Blantyre

Chief industrial and commercial centre of Malawi, in the Shire highlands in the south of the country at the foot of Mchiru Mountain; population (1998) 502,100, (2007 calc) 778,800. The largest city in Malawi, it produces tea, coffee, rubber, tobacco, textiles, and wood products.

The city originated in 1876 as a mission station operated by the Church of Scotland and was named after the explorer David Livingstone's birthplace in Scotland. Modern Blantyre was formed in 1956 by the union of the towns of Blantyre and the railway centre of and Limbe (8 km/5 mi away). It achieved city status in 1966.

Blantyre has a major railway station at Limbe through which Malawi's tobacco exports are shipped to Beira, Mozambique. It also has Malawi's biggest tobacco auction. The High Court of Malawi and the University of Malawi (1964) are in Blantyre. Its airport is at Chileka, 19 km/12 mi away.

Blantyre

Town in South Lanarkshire unitary authority, Scotland, near the River Clyde, adjoining northwest Hamilton, 12 km/8 mi southeast of Glasgow; population (2001) 17,300. The district was once a major coal producer, but engineering is now the principal industry, conducted on a large industrial estate.

Blantyre was the birthplace of the 19th-century explorer David Livingstone, and the tenement house where he grew up is now a museum, with displays recounting Livingstone's explorations in Africa. The ruins of Blantyre priory, founded in the late 13th century, are sited upriver on the banks of the Clyde.

Blantyre and north Hamilton suffer from high unemployment, and received a £3.5 million budget in 2001 to address youth unemployment and social exclusion over three years, as part of the Social Inclusion Partnerships Initiative.