Madagascar Retains 15 Million Acres as Nature Reserve

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In an effort to preserve wildlife and ecosystems in the region, as well as booster tourism revenues, the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar has reduced the destruction of its protected forests eight-fold. Madagascar, which is the world’s fourth largest island, is home to hundreds of species of various wildlife and vegetation. Conservationists are aiming to retain 15 millions acres as protected nature reserves.

“We need to do a lot. But the important thing is that the trend is in the right direction, which is not the case for every country in the world,” James MacKinnon, who works for Conservation International in Madagascar, told Reuters.

To date, the main causes of deforestation in Madagascar are clearing trees for farms and burning wood to make charcoal. However, since President Marc Ravalomanana vowed to ramp up environmental protection in 2003, a combination of tree-planting, community involvement and the extension of reserves have all contributed to less deforestation.

Madagascar’s long isolation from the neighboring continents has resulted in a unique mix of plants and animals, many found nowhere else in the world; some ecologists refer to Madagascar as the “eighth continent”. Of the 10,000 plants native to Madagascar, 90% are found nowhere else in the world. The island’s varied fauna and flora are endangered by human activity, as a third of its native vegetation has disappeared since the 1970s, and only 18% remains intact.

The eastern side of the island is home to tropical rainforests, while the western and southern sides, which lie in the rain shadow of the central highlands, are home to tropical dry forests, thorn forests, and deserts and xeric shrublands. Madagascar’s dry deciduous forests have been preserved generally better than the eastern rainforests or the high central plateau, presumably due to historically low population density and scarce water supplies.

Extensive deforestation has taken place in parts of the country. Slash-and-burn activity, locally called tavy, has occurred in the eastern and western dry forests as well as the on the central high plateau, reducing certain forest habitat and applying pressure to some endangered species. Slash-and-burn is a method sometimes used by shifting cultivators to create short-term yields from marginal soils. When practiced repeatedly without intervening fallow periods, the nutrient-poor soils may be exhausted or eroded to an unproductive state. The resulting increased surface runoff from burned lands has caused significant erosion and resulting high sedimentation to western rivers.

“We have a unique biodiversity,” the environment and tourism minister, Harison Edmond Randriarimanana said. “Eighty percent of our species are endemic. Our neighboring countries like Mauritius, the Seychelles or even Reunion cannot compete with us in this respect. We are going to sell this to tourists.”

According to researchers, deforestation in the tropics causes about 20% of all man-made carbon dioxide emissions.