Land grabbing

in Madagascar

Echoes and testimonies

from the field 2013
The authors sincerely and warmly thank all those who contributed to
the preparation of this report, including witnesses and interviewees who
accepted to share their impressions and information with us, translators
and interpreters both in Madagascar and in Europe, and all the people
who contributed with their comments to improve the report
 TABLE OF CONTENTS
FOREWORD A GLOBAL PHENOMENON

Written by INTRODUCTION CONTEXTUALISING LAND GRABBING

Giulia Franchi, Mamy IN MADAGASCAR
Rakotondrainibe,
Eric Hermann FIRST PART FRAMING THE ISSUE
Raparison, Philippe
Randrianarimanana 1. Cultural contextualization on the use of land in Madagascar
1.1. The sacred nature of ancestral land
Pictures 1.2. The existence of legitimate land rights for local communities
TerraProject
and Giulia Franchi 2. Legal Framework: what rights’ protection for Malagasy
peasants in the framework of land grabbing and the growing
Graphic design
Carlo Dojmi di Delupis commercial pressure on land?
2.1. Context: negligence of the State authorities towards the unwritten land
Produced by rights in the process of granting land to investors
Re:Common 2.2. The Malagasy law and the protection of unwritten land rights
www.recommon.org 2.2.1.The very weak protection of the rights of land usufruct during the
colonial era (1896-1960)
Contacts 2.2.2. The protection of the rights of land usufruct (unwritten land rights)
from the independence (from 1960 to date)
Re:Common:
Giulia Franchi
gfranchi@recommon.org SECOND PART PROJECTS AT GLANCE

Collectif pour la 3. Land: one resource, many drivers

Défense des Terres
Malgaches – TANY
Energy
3.1. Tozzi Green - Italy
Mamy Rakotondrainibe
3.2. Delta Petroli - Italy
patrimoine.malgache@
yahoo.fr Mining
3.3. Ambatovy – Canada/South Korea/Japan
Solidarité des 3.4. Mainland Mining - China
Intervenants sur le
Foncier – SIF Forestry
Eric Hermann Raparison 3.5. Mada Woodlands - Norway
sif@blueline.mg
Pharmaceutical Industry
3.6. LAICO/Bionexx - Libya/Madagascar/France

September 2013 Tourism

3.7. The case of Nosy Be

A special case: The «best investment project

in Madagascar»?
3.8. QMM/Rio Tinto - UK/Australia/Canada

4. Conclusions
Foreword

A GLOBAL PHENOMENON *

The word grabbing means clutching, seizing, snatching or even

looting. The association between the notion of grabbing and the
word land evokes a deeply worrying scenario. But who exactly is
grabbing what? And who from?
Let us start from the first assumption: this munities who are revoked their access to land
phenomenon is not new. Over the centuries, are disrupted; local economies are destroyed;
the control of land and natural resources has the culture, the social fabric, the very sense
been the leitmotiv behind colonial expansion. of identity of local populations risk being torn
Entire countries were created after forcing apart; small-scale agriculture and subsistence
people off their land and current attempts production are threatened; rural communi-
to impose Western development models on ties are deprived of their means of subsis-
a global scale in order to create new markets tence and the rights to use the resource they
and increase profits are possible depend on for their survival.
thanks to the control exercited This phenomenon
on natural resources. is accompanied This phenomenon is accompanied
by the growing by the growing and increasingly
Over the last few years, after and increasingly worrisome criminalisation of social
decades of forced globalisa- worrisome movements and people who stand
tion, neoliberal regimes and up for their rights, which is often
criminalisation of
widespread pillage of natural possible through the connivance
resources, a new form of land
social movements between political and corporative
grabbing started rearing its ugly interests, local police and private
head, showing its most virulent and conta- security. This process cannot be confined to a
gious features. specific area; it occurs in the global South as
well as the global North, wherever common
The new drivers are many and varied: land is resources are at risk and local communities
grabbed to grow food crops or biofuels, to de- choose not to give up.
velop the mining industry, to plant forests, to
build dams or other infrastructure, to develop But in order to better understand the new on-
touristic resorts, to mark the borders of natu- going rush for land it’s necessary to highlight
ral parks, to expand cities, to establish a mili- the links between the explosion of different
tary occupation for geopolitical interests or converging crises, which have contributed to
simply to possess it as safeguard against other transform land, traditionally not a typical in-
risks. The damages produced on those who vestment asset, into a very precious resource
live on or thanks to the land that gets grabbed to control as fast as possible:
are often similar and incalculable, regardless
of the actual reasons behind each event. Com- i) the food crisis and the declared need for
*Abstract from “Land Grabbers – Italy’s involvement in the
many countries to assure a constant supply
Great Land Grab” , Re:Common, June 2012. Available at: of cheap food by outsourcing food produc-
http://www.recommon.org/land-grabbers-italys-involve- tion, ii) the energy and climate crisis which,
ment-in-the-great-land-grab/ according to the current development model,

2 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

has produced the need to diversify energy
sources, boosting agrofuel demand, iii) the
financial crisis which, with huge amounts
of capital fleeing traditional markets for
more secure and profitable investments, has
further exacerbated speculation on food and
land.
The FAO food price index, which measures
price changes for a basket of basic food com-
modities, increased by over 70% between
early 2007 and mid-2008. At the same time,
the price of wheat rose by 80% while maize
prices went up by 90%1. The reason for this
extreme price volatility is only partly to do
with adverse climatic conditions, increased
production costs or greater demand for food
from emerging societies, as many try to
make us believe2. On the contrary, it can be
better understood if one considers that in
1 Scommettere sulla fame. Crisi finanziaria e speculazio-
ne su cibo e materie prime (Betting on hunger: financial
crisis and speculation on food and raw materials) Andrea
Baranes (ed), Fondazione Culturale Responsabilità Etica,
December 2010
2 Price Volatility in Food and Agricultural Markets: Policy
responses, Policy Report including contributions by: FAO,
IFAD, IMF, OECD, UNCTAD, WFP, the World Bank,
WTO, IFPRI, UN HLTF, 2nd June 2011.
several countries, for almost thirty years now,
domestic food production capacity has been
systematically dismantled to make way for an
increasing externally induced need for large-
scale export production. After the outbreak of
the financial crisis, speculative capital fleeing
from traditional markets discovered that
betting on people’s needs was by far more
lucrative3.
While in richer countries spikes in food prices
have caused a sudden drop in the purchasing
power of the weakest sections of society, the
world’s poorest populations have been pushed
into full-blown food emergency. After the
outbreak of the crisis, several governments,
especially in the Middle East and Asia, started
to reconsider their domestic food policies in a
rather vain attempt to avoid internal disor-
ders as well as social and political instability.
A number of governments thought they had
found a profitable solution by outsourcing
food production in order to assure sufficient,
regular and low-cost food supplies. In other
words, countries with large capitals but little
3 Il grande gioco della fame: scommetti sul cibo e divertiti
con la finanza speculative (The great hunger game: betting
on hunger and enjoying it thanks to speculative finance),
Andrea Baranes, Altreconomia Edizioni, 2011
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 3
farmland started going on a land shop- States, Brazil, the European Union and many
ping spree abroad, in Africa, Asia and Latin other governments have generally been re-
America, where land is a lot cheaper and garding with favour the worldwide expansion
local governments are often ready to make it of agrofuel production.
available to foreign investors,
even if this implies amend- Together with the All this was caused by the
ing current laws4. food crisis, the 2007- outbreak of the climate crisis
and by rising concerns over the
2008 financial crisis
Together with the food crisis, energy crisis, sparked by oil and
the 2007-2008 financial cri-
significantly contributed natural gas price volatility, as
sis significantly contributed to turn land into a oil importing countries have
to turn land into a strategic strategic capital asset for to depend on few and often
capital asset for new players new players other than politically unstable producing
other than traditional mul- traditional multinational countries. Consequently, agro-
tinational companies. After companies. fuel production was encouraged
the US subprime mortgage as an environmental-friendly
bubble burst and the hous- and “clean” alternative to fossil
ing market stopped being an extremely attrac- fuels. Thus, in the last few years, as a result
tive investment opportunity, huge amounts of of governments’ ambitious objectives to
capital fled traditional markets towards more blend biodiesel and bioethanol with tradi-
secure sources of profit. Since 2008, a well- tional transport fuel, agrofuel production has
equipped army of investment funds, pension skyrocketed. Demand has risen, laying the
funds, private equity funds, hedge funds and ground for an extremely lucrative business.
insurance companies have joined in a world- But, while wealthy countries strive to meet
wide land-grabbing spree5. Their conduct has their clean energy targets, prime farmland
led to a sudden rise in land prices, leaving lo- throughout the planet is switched from food
cal smallholders little room to manoeuvre, as to fuel6.
they are denied access to the land they need
for their survival and they are deprived of And agrofuel production is directly related to
their very means of subsistence. spikes in food prices and shrinking areas of
food producing land; similarly, it causes the
As far as these players are concerned, they expropriation of peasants’ land, the evic-
don’t always seize land for farming. Growing tion of peasants, shepherds and indigenous
global competition for agrofuel and large- communities from their territories and the
scale food production is only one side of the criminalisation of social movements opposing
story; several new international investors are this development model.
acquiring land as a guarantee against infla-
tion or as a way to access new markets and In short: problem is you can’t eat fuel.
hold dominant or monopolistic positions in
them as they expect those markets to become
very lucrative in the near future.
In the meantime, since 2007, the United

