On Friday 9th June 2023 Malawi Liverpool Wellcome programme community convened for the inaugural staff forum in the year 2023.
During the highly patronized staff forum MLW’s incumbent Director Professor Henry Mwandumba stated the need for more collaborations to uphold MLW’s bar of excellence.
Mwandumba said he is ready to spearhead discussions with other collaborative partners apart from the Wellcome, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) and University of Liverpool.
“With your support I am willing to start talking to other entities for collaboration apart from the already existing partners this will strengthen our research capacity as research needs are fast growing with climate change being one of the priority areas of concern, “said Mwandumba.
Among others, in what was his first address since he ascended to MLW Directorship, Professor Mwandumba said it is challenging to take up MLW’s leadership after successful leaders within the 3 decades.
He said, in his tenure, much focus will be on graduating the PhD holders to independent researchers.
“We have done really well in training next generation of scientists at secondary, tertiary and post graduate level but the challenge that we have is for the PhD graduates to be independent researchers, in my leadership that’s the area I will focus much, it is that we are going to neglect other areas of training they are equally important areas,” said the MLW Director.
In addition, the MLW Programme Director thanked all teams within the research organisation for their incredible contributions during the Malawi Scientific Advisory Board (MSAB) and International Scientific Advisory Board (ISAB) visits to MLW.
During the staff meeting on behalf of the Chief Operations Officer, the head of operations Tamara Chipasula Makawa presented on the Phenomenonal contributions of the operations teams to the excellent work of the MLW.
Chipasula applauded the MLW Operations teams for their contributions despite several challenges that grappled the country’s operations and specifically MLW’s works.
“We have experienced several problems, it was COVID-19, then Cholera and Cyclone Freddy, the areas hugely affected were the ones we conduct our research, this shifted our focus as we needed to respond to these problems on the ground. A big thank you to the crisis management teams that were spending sleepless nights to ensure that situation normalised, “said Chipasula.
The MLW’s head of operations touched on the economic status of MLW saying currently the institution will be operating within a tight budget with a 2-year core grant extension from the Wellcome.
“Our 5-year Core grant expired, and we are yet to pitch our new budget to our funders, as we are waiting for a 2-year core grant extension. In this interest, our budget has been trimmed for example there is no money for constructions during the extended period. However, in the next core grant renewal we are expected to pitch 7 years grant renewal,” said the head of operations.
