DWAS extends MZUNI’s research footprint

The Department of Water and Sanitation (DWAS) is set to kickstart a new project funded by the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago’s (EPIC) Clean Air Programme. Mzuzu University’s lead, Dr. Brighton Chunga, says the new project is one of the 12 new projects that EPIC has awarded worldwide this year. In this project, Dr Chunga will collaborate with researchers in the USA, Ghana, and the UK to embark on a project called “Malawi Initiative for Clean Solutions” (MIfCAS).

Dr Chunga said that currently, there was no established stationary open-source long-term reference air quality monitoring station in Malawi. “This makes it difficult to understand trends and background levels of air pollution, a prerequisite for developing and implementing air pollution management and control strategies such as national ambient air quality standards,” he said. Dr. Chunga said this also makes it challenging to develop domain-specific calibration protocols for the use of lower capital-cost air quality monitoring approaches and identify sources of air pollution.

This project aims at establishing a comprehensive network of 32 stationary air quality monitoring sites focused on measuring PM2.5 levels in Malawi. It is co-designed to generate actionable, domain-specific, reliable, meaningful, open-source, and quantitative air quality data that can drive significant policy changes at the national level, ultimately improving public health outcomes.

MZUNI, as a hub, will spearhead data collection, management, and sharing with relevant stakeholders, including the Ministry of Health, Malawi Environment Protection Agency (MEPA), Malawi Bureau of Standards, Department of Climate Change and Meteorological Services, and international regulators.