Data-center law in Malawi

National jurisdiction · as of 2026-09-05

Malawi has no data-center-specific siting, permitting, or utility statute; a data-center project falls under the general investment framework of the Investment and Export Promotion Act, 2012, which established the Malawi Investment and Trade Centre and repealed the earlier Investment Promotion Act and Export Promotion Council Act.

The Act names agriculture, agro-processing, fisheries, forestry, manufacturing, mining and tourism as priority investment sectors, without naming information technology or data infrastructure as a distinct priority, though the Malawi Investment and Trade Centre may add other productive sectors with the Minister's approval.

No provision addresses electricity grid interconnection, water use, or air emissions specifically; an investor instead applies for an investment certificate and relies on the Centre's one-stop service to obtain other permits under separate written laws. An international investment-law tracker also lists a later Investment and Export Promotion Act, 2024, but its own text is not described here, so whether it has superseded the 2012 Act is not confirmed.

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Instruments on record

1 instrument on record, grouped by the family of approval each one governs.

Public agreements

What fiscal agreements attach a data center to its host jurisdiction?

Investment and Export Promotion Act, 2012

In force

Investment and Export Promotion Act, 2012 (No. 11 of 2012)

Applies to both

The Act establishes the Malawi Investment and Trade Centre and a framework of investment certificates administered by its Board and Chief Executive Officer: an investor applies for a certificate, the Board may approve it on terms and conditions it thinks fit, revoke it, or reject the application, and the Centre operates a one-stop service to obtain other relevant permits from public sector agencies.

Section 5 directs the Centre to accord priority to investment and export promotion in agriculture, agro-processing, fisheries, forestry, manufacturing, mining and tourism, and any other productive sector the Centre determines with the Minister's approval, without naming information technology or data infrastructure as a distinct sector. Section 12 states that nothing in the Act exempts an investor, exporter, public officer or authority from complying with any other written law.

Section 17 repeals the prior Export Promotion Council Act and Investment Promotion Act. Section 1 ties the Act's commencement to a date the Minister appoints by notice published in the Gazette, and the source read for this Act does not carry that notice's date.

Source: Full text of law

Every entry cites the instrument it describes. None of it is legal advice: verify a citation before relying on it. Full sourcing: read the methodology. The rest of the record: all jurisdictions.