Malawi Cash Transfers: Canva Founders Commit $150 Million
MALAWI · SOCIETY
Key Facts
—The gift: Cliff Obrecht and Melanie Perkins, Canva’s married co-founders, have committed $150 million to direct cash for Malawi’s poorest – $50 million from 2021 to 2023, plus a $100 million anchor pledge in October 2025.
—The record: The October pledge is the largest single gift in the history of GiveDirectly, the nonprofit running the programme.
—Delivered so far: About $52.5 million has reached Malawians since 2023, with the rest flowing over the next four years.
—The new phase: Payments of $550 per adult at district-wide scale, starting in Chiradzulu and aiming to reach 185,000 people by early 2027.
—Early results: In the Khongoni pilot area, GiveDirectly reports 90 percent of recipients rose above the extreme poverty line within three months, child mortality fell 48 percent and school enrolment rose 23 percent.
—The question: Whether simply handing people money can end extreme poverty faster than traditional aid – tested at the largest scale ever attempted in a low-income country.
Malawi cash transfers funded by Canva’s billionaire founders have reached $150 million in committed money. That powers the largest unconditional cash experiment ever tried in a low-income country, and early results suggest the simplest form of aid may be among the most effective.
Who is behind the Malawi cash transfers
Cliff Obrecht and Melanie Perkins are the married co-founders of Australian design software giant Canva. They have run the effort since 2021 through their Canva Foundation, in partnership with the nonprofit GiveDirectly.
The couple committed $50 million between 2021 and 2023. They then added a $100 million anchor pledge in October 2025.
That October gift is the largest single donation in GiveDirectly’s history. About $52.5 million has actually been delivered to Malawians since 2023, with the rest flowing over the next four years.
The pair built Canva into one of the world’s most valuable private software companies. They have pledged the bulk of their fortune to philanthropy, and the Malawi programme is the centrepiece of that promise.
How the programme works
The model is radical in its simplicity. It identifies the poorest adults and sends them money by mobile phone, with no conditions attached.
Recipients decide for themselves how to spend it. They can buy food, fix a roof, pay school fees or start a small business.
What began as a $10 million pilot has grown into the largest unconditional cash-transfer programme ever tried in a low-income country. The new phase delivers about $550 per adult at district-wide scale, starting in Chiradzulu in southern Malawi, and aims to reach 185,000 people by early 2027.
GiveDirectly has spent over a decade testing the model across East Africa. It built the mobile-money machinery that makes district-scale payments possible, and Malawi is where that machinery now runs at full speed.
What the early numbers show
In the Khongoni area, the programme paid every adult. GiveDirectly reported that 90 percent of recipients had risen above the extreme poverty line three months after receiving the cash.
It also recorded a 48 percent drop in child mortality, a 27 percent fall in illness and a 23 percent rise in school enrolment. Cash’s critics worry about local inflation, dependency and what happens when payments stop.
GiveDirectly says its studies show little evidence of either problem so far. But the district-scale phase will be the sternest test yet.
Those figures come from the organisation’s own monitoring and will face sterner academic tests as the programme grows. Still, they echo a decade of research suggesting direct cash outperforms many traditional forms of aid, per GiveDirectly.
Why Malawi, and why now
Malawi is one of the world’s poorest countries. Most of its people live on smallholder farms that are vulnerable to drought and fertiliser prices.
It is also stable and largely peaceful. That makes it a workable laboratory for district-scale delivery.
The timing is pointed, as traditional aid budgets have been slashed across the West. Tens of thousands of Malawian migrants have recently returned home from South Africa under the pressure of anti-immigrant campaigns, adding strain to rural households.
The stakes reach beyond one country. If district-scale cash works in Malawi, advocates argue, it offers a template for dozens of low-income countries where aid is shrinking and poverty is concentrated in the countryside.
A debate Latin America knows well
Readers in our home region will recognise the argument. Brazil’s Bolsa Família showed a generation ago that direct payments to poor families can cut poverty at national scale, and cash-transfer programmes now run across Latin America.
Mexico, Colombia and half the region run their own conditional variants. Economists still argue over strings versus no strings, and Malawi’s experiment lands squarely on the no-strings side.
The Malawi experiment pushes the idea further. It is unconditional, universal within a district, and funded by private tech wealth rather than a state.
If the results hold at scale, the case for cash as the default tool against extreme poverty gets much harder to ignore, per Billionaires.Africa.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much have Canva’s founders committed to Malawi cash transfers?
$150 million in total – $50 million between 2021 and 2023, plus a $100 million anchor commitment in October 2025, the largest single gift in GiveDirectly’s history.
How do the Malawi cash transfers work?
GiveDirectly sends about $550 per adult by mobile money, with no conditions attached, at district-wide scale – starting in Chiradzulu and targeting 185,000 people by early 2027.
What results has the programme reported?
In the Khongoni pilot, GiveDirectly reported 90 percent of recipients rose above the extreme poverty line within three months, child mortality fell 48 percent and school enrolment rose 23 percent.
Why is this experiment significant?
It is the largest unconditional cash-transfer programme ever tried in a low-income country, testing whether direct cash can end extreme poverty faster than traditional aid.
Connected Coverage
The economics of poverty run through our reporting on Ebola’s $3.6 billion economic shock and the exodus reshaping the region in The Silence of the Expelled. Follow the region on our Africa hub.
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