The Shifting Political Economy of Tobacco Production in Malawi

This paper examines the shifting political economy of tobacco production in Malawi, focusing on regional restructuring of the sector. Drawing on primary fieldwork conducted in Central and Southern Malawi, complemented by secondary data and document analysis, we explore how tobacco production has become increasingly concentrated in Central Region while declining in Southern Region. Integrating insights from Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis and Evolutionary Economic Geography (EEG), we suggest this restructuring constitutes a diffuse power shift jointly shaped by powerful actors pursuing overlapping but distinct interests. The result is a reconfigured tobacco economy that entrenches corporate control, and exacerbates regional inequalities. This adds a ‘meso’ analysis to more familiar ‘macro’ and ‘micro’ accounts of diversification, thereby contributing to the literature on agrarian change, value chain governance, and the political economy of development in sub-Saharan Africa.