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Malawi vs Rwanda

On research quality in 2022-now, Malawi ranks #61 in the world and Rwanda #69, of 189 countries. Malawi stands higher in 3 of the 7 fields both publish in, Rwanda in 4.

Research profiles alike: 0.81very similar shapes of research, whatever their size. How it is measured

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Malawi

World rank, 2022-now
#61
#55 all time
Works, 2022-now
3k
fractional
Top-10% rate
9.5%
share of its work among the world's most cited
Open access
63%
of its works free to read

Strongest relative focus: Forestry, Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, Parasitology.

Rwanda

World rank, 2022-now
#69
#72 all time
Works, 2022-now
4.6k
fractional
Top-10% rate
10.2%
share of its work among the world's most cited
Open access
73%
of its works free to read

Strongest relative focus: Chemical Health and Safety, Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, Developmental Biology.

Who leads, measure by measure?

Rwanda leads on 5 of 9 measures: output, top-10% rate, open access, international co-authorship and growth. Malawi leads on 3 of 9 measures: research quality, excellence for its fields and citations per work. The two are level on institutions in the world top 100.

Malawi 31 level5 Rwanda
  1. #61Research qualityworld rank of 189 countries, 2022-now#69
  2. 1.12×Excellence for its fieldsits top-10% rate against what its topics predict; 1.00× is as expected0.99×
  3. 3kOutputfractional works, 2022-now4.6k
  4. 9.5%Top-10% rateshare of its works among the world's most cited10.2%
  5. 16.6Citations per workall time, per fractional work8.2
  6. 0World top 100institutions it holds among the world's best 1000
  7. 63%Open accessof its works free to read, all time73%
  8. 49%Internationalof its works written with co-authors abroad, all time57%
  9. +46%Growthworks in 2022-25 against 2018-21; half a bar is no change+111%

A rank is drawn as its standing: the longer the bar, the nearer the top. Anything else is drawn against the larger of the two, and two values a hair apart are called level. Quality, excellence and the top-10% rate are explained in the methodology.

Who leads in each field?

Malawi stands higher in 3 of 7 fields, Rwanda in 4. Rwanda leads most in Environmental Science (#56 against #72); Malawi leads most in Agricultural and Biological Sciences (#51 against #68). Each bar is that side's standing among all countries ranked in the field: the full bar is first place.

Malawi 34 Rwanda
  1. #51Agricultural and Biological Sciences#68
  2. -Business, Management and Accounting#78
  3. -Computer Science#75
  4. -Engineering#81
  5. #72Environmental Science#56
  6. #45Medicine#56
  7. #65Social Sciences#70

Standing is the percentile of world rank within each field, 2022-now; the printed number is the rank itself. A dash means the field is too small there to rank. How sides are compared.

The numbers behind each field

Click a heading to sort. The side that does better in a pair of columns is shaded: a lower rank, a higher rate, more works.

Field Malawi rankRwanda rank Malawi top 10%Rwanda top 10% Malawi worksRwanda works
Agricultural and Biological Sciences #51 #68 11.7% 13.9% 336 263
Business, Management and Accounting - #78 - 5.4% - 221
Computer Science - #75 - 9.3% - 301
Engineering - #81 - 8.8% - 331
Environmental Science #72 #56 7.4% 9.0% 275 374
Medicine #45 #56 11.8% 10.4% 641 890
Social Sciences #65 #70 8.2% 11.6% 534 799

What is each known for?

The keywords that describe each side's research, by fractional works in 2022-now and weighted toward what it does more of than the world.

