This paper analyzes the impact of a fertilizer subsidy program in Malawi on household food
security and the total annual per capita consumption expenditure. The study uses the nationally
representative two-wave Integrated Household Panel Survey (IHPS) data of 2010 and 2013. Fixed
effect and correlated random effect quantile regression models are employed to estimate the
conditional mean and heterogeneous effects of subsidized fertilizer. The study finds a positive
effect of subsidized fertilizer on the availability of kilocalories per capita per day, the number of
months of household food security, and the probability of a household being food secure over the
whole year. The study also finds heterogeneous effects of the program with relatively higher impact
on food secure households. However, the study finds no evidence of effects on annual per capita
consumption expenditure. These results suggests that farm input subsidy programs could be
beneficial for the improvement of food security, particularly of larger food crop producers, but
such programs are less useful when the main policy objective is to decrease poverty.