4 Seized! The 2008 land grab for food and financial security,
GRAIN, October 2008.
5 The vultures of land grabbing: the involvement of Euro-
pean Financial Companies in large-scale land acquisition
abroad, CRBM and Merian Research, 2010.
6 “Weathering the storms: land use and climate change”,
Shalmali Guttal, July 2011 in Defending the commons,
territories and the rights to food and water, Land Struggles,
LRAN Briefing Paper Series 2, August 2011.

4 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

MADAGASCAR
The regions concerned by the report
Introduction

CONTEXTUALISING LAND
GRABBING IN MADAGASCAR
For several years now, a global alert has been launched to this
spiraling land grab, which is mostly targeting developing (or rather
“impoverished”) countries worldwide.
Africa is at the forefront of this growing rush The fall of that regime through a military-
for land, largely justified with the implemen- civilian coup, leading to the establishment of
tation of investment projects to promote de- the new Transition Government, pushed the
velopment, but actually source of insecurity country into a catastrophic political crisis,
at all levels for local communities. with dramatic consequences at the economic
and social level for the local population.
The impacts and severity of this phenomenon According to World Bank figures, the pro-
are widely perceived by many affected com- tracted political crisis in Madagascar has, in
munities as a new form of colonization, as it fact, taken a heavy toll on the population. The
dispossesses them of the land on which they overall flat economic growth over the period
live, but also deprives them of 2009-13 created the conditions
their resources, their lifestyles The ugly face of for a sharp increase by more than
and their culture, exploiting 10% of the population living under
land grabbing in
their wealth. 2 dollars a day, reaching today
Madagascar was
the 92%7. Morever, Madagascar’s
Far from being spared, re- revealed to the longterm governance problems
source-rich Madagascar is in public opinion by the were worsened by the current
the front line of the appetites Daewoo deal in 2008 crisis, with a weakened rule of
of investors in search of ever law, increased insecurity, poor
more lucrative opportunites. governance in the exploitation of
natural resources, limited progress on the
The ugly face of land grabbing in Madagascar anti-corruption front, and poor transpar-
was revealed to the public opinion by the ency standards in the management of public
Daewoo deal in 2008, with the proposed lease resources8.
of 1.3 million hectares of arable land for 99
years to a subsidiary of the South Korean gi- If Madagascar, before 2009, was already
ant, for the cultivation of crops intended for among the poorest countries in the world, the
export. political crisis has only made matters worse.

The scandal increased the already ongoing

political mobilization against Marc Ravalo-
manana’s regime, mainly criticised for bad
governance and widely percieved as being
deaf and unresponsive to the worries of the
population.
7 “Madagascar: Measuring the Impact of the Political Cri-
sis”, Feature Story, World Bank, June 2013
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2013/06/05/
madagascar-measuring-the-impact-of-the-political-crisis
8 Madagascar: Chiffrer le couts élevés de l’impasse politique,
20 juin, 2013, Powerpoint presentation by Haleh Bridi,
Country Director, World Bank, Madagascar

6 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

The country is today experiencing a situation
of imminent serious food crisis, the most af-
fected being children: more than 50% of them
are suffering from chronic malnutrition9.
Agricultural production suffered the conse-
quences of the lack of inputs, difficulties in
marketing the products due to a degraded
road system, banditry and crops theft, in ad-
dition to natural disasters and the recent lo-
cust invasion10. Moreover, the country regis-
tered a sharp decline in the number of cattle11,
and also fishing met serious difficulties12. The
report of the United Nations Special Rappor-
teur on the Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter,
after his mission in Madagascar in July 2011
already highlighted all these risks13.
In absence of a coherent national strategy for
farming and breeding, the food crisis is hit- photo ©TerraProject
ting even harder.

Contrary to its assertions, in fact, it is widely tural investments. Moreover, it implemented

percieved that the transition power has
undertaken very few actions to support and
improve the conditions of small scale food
producers and to really oppose land grabbing
and other natural resources’ exploitation.
The Andry Rajoelina’s governments are, in
fact, perceived as having kept the policies
of the former President government, with
regard to international investments, sub-
stantially unchanged. (…) The government is
known for having concluded contracts in the
mining sector, discussed opportunities to sell
water access14 and it stayed open to agricul-
9 http://www.ambafrance-mada.org/appui-a-la-
lutte-contre-la ; http://www.afriquinfos.com/arti-
cles/2012/6/12/madagascar-enfants-moins-souffrent-
malnutrition-chronique-204059.asp
10 http://www.laverite.mg/index.php?option=com_co
ntent&view=article&id=1411:reseau-des-observatoires-
ruraux-importance-de-lagriculture&catid=4:economie;
http://www.fao.org/news/story/fr/item/178663/
11 http://www.lexpressmada.com/elevage-
madagascar/33107-le-cheptel-bovin-en-declin.html
12 http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2012/07/06/
comment-la-peche-europeenne-lese-madagas-
car_1730136_3244.html.
13 http://www.srfood.org/fr/mission-to-madagascar
14 http://hasinimadagasikara.mg/index.
a new regulation (Circulaire N°2010-321),
explicitly advocating land lease.15 According to
a report published in 2011 by the Observatoire
du Foncier (OF) of Madagascar, between 2005
and 2010, about 50 agribusiness projects
were announced or revealed in media and
research reports, with nearly 3,000,000 ha of
land being affected (65% for food production,
32% for biofuel, 3% for forest plantations)16.
However, on the paper presented at the Inter-
national Conference on Global Land Grabbing
held at Sussex University in April 2011, the
OF reported information of additional deals
which were not mapped in the other report,
proving that figures which only refer to large
php?option=com_content&task=view&id=245&Item
id=82
15 “From International Land Deals to Local Informal Agree-
ments: Regulations of and Local Reactions to Agricultural
Investments in Madagascar”, Burnod Perrine,Gingembre
Mathilde, Andrianirina Ratsialonana Rivo, and Rato-
voarinony Raphael, Paper presented at the International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing 6 - 8 April 2011
16 “After Daewoo ? Current Status and Perspective of
Large-Land Scale Acquisitions in Madagascar”, Observa-
toire du Foncier à Madagascar, CIRAD, ILC. Andrianirina
Ratsialonana, R., Ramarojohn, L., Burnod, P. and Teys-
sier, A., 2011

