Background Notes : Malawi (05/08)
OFFICIAL NAME: Republic of Malawi
Geography Area: 118,484 sq. km. (45,747 sq. mi.); land the size of Pennsylvania, with a lake the size of Vermont. Cities: Capital–Lilongwe. Other cities–Blantyre (the commercial capital), Zomba, Mzuzu. Terrain: Plateaus, highlands, and valleys. Lake Malawi (formerly referred to as Lake Nyasa) comprises about 20% of total area. Climate: Predominately subtropical.
People Nationality: Noun and adjective–Malawian(s). Population (2007 est.): 13,603,181 (approximate figure for 2007 from National Statistics Office estimates). Annual growth rate (2006): 3.3%. Ethnic groups: Chewa, Nyanja, Tumbuka, Yao, Lomwe, Sena, Tonga, Ngoni, Ngonde, Asian, European. Religions: Protestant 55%, Roman Catholic 20%, Muslim 20%, indigenous beliefs 3%, other 2%. Languages: English (official), Chichewa (official), regional dialects, i.e., Chitumbuka, Chiyao, Chilomwe. Education: Years compulsory–none. Enrollment (2004)–primary, 82%. Literacy (2004 est., age 15 and older)–64%. Health: Infant mortality rate (2004)–76 deaths/1,000 live births. Life expectancy (at birth, 2005 est.)–40 yrs.
Government Type: Multi-party democracy. Independence: July 6, 1964. Constitution: May 18, 1995. Branches: Executive–president (the president is both chief of state and head of government), first and second vice presidents, cabinet. Legislative–unicameral National Assembly (193 members). Although the Malawian constitution provides for a Senate, in practice the legislative branch’s upper house does not exist. Judicial–High Court, Supreme Court of Appeal, subordinate Magistrate Courts. Administrative subdivisions: 28 districts. Political parties: Democratic Progressive Party (DPP, ruling party) United Democratic Front (UDF), Malawi Congress Party (MCP), Alliance for Democracy (AFORD), New Republican Party (NRP), National Democratic Alliance (NDA), People’s Progressive Movement (PPM), People’s Transformation Party (PETRA), and Congress for National Unity (CONU). MCP and UDF are the two main opposition parties in parliament. Suffrage: Universal at 18 years of age. Central government budget–2007/2008 budget is $1.2418 billion (MK 176.34 billion).
Economy GDP (2006 est.): $2.2 billion. Annual real GDP growth rate (2006): 7.9%; (2007 est.) 7.4%. Per capita GNI (2008 est.): Approx. $289.50. Avg. inflation rate (2005): 15.4%; (2006): 11%; (2007): 7%. Natural resources: Limestone, uranium (potential), coal, bauxite, phosphates, graphite, granite, black granite, vermilite, aquamarine, tourmaline, rubies, sapphires, rare earths. Agriculture (approx. 34.7% of GDP): Products–tobacco, sugar, cotton, tea, corn, potatoes, cassava (tapioca), sorghum, coffee, rice, groundnuts. Arable land–34%, of which 86% is cultivated. Industry (19.4% of GDP): Types–tea, tobacco, sugar, sawmill products, cement, consumer goods. Trade (2005 est.): Exports–$578 million: tobacco, tea, sugar, coffee, peanuts, wood products. Partners–U.S., U.K., South Africa, Germany, Japan. Imports–$1.066 billion: food, petroleum products, semimanufactures, consumer goods, transportation equipment. Partners–South Africa, Zimbabwe, Japan, U.S., U.K., Germany. Fiscal year: July 1-June 30.
Tags: dc, passport
May 18th, 2008 at 6:17 am
yes
You are correct in making that point. And thanks for posting the useful info about the ANN 
I’ll make sure that I go through them…Also I’d like to point out that the post talks about important points to take care of when working with ANNs (when you do not have any formal training in that field). The post also links to many useful resources like brainnet and AForge.Neuro etc.
May 18th, 2008 at 7:07 am
All of us have heard of Neural Networks and how ‘cool’ and ‘complex’ they are. What are they used for? When and why should we use Neural Networks? How to create your own neural network to perform an actual AI task? Everything explained in simple beginner’s terms as an effort towards building a module for Project Recog.
May 18th, 2008 at 7:58 am
Anyone implementing NNs needs to read Efficient Backprop!It’s a great simple paper with lots of “tricks of the trade” (the title of the book it’s from).
May 18th, 2008 at 8:48 am
With all due respect, this blog post didn’t explain anything except that it’s hard to learn about them from a textbook, that you can find info on wikipedia, and that other people use them.Here, let me help:”Machine Learning,” by Tom Mitchell is a good textbook on machine learning. It has a chapter on Neural Nets, but that is not the thrust of the book. Even so, the chapter gives a good enough run-through to get started.There is a treatment in “Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach,” by Russell and Norvig, but, again, that’s not the thrust of the book.I have one more reference, but I don’t want to get the author’s name wrong. The last book IS about neural nets. I’ll post it when I get back to my apartment.If you’re just looking to tinker with machine learning, I suggest Weka. It’s not hard to set up, but it is quite powerful.If you’ve got Matlab, it has a neural network toolbox in it, but I’ve never used it.
May 18th, 2008 at 9:39 am
Awesome looking film from Christian Bale and Werner Herzog
May 18th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Good deal. I wasn’t trying tp be discouraging or anything, just to point out where you might find some fairly good material.Also, you might want to cross-post to the programming reddit.