About us

Malawi Red Cross Society (MRCS) was established by Chapter 18:09 of the Laws of Malawi by Parliament in 1966 (Act 51) as a humanitarian organisation with established presence across all Government administrative districts. It became a member of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in 1971.

“Giving hope to those in need” is the vision for Malawi Red Cross Society pivotal to the organizations interventions and its mission is to alleviate human suffering and improve quality of life of vulnerable people through humanitarian Aid, relief, short term and long-term development, partnerships, engagement and dissemination of the movement’s fundamental principles. 

The Malawi Red Cross Society was originally established as a relief organization. However, over the years the Society has diversified and strengthened its programming portfolio to blend development aspects in its humanitarian interventions.  

Organizational Structure  

MRCS has an organizational structure covering governance and management levels to support the implementation of its mandate. At governance level, the council is the highest body comprising of representatives/council members from 28 Divisions, one in each of the 28 government administrative districts of the country. This body is responsible for policy direction. The National Executives Committee (NEC) is elected by the council to ensure that policies endorsed are implemented accordingly with the leadership of the president. Under the NEC, are division and sub division committees that derive from a network of over 85,000 volunteer members across the country.

At management level, the Secretary General is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) who reports to the NEC The functions of the secretariat are sub divided into programs and services. Programs include Disaster Management, Health and Care and Branch Development. Services include Planning, Quality & Learning, Finance, Transport, Human Resource, Information, Communications, Resource Mobilisation and Logistics.

Malawi Red Cross Society Programmes

MRCS implements both short term and long-term programs focusing on Health Care, Water Sanitation & Hygiene promotion, Community Resilience, Vulnerable children’s interventions, first aid and Blood donor mobilization, Branch & Youth Development, restoring family links, Community-integrated disaster risk reduction interventions, Response & Recovery focusing on livelihoods and resilience building initiatives.

According to the aforementioned thematic areas, the national society has the following goals in its current strategic plan (2020-2024): 

  1. Safer and more resilient communities through comprehensive disaster management
  2. Increased access to and utilization of health services and encourage healthy behaviors 
  3. Strengthened branches, volunteer management, membership and youth engagement
  4. Increased resource base, effective service delivery & accountability.

MRCS has a pool of trained emergency team members who are engaged within 72 hours of the disaster. This is a clear manifestation of the readiness of the Red Cross to swiftly rise up to respond to urgent needs of emergencies. Further, the organisation has trained and vast experienced staff and volunteers in diverse humanitarian sectors, namely Health & WASH (55: 30M, 25F), Relief (61: 38M, 23F), First Aid (65: 31M, 34F), Shelter (37: 24M, 13F), Nutrition & Food Security (59: 27M, 32F), Protection, Gender & Inclusion (39: 17M, 21F), Data management (17: 11M, 6F), Communications (1 male), Cash transfer (39; 26M, 13F) among others. All humanitarian and resilience support interventions have been possible with close collaboration with DODMA, WFP and other stakeholders including strong network of community-based volunteers across the country.

Use of Software Platforms for Beneficiary Registration and Verification:

MRCS traditionally uses MEGA V in identification and registration of beneficiaries. The national society staff were fully trained in the system and use it regularly in the distributions of emergency and relief items. In addition, MRCS staff were also trained in SCOPE by the WFP. In this response, MRCS will use SCOPE in collaboration with WFP to manage the response. Furthermore, MRCS has vast experience in the use of ODK and Kobo collect. These skills will be vital and compliment to the use of the SCOPE. MRCS has tablets and scanners which can be released to the operation on arrangement with WFP in case of need.