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 7

scale areas are not exhaustive, and that new concerns about the growing phenomenon in
deals occurred after 2009. These include the country.
deals promoted by both, foreign and domestic
investors, which are being negotiated for- In fact, despite the attempt of the new 2005
mally or informally, officially and unofficially, land policy to increase protection over cus-
at the local and regional level. Some of these tomary rights, the implementation of the new
deals are ongoing, others were suspended or norms and regulations still suffers from legal
never saw the light. omissions and shortcomings. And the tranfers
of land, of more or less vaste area, for pub-
A written statement submitted at the UN lic or private benefit, to foreign or domestic
Human Rights Council by the NGO Europe- actors, through lawful or unlawful manners,
Third World Center (CETIM) in early May continued. This phenomenon, beside posing
201317, refers to lack of legality and legiti- the problem of the legal framework and its
macy in the process of definition of contracts relevance, seriously questions the existence of
during the transition government. a rule of law and of good governance prac-
In other words, the loud mediatic echo tices against the scourge of corruption.
granted to the Daewoo scandal
managed to mask other agri- One of the most In Madagascar, the size of land
cultural projects of lesser scope pernicious aspect of concerned by on-going deals is
in Madagascar, setting the base these land transactions not necessarily an adequate cri-
for the more silent wave of land lies in the asymmetry terion for the definition of land
grabbing that is happening grabbing, that is not limited to
of the means for
today, with several investment transactions on large surfaces.
projects that keep being negoti-
negotiation between To minimize social unrest, in
ated, often behind closed doors. local communities and fact, investors developed diverse
This approach of the Malagasy investors strategies compared to what
authorities barely hides a policy they did elsewhere.
of appeasement and collusion with powerful
local and foreign investors. In Madagascar long-term leases seem pre-
ferred to purchases. During the Transition
In Madagascar land grabbing is translated period, investors often split up their project
into the takeover or acquisition of land sur- by negotiating contracts to establish pilot
faces which seriously affects the local com- projects on some smaller plots with even
munities’ customary right of usufruct and of shorter-term renewable leasing contracts.
legitimate occupation, mainly through evic-
tions from their land. Since 2009 the Collectif One of the most pernicious aspect of these
pour la Defense des Terres Malgaches has land transactions lies in the asymmetry of the
been strongly denouncing and exposing any means for negotiation between local com-
known attempt to do so18 , and in August 2011 munities and investors. Malagasy communi-
the Collectif launched the global petition ties, in fact, are often consulted, but a lack of
“Halt to landgrabbing”19, to share the growing information of the real impacts inherent to
these deals has sometimes led to acceptance
before, and regret later. To counterbalance
17 Exposé écrit présenté par Europe-Third World Center
(CETIM), organisation non gouvernamentale dotée du
the strong expertise and legal means made
statut consultatif général; 16 mai 2013, UN Human available to investors, a stronger alliance
Rights Council between competent and committed lawyers,
18 http://terresmalgaches.info peasants and civil society organisations is
19 http://terresmalgaches.info/spip.php?article40 proving to be of outmost importance.

8 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

Finally, the productive drive behind the use of
surfaces and territories does not represent a
significant criterion either. A widespread idea
is that land “acquisitions” in Madagascar are
intended to produce food crops to counter-
balance poverty and the repeated food crises.
However, in a global context of rising prices
of agricultural commodities, agribusiness is
increasingly attractive for large investors;
most of the agribusiness projects in Madagas-
car are meant to produce mostly agrofuels or
other crops, such as plants for pharmaceuti-
cal industry, and the food produced in the
framework of agribusiness projects is mostly
meant for export. Beside this, investors con-
tinue to develop all kinds of projects, with the
primary motivation to maximize profits.
Meanwhile, Malagasy peasants have a very
low probability of winning in the competition
for land that opposes them to the transna-
tional companies investing in Madagascar,
as most of them are smallholder families
producing for their subsistance on areas of
less than 1 hectare in average. The investors’
project may lead to a dangerous lack of food
availability for local communities, and to an
increase of their dependance to food import,
and their exposure to food price volatility.
This report is the result of a field mission to
Madagascar carried out in March-April 2013
in cooperation between the Collectif pour la
Défense des Terres Malgaches – TANY, the
malagasy platform of peasants organisations
and NGO Solidarité des Intervenants sur
le Foncier – SIF and the italian association
Re:Common.
Through a field survey on some sample proj-
ects, based on the testimony of direct partici-
pants and impacted communities, the report
intends to demonstrate that the pressure
exercited on Madagascar’s land and natural
resources, in the framework of the political
crisis, is growing, and the transition period
has seen the proliferation of land conflicts
throughout the territory, at the expense of lo-
cal people, peasants, breeders and fishermen.
In order not to expose the identities of wit-
nesses and interviewees, we decided not to
mention their names in the report.
The report is structured in two parts:
The first part aims at framing the issue,
highlighting the specific cultural and juridical
context in which land grabbing is taking place
in Madagascar. Understanding the cultural
context, (i.e the value of land and cattle rais-
ing for the Malagasy society), is of fundamen-
tal importance to explain why land grabbing
seriously jeopardizes the functioning and very
survival of local communities’ social, cultural
and economic systems. Similarily, the juridi-
cal overview is meant to be an effective tool
to explain how the legacy of colonialism is
still responsible of enforcing specific relations
of power in Madagascar for what concerns
land tenure. Moreover it aims at highlight-
ing the fact that, despite valuable attemps
to improve the legal framework to protect
customary rights and rights of ancestral use
over the land, the new laws still suffer from
shortcomings and omissions. This results into
a legislative vacuum and some contraddictory
approaches within the national legislation,
which are becoming effective tools for the
local government and multinational corpora-
tions to implement facts on the ground, that
dramatically affect the daily lives of local
communities.
The second part is an overview of some on
going projects in Madagascar that entail mov-
ing the control of land and natural resources
from the local communities to multiple trans-
national actors, with the related consequenc-
es. Through a number of cases, the report
highlights the diversity of investors coming
from around the world, but also the diversity
of the sectors in which they operate, ranging
from energy, mining, forestry, pharmaceutical
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 9
industry and tourism. Finally, the objective of
the report is to describe and to denounce the
mechanisms and practices that promote land
grabbing within the Malagasy cultural and le-
gal context. But, above all, it aims to support,
in this unequal fight, the resistance of the
Malagasy people, including peasants, breed-
ers and fishermen, relying on their words and
their struggles.

INDICATIVE TIMELINE OF MALAGASY

RECENT HISTORY AND KEY DATES

1896 Madagascar becomes a French colony

26th of June 1960 Declaration of Independence from the French colonial regime

2003 Promulgation of the Law 2003/028 on immigration, authorizing the pur-

chase of land by foreign entities with an investment of over 500.000 USD

May 2005 Launch of the Land Reform in Madagascar

August 2005 Amendment to the Mining Legislation

November 2006 Recognition of customary land rights within the land reform

January 2008 Promulgation of the Law 2007/036 allowing foreign companies relying on
a Malagasy subsidiary or a Malagasy business partner to purchase land

2007-2008 Global food crisis

Late 2008 Revelation of Daewoo Logistics Project on the leasing of 1.3 million hecta-
res of arable land in Madagascar

End 2008/beg. 2009 Demonstrations in Madagascar against the project

March 2009 Civil-military putsch in Madagascar: the new head of the regime an-
nounces the “end” of Daewoo project and the new government’s wil-
lingness to renegotiate major mining contracts

October 2010 Circular 321-10/MATD/SG/DGSF of the Ministry of Land Planning on the

procedures for the acquisition of large areas of land - over 2500 ha

Septembre 2011 Adoption of a roadmap out of the crisis which prohibits the government
from making new long term commitments, that will fall under the juri-
sdiction of the future government, after elections

10 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 FIRST PART
FRAMING THE ISSUE

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 11

1 CULTURAL CONTEXTUALISATION
ON THE USE OF LAND IN MADAGASCAR
Malagasy people have a visceral connection to the land. This is
summarized in the basic concept of “Tanindrazana”(ancestral land),
that symbolizes Madagascar as a whole.

1.1. The sacred nature of ancestral land
Tanindrazana is, in fact, at the heart of the
self-identification of the Malagasy in connec-
tion with their ancestors. They devote them
an unwavering worship, which was never
altered by the Christianization. Each family
has its own attachment to Tanindrazana, a
rural territory that marks the family’s origin
and its final destination.
Malagasy. It has almost a religious character21
because, in people’s belief, it represents the
Mother, the ancestors and God at the same
time. A Malagasy proverb says: “The land
is God’s first wife: it nurishes the living and
embraces the dead”22, referring to the three
myths: the myth of the land as wife of the
creator, the myth of the land as mother of the
first human couple and the myth of the land
perceived as divinity.

