion from formal work.
• Emerging industries like nut processing and mining offer potential for job growth, but infrastructure and policy challenges must be addressed.

The latest Malawi Economic Monitor by the World Bank sheds light on Malawi’s labor market, revealing that formal wage employment is extremely limited. Only 10.3 percent of workers hold permanent jobs, with the vast majority engaged in informal, self-driven work, particularly in subsistence agriculture. This underscores a structural challenge, as most jobs are low-productivity and unstable.

The monitor shows that Malawi has 10.6 million people aged 15-64, with 60 percent under 35 and a large majority living in rural areas. Despite this large pool, only 38.8 percent of working-age adults are employed—meaning 61.2 percent are unemployed. The gap is even wider among key demographics: only 43.3 percent of women participate in the labor force compared to 54.2 percent of men, and youth participation is just 32.3 percent versus 60.5 percent for those aged 25-34.

Education levels also remain low, with 58 percent of the population only having primary schooling and only 2.7 percent holding university degrees. This limits access to higher-quality jobs and contributes to the ongoing underutilization of labor. In fact, 55.5 percent of the working-age population—including 66.4 percent of youth—are either unemployed or under-employed.

Agriculture dominates employment, accounting for 39.3 percent of workers, even when excluding subsistence farming. This slow shift away from agriculture suggests that Malawi has yet to experience much-needed structural economic transformation.

On the upside, the Economic Monitor identifies new growth potential in agro-processing and mining. Projects in macadamia, soybeans, groundnuts, and other sectors could help diversify the economy and create more job opportunities along the value chain. But progress is stalled by policy inconsistency, currency shortages, and poor infrastructure, all of which hinder competitiveness and limit scale.

World Bank Malawi Country Manager Firas Raad noted that Malawi has the talent to reverse these trends, but rapid action is needed to stabilize the economy and resolve bottlenecks in production and exports.

Scottish economist Velli Nyirongo agrees the data highlight deep structural problems but also indicate areas where thoughtful policy and targeted investment could deliver economic transformation. By making these sectors more competitive and accessible, Malawi can move closer to broader employment and more inclusive growth.

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