An island country east of Mozambique in southeastern Africa, Madagascar has a total land area of 587,041 sq km. It is the fourth-largest island in the world. In comparison, Madagascar is slightly less than twice the size of the state of Arizona in the U.S., or slightly smaller than Ukraine. The country’s climate is tropical on the coast, temperate inland and arid in the south. Of the total land area, only five percent is utilized for cultivated crops, with one percent of total land dedicated to permanent crops such as fruit- and nut-bearing trees. Deforestation and erosion, aggravated by the use of firewood as the primary source of fuel, are serious concerns for the nation. Other environmental issues include the lack of adequate water treatment and an increasing number of endangered flora and fauna species. Madagascar’s population is approximately 22 million. Nearly 80 percent of the country's inhabitants live in the countryside, where living conditions have steadily declined in recent years, particularly in terms of transport, health, education and market access. Poverty is also more prevalent in these areas: 76.7 percent of rural inhabitants are poor, compared with 52.1 percent of urban inhabitants. Agriculture, including fishing and forestry, is a mainstay of the economy, accounting for more than one-fourth of GDP and employing 80 percent of the population. Ongoing political strife over the last decade has hindered the nation’s ability to grow its GDP. As a result, tourism dropped more than 50 percent in 2009, and domestic and foreign investors remain wary due to the uncertain investment environment. However, agriculture remains strong with coffee, vanilla, meat and seafood topping the list of exports. Other agricultural products from Madagascar include sugarcane, cloves, cocoa, rice, cassava, beans, bananas, peanuts and livestock products.
Recent IFDC Projects in Madagascar
- Strategic Alliance for Agricultural Development in Africa (SAADA-B) – Urea Deep Placement (UDP) Trials, 2006-2011
The objective of SAADA-B is to expand IFDC activities and best practices developed in West Africa such as ISFM, UDP, fertilizer resource assessment and market information systems (MIS) into other regions of Africa. Specifically, this project expansion is designed to replicate the CASE approach and other aspects of the IFDC agribusiness model in select countries of East and southern Africa. Prior to the initiation of these SAADA-B activities, IFDC prepared the groundwork in a group of East African countries, establishing long-term projects in Malawi, Mozambique and Uganda. For this purpose, IFDC developed a framework for Agricultural Input Markets Strengthening (AIMS) and conducted country assessments in these pilot countries as well as Angola, Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia (among others). In Madagascar, efforts are focused on urea deep placement trials that are testing the viability and scalability of this advanced fertilizer technology.