Indeed, the attachment of Malagasy people to If the rural territory of Tanindrazana is in-
their land is symbolized by perennial prac- habited by the ancestors, sometimes symboli-
tices from birth until their death, such as the cally identified through visible signs in the
underground burial of the pla- landscape such as rivers, trees
Because of its sacred and rocks, it is also the place to
centa, the tavony, or the repa-
triation of the deceased to their nature, land plays live for the community, with its
family tomb, the fasana, even if both a functional habitat, cultivated and grazing
the death occurs thousands of and a dysfunctional lands and hills (tanety)23.
kilometers away20. role in the social,
economic and political Because of its sacred nature,
The tombs or fasana, seeble on organization of land plays both a functional
quite the whole island, play a and a dysfunctional role in the
Malagasy society
central role in families’ unifica- social, economic and politi-
tion and identity and they are cal organization of Malagasy
subject to numerous fady, prohibitions or ta- society. Its functional role is evident through
boos. The tombs are the binding tool between the multiple activities that revolve around it
the living, the ancestors and God through the and whose effectiveness especially depends
land; for these reasons, land occupies a privi- on several parameters, including the choice
leged place in the hierarchy of values.
21 René RARIJAONA, Préface de Jean CARBONNIER
Beside its economic value, land is sacred to ; Le concept de propriété en droit foncier de Madagascar
(étude de sociologie juridique) ; UNIVERSITE DE
MADAGASCAR, Ed. CUJAS ; Paris ; 1967; pp.29-30.
20 C. Bidaud Rakotoarivony & M. Ratrimoarivony Terre
ancestrale ou Parc National? Entre légitimité sociale et 22 “Ny tany vadiben-janahary: mihary ny velona, manot-
légalité a Madagascar, Vertigo - volume 7 n. 2 September rona ny maty”
2006 23 See footnote 20

12 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

of what kind of land policy to apply. But land
is also one of the foundations capable of
triggering social and political destabilization
in Madagascar. The large number of land
disputes currently in courts reflect the impor-
tance of land (a consistent part of the current
cases debated in Malagasy courts are directly
or indirectly related to land issues)24, and the
lack of population knowledge about the laws
is the usual reason given for this25.

For Malagasy people land, as ancestors’ prop-

erty (Tanindrazana), is inalienable.

Beyond a common commitment to Tanindra-

zana, the Malagasy might have a diversified
relationship with the land depending on the
regions and on the characteristics of the land.
The consecutive population migration in the
past and current times, led to a cohabition of
Malagasy people coming from different re-
gions of Madagascar in nearly all rural areas, photo ©TerraProject
in small town and big towns of the island.

This attachment to the land results in a In the popular consciousness, the sale of land
widely spread opposition to the sale of land to to foreigners remains a taboo also today in
foreigners. Madagascar. But the Malagasy investment
legislation cancelled this ban in 2003, during
This precept has been observed since the the regime of President Marc Ravalomanana.
time of the royal monarchs. Its transgression While the Land Code continues to prohibit
by the King Radama II (1829 - 1863), was the sale of land to individual foreigners, the
the main cause that led to his assassination amendments to the laws in other fields have
on the night of May 11, 1863. The king had made foreign companies and investors able to
signed a charter on June 28, purchase land. The law 2003-028,
1855, at the benefit of the In the popular by fixing the terms for the orga-
French businessman Francois consciousness, the sale nization and control of immigra-
Joseph Lambert, who ran the of land to foreigners tion, authorizes the purchase of
private company “Menon remains a taboo also land by foreign companies with
Lambert & Co.”. Article 04 an investment of over USD 500
today in Madagascar
of the Charter allowed the 000. In January 2008, the Invest-
French to buy and exclusively ment Law 2007-036 allowed the
exploit land on the northern part of the same for those companies that can count on
island. This resulted in the King earning the a subsidiary company in Madagascar, without
charge of “selling out the country” to Euro- the investment amount criteria anymore. As
pean powers. we will see in the next chapter, it is enough
for a company to establish a subsidiary under
24 http://www.observatoire-foncier.mg/article-74/ Malagasy law, headed by a manager residing
25 http://www.observatoire-foncier.mg/article-66/

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 13

in Madagascar, and to obtain an authoriza-
tion for land acquisition according to Articles
12, 18 and 19 of Law 2007-036.

Further to this law promulgation, foreign

companies may easily buy land. However, the
frequent use of Malagasy subsidiary company
as figurehead makes the identification of for-
eign investors rather difficult in spite of rare
information revealed about such sales26.
In addition, the frequent collaboration of for-
eign companies with Malagasy managers or
associates makes the differenciation between
Malagasy and foreign investors difficult for
common citizens: more information is needed
about the shareholders and their respec-
tive participation as well as the kind of deal
concerned, sale or lease. Indeed, knowing the photo ©TerraProject
opposition of most Malagasy people to any
land sale to foreigners until now, the foreign
investors and their Malagasy associates or when Malagasy people were informed that
representatives on the field make sure to keep the deal referred not to a sale but to a lease,
the real nature of the deals hidden. So the people’s anger did not decrease, as 99 years of
information available to the public may lead land unavailability looked like a sale concern-
people to think that Malagasy investors are ing the consequences for the affected families’
more likely to buy large area of land, while lives and the loss of national sovereignty.
foreign lean to obtain long-term leases.
If the Malagasy consider the sale of land
More recently the land issue was one of the assets as a serious fault, if necessary, and as
main arguments put forward by the opposi- a last option, they would sell their land or
tion parties to escalate the Malagasy political rice fields when in need (long illnesses that
crisis in early 2009, and one of the reasons for require significant cash or incurring expenses
the current political crisis. The high Malagasy for the education of children in the city), but
authorities had engaged the Malagasy State this sale tends to meet two priorities:
in a process dealing with the promise of a
long-term renewable lease agreement of 99 • Preferably selling only the land that one
years for an area of 1.3 million hectares with acquired for oneself, avoiding, as much as
the South Korean company Daewoo Logistics possible, to sell the land inherited from
to cultivate corn and palm oil to be exported ancestors
to South Korea. The opacity of the informa-
tion on this contract was interpreted by the • Preferably selling to other family mem-
opposition and the majority of the population, bers, neighbors or people coming from
even from outside the four concerned regions the same village, in order to keep the
- Sava, Atsinanana, Menabe and Melaky - as heritage within the community (tsy
an act of treason because it implied the sale mifindra tànana), in the hope to be able to
of Tanindrazana, the ancestors’ land. Even get it back later, or to make sure that the
land does not go to foreigners.
26 http://terresmalgaches.info/spip.php?article43

