Agnes Tembo, a participant in Malawi's Soils, Foods, and Healthy Communities project, tends to her field of pigeon peas, Mzimba District, Malawi, August 2016 (photo by Jonathan W. Rosen).

In this week’s Trend Lines podcast, WPR’s senior editor, Frederick Deknatel, and associate editor, Karina Piser, discuss how to get India-Pakistan ties back on track, the international outrage over Russia’s actions in Syria, and Tanzania’s troubling authoritarian turn. For the Report, Jonathan Rosen talks with Peter Dörrie about Malawi’s struggle for food security. Listen:Download: MP3Subscribe: iTunes | RSS Relevant Articles on WPR: What Will It Take To Get Troubled India-Pakistan Ties Back on Track? International Outrage Won’t Change Russia’s Behavior in Aleppo Magufuli’s Reformist Drive Takes an Autocratic Turn in Tanzania From Drought to Green Revolution? Malawi’s—and Africa’s—Quest for Food […]

Women and children separate grain from soil, Machinga, Malawi, May 24, 2016 (AP photo by Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi).

Driving along central Malawi’s M5 lakeshore highway in mid-2016, a visitor could be forgiven for mistaking the surrounding countryside for desert. In what should have been an area lush from rains ending in April, the land of gently sloping hills, baobab trees and fiery sunsets was parched. Although the road meandered past some signs of greenery—mango trees, tobacco fields, irrigated sugar cane for export—the dust that stretched to the horizon did little to mask that Malawi, like much of eastern and southern Africa, is in crisis. Hit by the strongest El Nino in a generation, which disrupted rainfall patterns, ruined […]