The weather services in Nicaragua and Malawi are working with IEDRO volunteer Ed Root to test a computer program he developed that will read and digitize environmental charts showing rainfall, temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, sunshine, wind direction and speed, stream flow and other parameters within seconds instead of the 15 to 20 minutes now required to digitize these charts manually.
The Malawi Meteorology Service has an excellent website, www.metmalawi.com, in addition to being one our foremost digitizers of data.
Left to right: Donald Kamdonyo, Dir, National Meteorological Society; Martin Munkhanya, IEDRO volunteer; the meteorological society volunteer staff and behind, Ken Clark, NOAA/NWS employee
One of the photo digitizing work areas.
Population: 13,931,831
Capital: Lilongwe
Ethnic groups: Chewa, Nyanja, Tumbuka, Yao, Lomwe, Sena, Tonga, Ngoni, Ngonde, Asian, European
Language: Chichewa (official), Chinyanja, Chiyao, Chitumbuka, Chisena, Chilomwe, Chitonga, other Industries: Tobacco, tea, sugar, sawmill products, cement, and consumer goods
Religion: Christian, Muslim, other, none
Median age: 16.8 years
Life expectancy: 43.45 years
GDP per capita: $800/year
Economy: The economy is predominately agricultural with about 85% of the population living in rural areas. Agriculture accounts for more than one-third of GDP and 90% of export revenues. The performance of the tobacco sector is key to short-term growth as tobacco accounts for more than half of exports. The economy depends on substantial inflows of economic assistance from the IMF, the World Bank, and individual donor nations.
References
CIA World Factbook: Malawi