14 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

Moreover, the notion of collective usufruit
was the trend recognised more often, as far as
written records can be traced back, especially
since “the king Andrianampoinimerina (1787-
1810) who had established a feudal system of
the central highlands and imposed on other
parts of the island as his conquests. The land
had became the exclusive property of the
king. People could only count on the usufruct
of rice fields for their livelihood. On these
land, the right to enjoyment of fokonolona
(the traditional rural communities) was exer-
cised by local communities, who could not sell
it”27. Further to the acquisition of land titles
and certificates - ref to chapter below - and
the adoption of modern practices by some
Malagasy, the individual property tended to
expand, although a difference is still main-
tained between the lands inherited from
ancestors and those personally acquired28.
1.2. The existence of legitimate land
rights for local communities
In Madagascar, customary rights or legitimate
land rights have always coexisted with written
civil law. In this regard, following indepen-
dence, the fokonolona obtained the recogni-
tion of the rights of collective use of crops,
rangeland and pasture for livestock, fishing,
gathering or cutting wood for household use.
Customary occupations and practices are, in
fact, recognized by positive rights since the
end of colonization, but they are not respect-
ed by the State authorities, despite the fact
that the land law was designed starting from
the customary practices (peaceful occupation
according to the practices and customs of the
place, Ordinance 60-004 Article 11, 18, 26
and 31).
27 “L’accès coutumier aux ressources liées à la terre:
défendre l’indéfendable?”, Ramarolanto Ratiaray, Saholy
Rambinintraotra, in Géopolitique et Environment, page
99-100
28 M. Omrane, Accès à la terre, dynamíque démographìque
et ancestralité à Madagascar, Ed. L’Harmattan, 2008.
Customary rights practiced and claimed by
most rural inhabitants are based on the his-
torical lineage, the kinship ties and cultural
practices.
In addition to the land devoted to cultivation
and forests, grazing lands cover large areas of
the island. Breeding is extensively practiced
in Madagascar; in most regions the zebus (the
malagasy cows) occupies a prominent role
in the island’s culture, to the extent that it
becomes a true national cultural symbol.
Moreover, in the “big South” of Madagascar,
the zebus represents the main marker of
social recognition. The more one possesses
zebuss, the more he stands in the community
for wealth and importance, and this is a sign
of a successful life.
The value of the zebus also explains the
importance of the phenomenon of cattle theft
and trafficking committed by heavily armed
bandits, whose misdeeds have multiplied
since the beginning of the current crisis.
Historically, a founding principle in the Mala-
gasy land system is the exploitation of land,
intended as its enhancement and productive
use (cfr. fr. mise en valeur29). But it can take
several forms depending on cultural practices,
as evidenced by the case of cattle farming.
Furthermore, despite the low demographic
density in some parts of the island, Madagas-
car hosts various occupations and collective
land uses, as well as legitimate land rights.
By taking this carefully into account, it is
increasingly evident why Malagasy lands are
rarely free of occupation and rights.
It is obvious that, in this complex framework,
the increasing appetite for Malagasy land
sets a competition between foreign investors
themselves, but most of all with the local
people, whose land rights suffer from a long-
standing legal insecurity, still in place today.
29 In absence of a better and more appropriate word to
translate into English the concept of “mise en valeur”,
the words “enhancement, productive use and develop-
ment” will be used in the report.
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 15
2 LEGAL FRAMEWORK
What rights’ protection for malagasy peasants and herders in the
framework of land grabbing and the growing commercial pressure
on land?

2.1 Context: negligence of the State It should be noted that the distinction
authorities towards unwritten land between foreign and domestic investors is
difficult, especially after the promulgation
rights in the process of granting land
of the law 2007 036. One year before, in
to investors
May 2006, a major decision was taken with
the establishment of the Economic Develop-
For decades, the governments who have
ment Board of Madagascar – EDBM, with
succeeded in Madagascar, have adopted an
the objectives of strengthening the national
investment policy based on the attraction of
private sector competitivity by bringing sup-
foreign direct investment (FDI). Agricultural
portive solutions to find partners, to elaborate
lands are the target of a true “appetite”, since
business plans, to increase the foreign direct
large areas in Madagascar are considered
investments by promoting Madagascar as a
uncultivated, therefore allegedly available,
destination for investments, to elaborate and
because of the low population density and the
recommend incentive measures to boost in-
lack of planning for water management.
vestments in Madagascar and to assist inves-
The acquisition of land by foreign investors is
tors in implementing their projects. This body,
not officially put under discussion nowadays
financially supported by the World Bank, had
in Madagascar. The Constitution adopted in
non Magalasy managers at times and it was
November 2010 stipulates, in Article 1, that
defined by a Malagasy lawyer as the “bras
“the terms and conditions for the sale and the
armé” of the law 2007-03630.
lease of land to the benefit of foreigners are de-
termined by law”, but in practice, the approach
This process is also facilitated by the release
of the governments on this matter remains
of the Circular dated 20 October 2010 by the
arguable and not transparent.
Ministry of Planning and Decentralization
on the procedures of acquisition of land of
The problem of land grabbing in Madagascar
more than 2,500 ha in Madagascar, which
was brought to the attention of the gen-
mentions that to validate a long-term lease,
eral public with the Daewoo affaire, which
investors would be delivered a “special title”.
consisted in the intention of granting to the
This document name surely provokes a lot of
South Korean firm the direct control on 1.3
confusion on the field.
million ha of land. But since then, several
projects have been promoted, involving
Grabbing land would not be possible in
investors from different countries, and also
Madagascar without the support of the State
Malagasy themselves: Australians, Mauritians,
authorities because land acquisition, in the
Italians, Germans, English, Indians, Sri Lank-
ans, French.
30 http://www.cabinet-mci.com/669/les-innovations-
apportees-par-le-projet-de-loi-sur-les-investissements-3/

16 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

framework of the investments’ promotion 2.2 The Malagasy law and the
can not be achieved without an authorisation protection of unwritten land rights
issued by the competent authorities hav-
ing jurisdiction on the matter, which is the The legal provisions since 1896 until the
Minister in charge of land management. It adoption of Law No. 2005-019 of 17 Octo-
must be noted that, in the process of granting ber 2005 generated a paradoxical situation
land to investors, the State authority which is regarding the population’s perception of
responsible for land manage- the concept of property as
ment, does not guarantee Grabbing land would not defined in Article 544 of the
and protect the unwritten be possible in Madagascar Civil Code31. They stated that
rights of Malagasy nationals the lands which are not titled,
without the support of
on their land, even if they are deemed as State owner-
are protected by laws of 2005 the State authorities ship. However, the same
and 2006-031 now. because land acquisition,
legal provisions recognize
in the framework of the
also that this presumption
Due to the negligence of investments’ promotion of State ownership does not
the competent authorities can not be achieved apply on lands which are
towards the existence of without an authorisation occupied, individually or col-
unwritten land rights, the lectively, in effective, evident
implementation of these land and permanent manner.
investments has been causing everywhere From year 2005, the hegemony of the State in
problems to the peasants’ communities living land management, enshrined by the presump-
in areas where investment activities have tion of State ownership, was repealed and
taken place. Certainly, most Malagasy peas- replaced by the principle of presumption of
ants do not have written evidences confirm- private property. Since the enactment of Law
ing their land occupations, but the laws in No. 2005-019 of 17 October 2005, the rights
office, from the end of colonization to 2005, of usufruct on the lands which are occupied
have tolerated their rights of usufruct of the according to local customs and practices, are
land. protected and qualified at the legislative level
as untitled private lands, with the Municipali-
From the Land Reform of 2005, with the can- ties responsible of managing them, as grass-
cellation of the presumption of State owner- root territorial communities in their capacity
ship and the recognition of local rights, these of public entities of proximity.
land occupations should have been better
protected. 2.2.1 The very weak protection of the rights of
usufruct of the land during the colonial era
However, evidences from the ground show (1896-1960)
that the State authorities and/or the local
governments, during the process of granting In colonial times, the land policy and related
permission to land acquisitions, especially legal tools were among the main conquest
during land surveys, only consider the rights weapons of the French colonial state to mo-
which are formally recognized in writings. nopolize the Malagasy territory. This is the
Still, the protection of the rights of usu- reason why, in the early months of Mada-
fruct of the land, generally tolerated during gascar annexation to France, a law on land
colonization but recognized on the “réserves
indigènes”, has been strengthened by the
31 “The property is the right to enjoy and dispose of things
2005 land policy and by the related legal texts in the most absolute manner, provided it is not done in a way
responsible for its implementation. which is prohibited by law or existing regulations.”

