Four Fs, five excuses

Malawi’s economic report card is being marked by the wrong people.

Government sees four Fs and calls it progress: food, fuel, fertiliser and forex.

Millions of Malawians see something else.

They see a bag of maize that has risen from the celebrated K35 000 to around K85 000 or more. They see fuel queues. Farmers see fertiliser shortages. Businesses see forex they cannot get.

So what exactly is government celebrating?

If recovery cannot be felt at the market, filling station, farm or factory, perhaps it is not recovery at all. Perhaps it is simply a better-looking statistic.

That is the uncomfortable truth behind the President’s four Fs.

And there is a fifth F that does not appear on the official scorecard: failure.

Failure to distinguish between announcing progress and actually delivering it.

Government can count tonnes of fertiliser procured, fuel deliveries made, reforms announced and prices that once fell.

Citizens count what those things actually buy.

That is the real economic report card.

The President may be right that Malawi cannot recover in a year. But that is not a licence to package temporary relief, isolated improvements or government activity as broad economic recovery.

The question is simple: If the economy is recovering, where is the recovery?

Take food.

The President has pointed to falling maize prices as evidence of progress, citing a 50-kilogramme bag dropping from more than K100 000 to around K35 000.

There is one small problem.

The K35 000 bag seems to have disappeared faster than affordable forex.

Today, the same bag is reportedly selling for around K85 000 or more.

So, the Malawian carrying K35 000 to the market may reasonably wonder whether he has wandered into the wrong Malawi.

The problem is not celebrating a lower price. It is celebrating yesterday’s price as today’s achievement.

Malawians do not eat presidential statistics. They eat maize.

And the real test is not whether one commodity became cheaper for a while. It is whether households can afford more with what they earn.

Then there is fuel.

Government can point to deliveries and supply arrangements.

Motorists point to queues.

Businesses pay more for every litre. Transport operators pass those costs to passengers. Consumers then pay again through higher prices for goods and services.

Perhaps Malawi has invented a new definition of fuel stability: the queue is stable, the shortage is stable and everyone is waiting for the next tanker.

Then comes fertiliser.

Government can count tonnes procured and programmes launched.

But farmers do not plant tonnes of government announcements.

They plant fertiliser.

The real question is whether the input reaches the farmer, in sufficient quantities and at the right time.

Fertiliser arriving after the planting window is like bringing an umbrella after the rain.

Technically useful.

Practically late.

And then there is forex.

Here, the President has been relatively candid: foreign exchange remains one of the country’s most complicated problems.

Perhaps forex should not even be counted as one of the four Fs.

It may be the F behind the other three.

No forex, no fuel imports.

Forex shortages complicate fertiliser imports and constrain access to medicines, machinery and industrial inputs.

When businesses cannot obtain foreign currency, the pressure reaches consumers through higher prices, reduced production and shortages.

The four Fs, therefore, are not separate problems.

They are one economic chain.

Food depends partly on fertiliser. Fertiliser depends partly on forex. Fuel depends heavily on forex. Transport depends on fuel. Transport costs feed into food prices.

It is one big economic family.

Unfortunately, the family keeps fighting.

That is why the economic scorecard needs a harder look.

What exactly are we measuring when we declare progress?

Procurement?

Deliveries?

Policy announcements?

Or what happens after those things leave government offices?

A government may see maize prices falling while families see their overall cost of living rising.

It may see fuel deliveries while motorists see queues.

It may see fertiliser procurement while farmers see shortages.

It may see forex reforms while businesses remain unable to secure the currency they need.

The problem is not that government and citizens see different countries.

It is that one is measuring activity, while the other is measuring outcomes.

Governments make decisions based on their diagnosis of the problem. If the diagnosis is incomplete, the prescription will be incomplete too.

Malawi has had enough of temporary relief being packaged as permanent recovery.

The President is right that economic recovery cannot be achieved in one year.

But patience cannot become a substitute for accountability.

Citizens want affordable food.

Farmers want timely inputs.

Motorists want fuel.

Businesses want forex.

Taxpayers deserve an honest account of what is working, what is not and what is being done about it.

That is where journalism comes in.

We should not simply repeat the four Fs.

We should follow them.

Follow food to the market.

Follow fuel to the filling station.

Follow fertiliser to the farm.

Follow forex to the businesses and importers struggling to obtain it.

Because that is where the real economic report card is written—not in speeches, but in prices, queues, harvests, production and household budgets.

The most dangerous F is not food, fuel, fertiliser or forex.

It is failure to see the whole picture.

Malawi does not need four Fs and five excuses.

It needs four problems properly understood—and fixed.

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