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The Malawi Government is encouraging investors to invest in growing of crops for biofuel production as the country is slugging behind in integration of biofuels into its energy systems despite international forecast on the energy source looking exquisite for the next 20 ears.
Ministry of Energy Spokesperson Upile Kamoto told Agribusiness Review that Malawi’s biofuel industry is mainly dominated by Ethanol Company of Malawi (Ethco) in Nkhota-kota and Presscane in Chikhwawa. The two companies utilize molasses, a bye product in sugar production to produce approximately 20 million litres of ethanol annually.
Kamoto said: “The two companies produce three grades of ethanol namely fuel ethanol, extra neutral alcohol and rectified alcohol, it is exported and also used locally for blending with petroleum products.”
“The country also produces biodiesel from Jathropha but on a small scale. Toleza farm in Balaka district initiated a Jathropha farming program in 2012 with the aim of producing biodiesel to fuel their farm equipment such as tractors.”
According to Malawi’s National Energy Policy 2018 (NEP 2018), biodiesel constitutes only 4% of transport energy which is mainly blended with petroleum fuels at 20:80 for petrol and 9:91 for diesel.
Kamoto said: “Production of bioethanol and other biofuels is one of the policy priority areas in the NEP 2018. Under this priority area, the government intends to support, encourage and promote the production of bioethanol and biodiesel for blending or standalone use in vehicles as well as cooking and lighting.”
“The government intends to do this by increasing the supply of biodiesel and bioethanol, promotion of fiscal incentives for bioethanol and biodiesel production as well as implementing socially and environmentally responsive large-scale bioethanol and biodiesel projects.”
Kamoto said with the Malawi Government promoting private sector participation in the biofuels industry, a number of investors are already showing interest in becoming players in this industry.
“Engagements with them are currently underway and government is providing necessary support and policy direction,” she said.
She explained that government is supporting, encouraging and promoting the production of bioethanol and biodiesel for blending or stand-alone use in vehicles, as well as for domestic use such as cooking and lighting.
“The Malawi government has the NEP 2018 as well as the Malawi Renewable Energy Strategy that promote the production and use of biofuels such as ethanol. Currently, the policy has made it mandatory for bio-ethanol and bio-diesel to be blended with petroleum fuels,” she said.
Kamoto also said the Ministry is, among other things, promoting production of bio-fuels through appropriate pricing incentives, and recently the Malawi Energy Regulatory Authority (MERA) facilitated a review of the ethanol pricing framework for biofuels.
“Previously, ethanol pricing was pegged to the price of petrol despite different cost structures. Currently, with fuel ethanol pricing in place, the industry is assured of fully recovering all production costs, overheads and distribution costs,” she said.
Kamoto further said government intends to promote the biofuel industry by researching into use of Ethanol Driven Vehicles (EDVs), promoting awareness campaigns on the uptake of new technologies such EDVs and also promoting importation of conversion kits for existing petrol-powered vehicles.
PressCane, an ethanol distillery company which is a subsidiary of the conglomerate Press Corporation Limited began its operations in June 2004. Its plant is located in Chikhwawa about 30 km north of Nchalo (55km south of Blantyre) and employs 118 Malawians including management.
The company’s Chief Operations Officer Bryson Mkhomaanthu explained that Malawi could do better to promote local production of biofuels as the industry is growing at a slow pace due to lack of feed stock- molasses as a case of PressCane Limited.
Mkhomaanthu said; “Current demand of fuel ethanol is over 40 million litres per annum while we produce 18 million litres per annum leaving a great deficit to cover.”
He, therefore, disclosed that the company has initiated expansion plans whereby it is to invest in sugarcane production to cushion feed stock shortage as it only relies on molasses obtained from sugar processing firms.
“We would like to start producing own sugarcane in the next three years and we are to increase production from 18 million litres to 27 million litres per year in three years
Mkhomaanthu also said there is need to promote sugarcane production through smallholder farmers and reviewing of tax measures to assist manufacturers improve on the profit margin from biofuel sales.
The main products of PressCane are fuel ethanol also known as anhydrous alcohol (AA 99.5% v/v) and industrial alcohol (rectified spirit 95.0 – 97.0% v/v). Sugar cane molasses are procured from Illovo in Nchalo and fermented into ethanol. The high quality of the ethanol is enhanced by the new molecular sieve dehydration (MSDH) technology installed in the distillery. In 2014, EthCo and Presscane initiated the project dubbed Raw Materials (RAMA). In their drive to increase ethanol production, the companies engaged smallholder sugarcane farmers to grow sugarcane with the aim of increasing the production of molasses.
Increased molasses production would ultimately mean increased feedstock for ethanol production thereby enabling the companies to operate their factories at full capacity. However, the long term plan is to use the sugarcane as feedstock for ethanol production, on top of the molasses from the sugarcane factories.
Global statistics indicate that Biofuels Market is expected to grow at a rate of not less than 8% during 2020-2025 propelled by the increased demand for secure, sustainable, and clean energy supply across the globe.
On account of higher mandates for biofuel blending in automotive fuels and increasing governments’ support for eco-friendly alternatives, the global consumption of biofuel is expected to further grow at a significant level during the forecast period.
The growing environmental need is to draw upon cleaner, renewable, sustainable energy sources to meet the ever-increasing demand for fuel.
Biofuels thus ethanol and biodiesel represent the majority share of renewables in global energy demand for road transport. Demand for bioenergy in the transportation sector is driven by blending mandates in significant economies and by sustained fuel use around the world.
From the 1980s, Malawi has been producing sugarcane ethanol and blending it at proportions of 10-25% with gasoline, in response to the 1970s energy crises and the higher costs of importing refined oil products into the landlocked country.

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