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 17


property was enacted by the Queen Ranava-
lona III, on March 9, 1896, referred by the
Resident General of the French Republic Hip-
polyte Laroche, under pressure and in favor
of the French colonial State to organize and
manage indigenous land. This land policy was
aimed at exploiting the agricultural poten-
tial of Madagascar to refuel of raw materials
the industrial needs of France. To do so, the
colonial State, through this law, strengthened
the presumption of State ownership, eminent
domain of the king at the time, through the
“Torrens Act” system, which aimed at pin-
ning down and formalizing land ownership
through the Land Registry.
Since nobody in Madagascar, at the time, did
own written documents to prove his land
rights, this law through Articles 2, 4 and 6,
recognized the indigenous occupation of land
plots on which people built houses and grew
food before the enactment of the Land Law.
This right of usufruct, which would be a clear
limit to the presumption of State owner-
ship, was in fact weakened by the decree
of September 28, 1926, which required the
submission of written evidence to prove the
existence of the right of usufruct of the land
in order to rebut the presumption of State
18 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
photo ©TerraProject
ownership: “the State is presumed owner of
all lands which were undeveloped and unregis-
tered on the day of promulgation of this decree
in the colony, and that are not owned by third
parties under land title registration or regular
concession titles. This presumption may, how-
ever, be rebutted by contrary evidence establish-
ing, particularly with regard to the indigenous
people, that their property predates the Act of
9 March 1896. The testimony will not be in
this matter, accepted as evidence to oppose
the above established presumption.”32 Thus,
these occupations, without legally recognized
right of usufruct or written evidences, were
at a disadvantage vis-à-vis the presumption
of State ownership. This is the origin of the
mindset that emphasizes written rights over
unwritten ancestral rights.
2.2.2 The protection of the rights of land usu-
fruct (unwritten land rights) starting from
independence (from 1960 to date).
a. The role of unwritten land rights
from 1960 to 2005
From 1960 until 2005 it was Act No. 60-004
32 Art 29 of the decree of 28 September 1926 regulating
domain in Madagascar
of 15 February 1960, with several amend- exercited on their plots the three elements
ments, which enshrined the principle of State of the right to property under Article 544 of
ownership and was the main land regulation the Civil Code: usus or right of use, fructus or
in Madagascar. However, this act admitted the right to usufruct, (i.e.to collect the fruits
that the presumption of State ownership and products of the land), and abusus or the
had no effect on the rights of individual and right to dispose of the goods both practically
collective usufruct (Art. 11.18, 26 and 31)33, (transformation, destruction ...), and legally
subject to the fullfilment of certain condi- (sale, donation ...). Occupants without regis-
tions for the application of the tered land titles, but with private
registration procedure. The implementation of contracts or authenticated acts,
Since the presumption of the land registration used all forms of transfer of their
State ownership did not apply procedure, in fact, plots: leasing, estate sale, gift,
to the occupations defined destabilizes the mortgage, sharecropping (pro-
by previous dispositions, the occupants’ right of hibited by law, but widespread
population actually inter- usufruct and generalized). In addition,
preted the occupation as an the courts have accepted as
actual property, and in their proof those private documents
widespread practices, the occupants were not or authenticated acts regarding untitled but
limited to the enjoyment of the land, but they occupied land.

33 Article 11 of Law No. 60-004: “The State is presumed
owner of all unlicensed or non cadastered or unsuitable
land under regular concession, or under the rules of pub-
lic or private common law - however, this presumption
does not apply to persons or communities who occupy
the land on which they exercise the rights of individual
and collective usufruct that can be recognized and for-
malized by the issuance of a federal title in accordance
with this Act “
Article 18 of Law 60-004: “A part from the lands regis-
tered or cadastered on behalf of individuals or owned
under the regular concession of titles or according to the
common public or private law, occupants of Malagasy
nationality who exercise a personal actual, evident, and
permanent activity on the land control (activity resulting
either in construction or in effective, serious and long-
lastoing enhancement, use and development of the land
according to the custom of the time and place and the
vocation of the land) after ten years to the verification
may obtain a title with the conditions limited to less than
30 hectares”;
Article 26 “The Malagasy nationals who, at the date
of this Act, for over ten years, have been exercited
with good faith exclusive, personal, visible, unequivo-
cal, continuous and peaceful enjoyment on urban plots,
characterized by buildings or other durable development,
may obtain a title under the conditions and according to
the procedure laid down in Articles 18 and following “;
Article 31: “When people collectively exercise the rights
to enjoyment, development and use of land, upon which
the community residents, city or traditional community
with legal personality may obtain such lands in endow-
ment. The allocation will be accompanied by general and
specific conditions, whose failure of observance may
result in its reduction or even its suppression”.
However, these legally recognized occupa-
tions still held an inferior position vis-à-vis
the titled plots. The implementation of the
land registration procedure, in fact, could
destabilize the occupants’ right of usufruct
- considered by the population as property
rights; according to Ordinance No. 60-146
governing the registration system, the titles
that are not registered in the land register are
not opposeable to third parties, therefore they
are not guaranteed by the State and, most
important, they have no legal value. Thus,
the occupants without titles might be evicted
from their land if anyone else happened to
have a land title on the land they occupied.
In addition, the figures arranged by the land
administration did not report the situation
of all land occupations, but only those under
process of registration or those already titled.
Therefore actual occupations, even if recog-
nized by law, were not protected and legally
guaranteed. It needs to be taken into account
that the majority of the occupants did not
register their land so far, due to the complex-
ity and high cost of the procedures or to other
reasons.
This contradictory situation is expressed in

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 19

the existence of two forms of property: on
one side, a written land property and, on the
other side, an unwritten land property. Faced
with the principle of State ownership and the
system of registration, the unwritten land
property is very fragile; it might return to the
demanial statute or to be titled in the name
of others who had not officialized the occupa-
tion under legal provisions, but had asked a
title under their name.
Coexistence between the presumption of
State ownership and recognition of land occu-
pations amplified by the voluntary character
of the registration process, puts the occu-
pants in a very ambiguous situation. Vis-à-vis
the State law, the occupation of untitled land
under Articles 11, 18, 26 and 31 of the land
law (60-004) rests between the right of usu-
fruct and the ownership – transitional rights
that require registration in order to become
property rights. For cons, the local practices
regard the occupation of untitled land as
property right.
Lawyers’ anthropology publications on the
customary rights in Madagascar deserve a
specific attention nowadays, their work led
to the Law 96-025 named GELOSE law that
transferred the natural resources – mainly
the forests - management to local communi-
ties34.
b. The creation of a new land statute
with the aim of legally protecting the
right of usufruct of the land: the un-
titled private property
To ensure the protection of the rights of the
occupants and in order to achieve efficiency
and effectiveness of the legislation, the pre-
sumption of State ownership was repealed35,
34 E Leroy, Faire valoir indirect et gestion patrimoni-
ale - comment tenter de conjuguer juridiquement, équité,
conservation et développement en matière de fermages et de
métayages à Madagascar, 1996
35 Law No. 2008-014 of 23/07/08 on the private domain
of the State, Decentralized Government and legal entities
20 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
at the advantage of the right of usufruct, by
setting up the presumption of ownership for
the actual occupants of the land. Thus, the
occupied land are deemed property of their
occupants, with the presumption of private
property. According to Article 33 of Law
2005-019, land held under untitled property
rights are “all lands, in urban and rural areas,
where individual or collective influence is exer-
cited, with obvious and permanent activities, ac-
cording to the customs of the time and place and
according to the vocation of the land, which may
be considered property right by a domanial act.”
Indeed, the presumption of private property
was already expressed in an indirect way in
the law 60-004, under the Articles on the
rights of usufruct, but it is only the law 2005-
019 that formally reinforced it. Thus, this law
has officially transformed the presumption
of State ownership and it has automatically
modified the right of usufruct into property
right.
However, the State, as representative of the
Malagasy population and guarantor of the
general interest, must find legislative room
within the public or private domain, to carry
out its missions. In addition, the State is
constitutionally recognized as a guarantor of
individual property (Article 34 of the Consti-
tution of the Republic of Madagascar). Before
the 2005 law, there were only two officially
recognized legal statuses:
1. the domain of the State (and of those le-
gal public law entities divided into private
and public domain)
2. the private property, which represented
only the land titled on behalf of private in-
dividuals or on behalf of public law entities.
of public law. Taken from the preamble: “The cancella-
tion of the principle of the presumption of State ownership
and the establishment by law No. 2005-019 of 17 October
2005 of untitled private land establishing the status of land
in Madagascar involves a revision of the law on the national
private domain ... (first paragraph) “.

