Why do 17,000 children under five die every day?

The overall rate of infant mortality has been halved in the past two decades.That's the good news. But Unicef' s latest figures estimate every day 17,000 under-fives die - 6.3 million a year - from largely preventable causes. Most of the deaths happen in the first hours or weeks following birth.

One of the eight Millennium Development Goals which was set in 2000 was to cut infant mortality by two-thirds. The aim had been to reach the target by the end of 2015, but at current progress it won't be achieved until 2026.

However, Malawi has achieved the target. According to Unicef, one of the keys to Malawi's success had been to correct information failure about infant health, with the creation of a network of health workers with basic skills, who lived and worked in the community. Their work focuses on simple matters like keeping infants warm, the importance of breastfeeding to boost immunity, use of mosquito nets, and providing vitamin A. This gives a great opportunity for a case study to be used by students of development economics - the BBC website has some great interactive data as well as a video explaining the issues, and an accompanying article.

Malawian officials are also dealing with the after-effects of a huge corruption scandal, which caused international donors to withhold aid until their governance is better managed - some information about this is given in a separate BBC article, with a link to further information, and it gives a rare opportunity to research some simple but effective evidence for the economic effects of corruption.