Malawi

▲ more of its work than of the world's◆ about the world's share▼ less than the world's
All 40 words, with their numbers
  1. Epidemiology245▲ 1.73×119 topics
  2. Climate Change202▲ 2.1×103 topics
  3. Sustainability141▲ 1.62×81 topics
  4. Globalization99▲ 1.41×86 topics
  5. Environmental Impact98▲ 1.61×51 topics
  6. Maternal Mortality91▲ 11×5 topics
  7. Sustainable Agriculture88▲ 8.0×13 topics
  8. Community Health Workers87▲ 28×2 topics
  9. Antiretroviral Therapy80▲ 14×6 topics
  10. Health Inequalities76▲ 18×4 topics
  11. Socio-economic Factors75▲ 19×2 topics
  12. Biodiversity74▲ 2.8×32 topics
  13. Child Mortality74▲ 29×1 topic
  14. Health Systems74▲ 29×1 topic
  15. Smallholder Farmers73▲ 9.8×6 topics
  16. Child Development72▲ 5.0×8 topics
  17. Social Networks70▲ 7.2×9 topics
  18. Food Security65▲ 3.4×20 topics
  19. Biodiversity Conservation65▲ 4.8×16 topics
  20. Rural Development64▲ 5.3×15 topics
  21. Global Burden62▲ 3.2×12 topics
  22. Poverty Reduction62▲ 13×5 topics
  23. Vaccine60▲ 4.2×11 topics
  24. Colonialism58▲ 3.5×17 topics
  25. Genetic Diversity58▲ 3.8×20 topics
  26. Global Burden of Disease57▲ 6.5×4 topics
  27. Mortality Rates53▲ 16×2 topics
  28. Technology Adoption53▲ 8.0×6 topics
  29. Maternal and Child Undernutrition52▲ 18×1 topic
  30. Water Sanitation Hygiene52▲ 18×1 topic
  31. HIV Transmission51▲ 19×2 topics
  32. Gender Inequality48▲ 9.7×6 topics
  33. Viral Load47▲ 17×2 topics
  34. Vulnerability47▲ 5.7×8 topics
  35. Agricultural Innovation44▲ 27×3 topics
  36. Preexposure Prophylaxis44▲ 26×1 topic
  37. Stigma and Discrimination44▲ 26×1 topic
  38. Livelihood Diversification44▲ 39×1 topic
  39. Market Participation44▲ 39×1 topic
  40. Global Health42▲ 7.6×6 topics

Rwanda

▲ more of its work than of the world's◆ about the world's share▼ less than the world's
All 40 words, with their numbers
  1. Climate Change299▲ 1.99×104 topics
  2. Epidemiology291▲ 1.32×127 topics
  3. Machine Learning221▲ 1.20×84 topics
  4. Sustainability200▲ 1.48×92 topics
  5. Deep Learning169◆ 0.88×79 topics
  6. Education164▲ 1.73×70 topics
  7. Environmental Impact144▲ 1.53×58 topics
  8. Public Health141▲ 1.75×56 topics
  9. Educational Technology133▲ 2.0×30 topics
  10. Globalization129▲ 1.19×75 topics
  11. Remote Sensing123▲ 1.82×40 topics
  12. Supply Chain Management122▲ 2.5×21 topics
  13. Genocide120▲ 41×3 topics
  14. Politics114▲ 7.9×12 topics
  15. Maternal Mortality108▲ 8.7×5 topics
  16. Risk Factors106▲ 1.74×35 topics
  17. Media105▲ 13×5 topics
  18. Middle East105▲ 31×2 topics
  19. Qatar104▲ 104×1 topic
  20. Rwanda104▲ 104×1 topic
  21. Community Health Workers100▲ 20×2 topics
  22. Risk Management94▲ 3.6×14 topics
  23. Health Inequalities92▲ 14×5 topics
  24. Socio-economic Factors89▲ 14×3 topics
  25. Child Mortality89▲ 22×1 topic
  26. Health Systems89▲ 22×1 topic
  27. Teaching Strategies84▲ 5.4×5 topics
  28. Higher Education82▲ 2.8×22 topics
  29. Child Development82▲ 3.6×8 topics
  30. Ethical Considerations75▲ 3.9×15 topics
  31. Global Burden of Disease75▲ 5.5×4 topics
  32. Student Engagement74▲ 3.4×16 topics
  33. Medical Education71▲ 4.8×11 topics
  34. Technology Integration70▲ 4.0×10 topics
  35. Vaccine69▲ 3.1×11 topics
  36. Global Health68▲ 7.9×7 topics
  37. Maternal and Child Undernutrition63▲ 14×1 topic
  38. Water Sanitation Hygiene63▲ 14×1 topic
  39. Poverty Reduction60▲ 8.4×5 topics
  40. Surgical Care46▲ 15×2 topics

Size is fractional works in the topics tagged with each word; colour is the word's share of the side's work against its share of the world's. Each word links to the topic it comes from most.

How has their output grown?

