Stevenson Highlights Important Friendship Between Scotland and Malawi

Speaking in a Scottish Parliament debate on Scotland and Malawi, Stewart Stevenson, SNP MSP for Banffshire & Buchan Coast, highlighted the responsibilities that Scotland holds as a friend of the African nation.

He said that tackling the issues of tobacco and climate change would be beneficial for Malawi’s future.

Mr Stevenson said:

“Two thirds of Malawi’s exports are tobacco. We are rightly seeking to remove tobacco as a major part of our society, for the health of people in our country. However, when we do that it will have a significant effect on the economy of a country such as Malawi. We therefore owe a duty to countries such as Malawi to help them cross over to a more beneficial mode of agriculture.

“We are already seeing a danger that tobacco farmers, in the face of reducing profits, move across to grow cannabis. That will not be helpful in the long term for people who are in desperate need in countries such as Malawi.”

He added:

“Climate change is making agriculture a more formidable challenge in many countries in Africa, and we in the developed world are largely responsible for that. We therefore need to ensure that we support people in Malawi, which we are already doing through a number of programmes there.

“Malawi is an important friend of ours; let us be an ever-important friend of Malawi.”