Agricultural Transformation Initiative (ATI), an organisation aimed diversifying tobacco-dependent economies, has partnered  with the Institute of International Education (IIE) to manage a pilot Fellowship and Scholarship Fund (FSF), an initiative that will fund will benefit more than 20 fellowships and scholarships for graduate study and postdoctoral research in the United States or South Africa.

In a statement released yesterday (23 July 2019), the firm says the initiative is aimed at supporting the country’s agriculture researchers. “This program is providing graduate students and postdoctoral researchers with the opportunity to study internationally in high-priority disciplines.”

According to the statement, ATI aims to help educate students about innovations in the various sectors that can be applied in Malawi to help the country’s economy become less dependent on tobacco crops and contribute to the transformation of the agricultural sector.

In April this year, ATI also rolled out a diversification initiative Mchinji and Lilongwe districts, aimed at addressing capital and resource barriers, access and training for alternative value chains, development of business plans, and gender challenges for women smallholder farmers. Country Director of Agricultural Transformation Initiative, Candida Nakhumwa, remarked that the Agricultural Transformation Initiative is dedicated to supporting the efforts of smallholder tobacco farmers to diversify their crop portfolio. “Opportunity International has successfully developed initiatives that benefit farmers, and this partnership will allow us to provide new and innovative solutions to tobacco farming communities in Malawi”