photo ©TerraProject
Another status was then added to Article 3 of
the Law 2005-019, concerning “land regard-
ing areas which are subject to a specific
protection regime,” but in reality they were
classified both under the State domain and
under private properties. The interest in the
explicit mention of this third status was that
of making the legislations referred to natural
resources’s protection compatible with the
legislations concerning land; for example the
Integral Nature Reserves (NIR) are more con-
sistent with the public domain lands, which
are imprescriptible, inalienable and unseiz-
able, and furthermore this new status will
enable to easily create land reserves.
The creation of another status of land, the
untitled private land, implies that local
practices are regulated by laws in the frame-
work of land tenure; another regime is then
created at the image of the local practices. As
a unitary State, the only way to avoid as much
as possible the monopolization of land man-
agement in Madagascar is by decentralization.
According to Article 136 of the Constitution
of the Third Republic, especially the second
paragraph: “the Local Authorities provide, with
the assistance of the State, public security, civil
defense, land administration and planning, eco-
nomic development, improving the quality of life.
In these areas, the law determines the allocation
of powers taking into account national and local
interests”.
The following laws have been enacted and
implemented to improve the decentralization
of land management:
• Law No. 2005-019 of 17 October 2005
laying down the principles for the land
statuses
• Law No. 2006-031 of 24 November 2006
on the legal regime of not titled private
land property, that attributes to the de-
centralized local government, the Munici-
pality, the power to guarantee property
rights on untitled private land
• Act No. 94-007 of 26 April 1995 relating
to the powers, competences and resourc-
es of regional and local authorities
• Act No. 94-008 of 26 April 1995 laying
down rules linked to the organization,
functioning and power of regional and
local authorities
The Law No. 2005-019 qualified as a frame-
work act, has the objective to determine in a
single document the various statuses of the
land and the principles to govern them. Each
land status defined in this law requires the
adoption of a specific legislation to recount
the details of the framework and related
issues, and the three statuses of land are
regulated through three legislative texts
respectively:
• untitled private property: Law No. 2006-
031 of 24 November 2006 intended to es-
tablish a legal regime of untitled private
land. Its implementing decree has already
been approved and enacted with Decree
No. 2007-1109 of 18 December 2007
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 21
• State property: Law No. 2008-013 on
private domain of 23 July 2008 and Law
No. 2008-014 on public domain. They are
meant to rule upon those lands which are
dependent to the domain of the State, of
decentralized authorities and other moral
entities of public law.
The laws governing the titled private proper-
ties and those lands subject to specific protec-
tion regimes are currently being developed.
c. Recognition, within the new land
policy, of the right of usufruct (unwrit-
ten land rights) on the land titled to
the Malagasy state.
The current legislation recognizes the public
usufruct of the lands which are titled under
the name of the State, in order to influence
the public to put at use the land within an
economic vision. This is the reason for which
paragraph 4 of Article 30 of Law No. 2008-
014 of 23 July 2008 on the private domain
of the State, and of the decentralized local
authorities and moral entities of public law,
allows people to collectively exercise the
rights of usufruct on lands which are titled in
the name of the State and of the decentral-
ized authorities;
d. The influence of the new land policy
and legal tools on other sectorial poli-
cies concerning land: coherence of the
new mining code provisions under
the letter of 2005 Land Policy on the
respect of the rights of usufruct and
rights of use
In 2005, the Malagasy Mining Code has
received an amendment. The Law No. 99-022
of 19 August 1999 fixing the Mining Code
and its implementing Decree No. 2006-910
of 19 December 2006 requires the holders of
mining permits who have only the right to ex-
ploit minerals in the subsoil, but do not hold
property rights on the land, to maintain good
neighborly relations both with the owner of
22 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
the land titles or land certificates, and with
the traditional occupants (Articles 125 to 129
of the law 2005-021 of 17 October 2005, Arti-
cles 307 to 365 of Decree No. 2006-910 of 19
December 2006). The consistency of the new
Mining Code with the law 2005-019 of Land
Reform remains a question to be discussed.
e. What legal status for grazing large
areas: an evident legislative vacuum
In Madagascar, especially in the regions of
Ihorombe, Menabe and in the Southwest
where extensive cattle raising is practiced,
the use of large areas of grazing land is an
ancient practice that is still implemented
until now. However, the legislation did not
advance a suitable solution on this matter.
Only the preamble of the law n ° 2006-031 of
24 November 2006 on the legal regime of un-
titled private land mentions it, by classifying
traditional grazing lands used at the family
level, as untitled private land; for what con-
cerns very large areas, they will be the object of
a specific law (preamble to the 2006 law). This
legal vacuum is explained by the vagueness
of Article 33 of law 2005-019 that qualifies
untitled private property in terms of: i) the
nature of the occupation, ii) the duration of
the occupation; iii) the size of the concerned
land. Before the 2005 land reform, grazing land
fell in the status of rural public land, which
could only be rented, with the possibility of sale
only for those portions managed under condi-
tions to be defined by the competent technical
services36. But despite this legal vacuum, it
is still not possible to reach the conclusion
that large grazing land areas fall within the
domain of the State.
In order to have legal provisions which meet
the reality on the ground concerning grazing
land, it would be necessary to conduct a deep
anthropological study.
36 Article 60 of Decree No. 64-025 of 21 May 1964
setting the terms of application of Act No. 60-004 of 15
February 1960 on the national private domain
2.3 What about the rights of Malagasy coming a valuable asset and are trying to evict
occupants on land titled on behalf of the Malagasy inhabitants who lived there and
cultivated the lands for decades.
the settlers?
In addition to the land plots titled by the
Grabbing land from Malagasy people began in
colons families, other kinds of land with ob-
the colonial period. Upon arrival, the installa-
solete statutes are still existing nowadays in
tion of the Land Service (Domains and Topo)
Madagascar, 53 years after the declaration of
was among the settlers’ priorities, in order
independence. Many Malagasy families have
to capture all the best and largest lands by
been living on those lands for decades, but do
registering them on behalf of the settlers, so
not hold any recognized right on them and
to produce the needed raw materials for the
cannot carry out any official procedure to ob-
french industries. After independence, Mala-
tain their property if they want to, while the
gasy people have taken up the exploitation of
blurred status of these lands may make them
their own land, even though, from the legal
more likely to be proposed to investors, keep-
point of view, the former colonial owners
ing the families living on them exposed to
can still claim their property through their
permanent insecurity. These lands are man-
descendants.
aged by the State since the independence:
The land plots titled in the name of foreigners
• The so-called “indigenous reserves”
during colonization were acquired through a
specifically assigned by the colonialist
process led by profound injustice. As of De-
system to the Malagasy people during
cember 14, 1960, the General Assembly of the
the colonization
United Nations declared the exercise of inde-
pendence from colonial countries and people,
• The “colonial concessions” previously
and Resolution 1514 was issued. It solemnly
used for the “culture de rente” such as
proclaims the need to put an end to colonial-
coffee, tobacco, sisal..
ism in all its forms and in all its manifesta-
tions, as soon as possible and unconditionally.
• In the same situation are the land on
which a “cadastral” process has started but
During colonization, many plots of land were
was not finalized37 and some other cases.
registered in the name of settlers in the land
register. When this period ended, the Mala-
gasy reclaimed their land through occupation,
in the areas around Analavory, Mampikony,
Mananjary, Morondava, Ambanja, etc.. Since
the law did not recognize as owner of the
land anyone else beside those registered in
the cadastral, the occupants were described
as squatters when the settlers’ descendants
started claiming the land taken by their
ancestors, act qualified by local inhabitants as
the perpetuation of colonialism.

Moreover, several descendants of the settlers

for decades did not show any interest for the
lands titled by their ancestors in Madagascar,
but they are coming back now that land is be- 37 Conseil Supérieur du Notariat, Mission d’Audit du
Foncier à Madagascar, 17-21 mai 2010 and footnot