Rwanda has out-published Malawi every year since 2019, when it overtook it.

still counting1k2kRwanda1,664 in 2025Malawi971 in 20251990200020102020

Fractional works per year.

Their share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share, because all of science grows. Each line is a side as a percentage of every work published that year.

still counting0.010%0.020%0.030%Rwanda0.028% in 2025Malawi0.017% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

The share of each side's works, year by year, that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. The average of all institutions is 10.0% (why not 10%).

still counting10%20%Rwanda11.2% in 2025Malawi10.2% in 2025200020102020

A year with under 1% of the side's peak output is left out: a rate over a handful of papers says nothing. The latest years are still being cited.

Who holds more of the world's best institutions?

A country's average quality and the number of institutions it holds at the very top can disagree, and both are worth knowing. The counts are nested: an institution in the top 50 is also in the top 100.

Malawi 05 level0 Rwanda
  1. 0In the world top 500
  2. 0In the top 1000
  3. 0In the top 5000
  4. 0In the top 1,0000
  5. #51Elite capacityrank among 204 countries#51

Institutions ranked on research quality, 2022-now. Elite capacity counts a country's institutions by their worldwide rank, weighted so a place at #1 counts for more than one at #480.

Which publishes more research, Malawi or Rwanda?

Rwanda publishes 1.5× as much research as Malawi in 2022-now (4.6k against 3k fractional works).

Whose research has more impact, Malawi or Rwanda?

10.2% of Rwanda's research reaches the world's top 10% most cited, against 9.5% for Malawi.

Is Malawi or Rwanda growing faster?

Output in 2022-25 was +111% against 2018-21 for Rwanda, and +46% for Malawi.

Which has more open access research, Malawi or Rwanda?

73% of Rwanda's research is free to read, against 63% of Malawi's.

Which has more world-class institutions, Malawi or Rwanda?

Malawi holds 0 of the world's top 100 research institutions and Rwanda 0; in the top 1,000 it is 0 against 0.

Which institutions lead in each country?

The highest-ranked institutions on each side on research quality, 2022-now. The percentage is each institution's own top-10% rate: the share of its works that are among the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. Every figure stands alone, so they do not add up to 100%.

Malawi

  1. 1University of Malawi9.1% top 10% · 650 works
  2. 2Kamuzu Central Hospital12.3% top 10% · 279 works
  3. 3Ministry of Education Science and Technology7.7% top 10% · 312 works
  4. 4Mzuzu University6.9% top 10% · 241 works
  5. 5Malawi University of Science and Technology6.9% top 10% · 172 works
  6. 6Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources11.0% top 10% · 243 works

Rwanda

  1. 1University of Rwanda11.0% top 10% · 1.6k works
  2. 2University of Kigali6.7% top 10% · 612 works
  3. 3Ministry of Natural Resources12.5% top 10% · 458 works
  4. 4Rwanda Biomedical Center13.9% top 10% · 207 works
  5. 5University of Global Health Equity13.5% top 10% · 218 works
  6. 6Ministry of Education12.9% top 10% · 231 works

The number is the rank inside the country. The track on each row is the top-10% rate; the tick is the average of all institutions, 10.0% (how it is set): teal above it, red below. The ranking is the quality score, which compares the rate with what each institution's own topics predict and adds a small reward for size, so the rates do not fall in order.

Who are the top researchers on each side?

The most cited researchers on each side, among those ranked.

Malawi

  1. 1 Amelia Catharine Crampin #138,780 worldwide 23k citations · 372 works
  2. 2 Kelias Phiri Msyamboza #162,077 worldwide 12k citations · 53 works
  3. 3 Eduard E. Zijlstra #238,180 worldwide 4.8k citations · 91 works
  4. 4 Elsbeth Robson #239,786 worldwide 3k citations · 121 works
  5. 5 Felix Khuluza #244,579 worldwide 1.6k citations · 40 works

Rwanda

  1. 1 Corine Karema #100,026 worldwide 84k citations · 83 works
  2. 2 Claude Mambo Muvunyi #103,506 worldwide 4.7k citations · 224 works
  3. 3 Agnès Binagwaho #112,520 worldwide 24k citations · 297 works
  4. 4 Ainhoa Costas‐Chavarri #144,195 worldwide 4.1k citations · 51 works
  5. 5 Pierre Gashema #164,832 worldwide 531 citations · 71 works