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 23

List of reference legal texts
Constitution
• Constitution of the First Republic
• Constitution of the Second Republic
• Constitution of the Fourth Republic
• Constitution of 2010
Land Policy
—— Letter of Land Policy, 3rd of May 2005
Framework Law of the Land Reform
—— Law No. 2005-019 of 17 october 2005
laying down the principles governing the
status of land
Untitled Private Land Property
—— Act No. 2006-031 of 24 November 2006
on the legal regime of untitled private land
property
—— Decree No. 2007-1109 on the imple-
mentation of Law No. 2006-031 of 24 No-
vember 2006 establishing the legal regime
of untitled private land property
—— The legal procedures for the imple-
mentation of the decentralization of land
management: Explanatory Note
—— The land office staff: employee of the
Municipality
—— Note # 4315-MID/SG/DGD/DASD/S.
AT.A.SD of 20 June 1996 on the control
24 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
of legality on issues of Municipality officers
subject to recruitment decisions
Public domain
—— Act No. 2008-013 of 23 July 2008 on the
public domain
—— Decree No. 2008-1141 of 1 December
2008 on the implementation of Law No. 2008-
013 of 23 July 2008 on the public domain
Private domain
—— Act 2008-014 of 23 July 2008 Law on the
private domain of the State, of the regional
and local authorities and legal entities of
public law
—— Decree No. 2010-233 of 20 April 2010
laying down rules for the application of Law
No. 2008-014 of 23 July 2008 on the private
domain of the State, regional and local au-
thorities and legal entities of public law
Decentralization
—— Act No. 93-005 of 26 January 1994 on the
general policy of the decentralization policy
—— Act No. 94-007 of 26 April 1995 relating
to the powers, skills and resources of regional
and local authorities
—— Act No. 94-008 of 26 April 1995 laying
down rules on the organization, functioning
and powers of regional and local authorities
—— Act No. 95-005 of 21 June 1995 on the
budgets of regional and local authorities
—— OPCIs or association of municipalities?
—— Decree No. 99-952 of 15 December
regulating the creation, organization and
operation of a Public Body Intermunicipal
Cooperation
—— Ordinance No. 60-133 of 3 October 1960
on the general rules governing associations
—— Financial and Administrative Tribunal to
support the Municipality
—— Extract of the 2001-025 Act on Financial
and Administrative Tribunal Court
Investment
—— Act N ° 2007 036 14 January 2008 on
investments in Madagascar (OJ No. 3178 of 3
April 2008, p.2951 2960)
Applications to obtain large scale
areas of land
—— Ministerial Circular No. 321/10/MATD/
SG/DGSF 25 October 2010 on the instruc-
tions on the procedure to be followed in the
application field of large area
Mining
—— Act No. 99-022 of 19 August 1999 relat-
ing to the Mining Code (OJ No. 2595 of
August 30, 1999, pages 1978 and following),
as amended by Law n ° 2005-021 of 17 Octo-
ber 2005 (OJ No 3015 of 20 February 2006,
pages 1569-1597)
—— Decree No. 2006 910 of 19 December
2006 laying down detailed rules for the appli-
cation of Law No. 99022 of August 19, 1999
amended Mining Code by Law No. 2005 021
of 17 October 2005 (OJ No 3097 of 30 March
2007, pages 2397-2489)
—— Law No. 2001-031 of 8 October 2002
establishing a special regime for Large Scale
Investments in the Malagasy Mining Sector
(LGIM) modified by the law No. 2005-022 of
17 October 2005
Legal texts before the land reform of
2005
—— Act of 9 March 1896 on land conservation
regime of registration
—— Ordinance No. 62-110 of 1 October 1962,
relating to penalties for violation of the right
to property and the transfer to the State of
undeveloped properties
—— Ordinance No. 83-030 of 27 December
1983 to strengthen the protection, preserva-
tion and conservation of the national private
and public domain
—— Act 60-004 of 15 February on the national
private domain
—— Ordinance 60-146 of 3 October 1960 on
the tenure registration system
—— Ordinance No. 62-041 of 19 September
1962 concerning general provisions of na-
tional and international law
—— 62-042 Order of 19 September 1962 lay-
ing down general rules for the enhancement,
use and development of rural areas
—— Act 2003-029 of 27 August 2003 amend-
ing certain provisions of Ordinance 60-146
—— Ordinance 74-022 Order of 20 June 1974
defining the orientation of tenure and speci-
fying the terms and conditions for the execu-
tion of land development works in rural areas
—— Ordinance 73-073 of 1 December 1973 on
the orientation of rural development
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 25
—— Act No. 2005 - 019 of 17 October 2005
laying down the principles governing the
status of land
—— Act 2006-031 of 24 November 2006 on
the legal regime of untitled private land
property
—— Act No. 2008-014 of 23/07/08 on the
private domain of the State, decentralized
authorities and legal entities of public law
—— Act No. 2008-013 of 23 July 2008 on
the public domain
—— Decree of 4 February 1911
—— Decree of 28 September 1926 regulat-
ing land in Madagascar
—— Decree of 25 August concerning the
recognition and incorporation of the indig-
enous property in Madagascar
26 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
—— Decree of 28 February 1956 repealing the
decree of September 28, 1926
—— Decree 63-285 of 22 May 1963 regulating
the mode of application of Ordinance 62-042
on AMVR
—— Decree No. 63-526 of 9 May 1963, estab-
lishing the composition of the commissions
provided for in Articles 20 and 27 of Law No.
60-004
—— Decree 64-205 of 24 May 1964 on the
application of the law 60-004 of the domestic
private sector
—— Decree 60-529 of 28.12.60 regulating the
conditions of application of Ordinance 60-146
—— Decree No. 2003-908 of 2 September
2003 on the application of the law 2003-029
—— Decree No. 2006-866 establishing PNF as
a Public Institution
 SECOND PART
PROJECTS AT GLANCE

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 27

3 LAND: ONE RESOURCE,
MANY DRIVERS
Energy
3.1 Tozzi Green – Italy Region: IHOROMBE
Capital: Ihosy
“Jatropha is not even good to make a coffin” Area: 26.930 km2
(local saying in Ihorombe Region) Population: 400.000
inhabitants
Ihorombe is one of the 22 regions of Mada-
gascar, located in the South of the island.
The city of Ihosy, that gives the name to one
of the three Regions’ Districts, is the capital
of Ihorombe Region and of the Bara people,
estimated to account for about the 3% of the
overall Malagasy population.

With an area of about twenty six thousands

square kilometers, Ihorombe has one of the
lowest population density of the Malagasy
regions, about six inhabitants per square
kilometer.

Crossing Ihorombe Region, heading towards

Ihosy, means driving for tens of kilometers,
where rocky hills with rice fields on the
slopes give way to immense and neverending
grassy plains, trampled by small and large
herds of grazing zebus.
It must have been the enormity of this ap-
parently uninhabited spaces that attracted
the attention of Mr. Tozzi when he first flew
here from Italy, and gave birth to the idea of
BBI (Biomass Biofuel Ihorombe Project), to
develop plantations of jatropha on a surface,
“eventually to 100,000 ha by 2019”38.
38 http://www.tozzigreen.mg/?lang=en (visited on May
the 14th 2013)
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
The Project
According to the information published by
Tozzi Green39, a subsidiary company of the
Italian Tozzi Holding Group, and in particular
of the Tozzi Renewable Energy branch, the
company is operating in the agriculture and
renewable energy fields, currently imple-
menting the project Biomass Biofuel in the
plateau of Ihorombe.
The company cultivates in particular jatropha,
39 ibid.

28 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

Box 1
Jatropha: facts and myths
Companies involved in its
production hail it “the new
frontier of sustainability”
as they maintain that it
poses no obstacle or threat
to food security. In fact,
its supporters focus on the
fact that jatropha is not an
edible crop anyway and that
it grows on arid soils. Also,
it can be used as hedges
around fields – thus fighting
desertification, especially in
Africa – and it can be inter-
cropped with two or more
food crops.
However, several studies
show that jatropha is not
living up to expectations: its
yields are not satisfactory on
marginal land and large-
scale jatropha plantations
require high fertiliser, pes-
ticide and water inputs. The
combination of higher pro-
duction costs and low yields
often presents a disappoint-
ing picture. The unpredict-
ability of jatropha yields is
further aggravated by the
unpredictability of market
conditions, which seriously
affect economic viability.
Some producer countries are
starting to place moratoria
on jatropha cultivation; also,
political discussions within
the EU to revise its agrofuel
policies adds to the uncer-
tainty, making jatropha an
increasingly insecure invest-
ment.
Jatropha growing has also
had some dramatic impacts
on the environment and
on the life of some rural
communities living in pro-
ducer countries. Contrary to
what its supporters claim,
jatropha is often placed
in competition with food
production, both when it is
grown on very fertile land
and when it is planted on so-
called marginal lands, which
are vital for the livelihood of
subsistence farmers, herd-
ers, hunters and gatherers.
The destruction of these
means of subsistence is per-
manent while, on the other
hand, jatropha plantations
do not create enough well-
paid jobs to sustain thou-
sands of displaced people.
A Jatropha Plant
near Satrokala,
District of Ihosy,
Region of Ihorombe,
Madagascar
Photo Giulia Franchi
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 29
Valuable ecosystems are
being destroyed to make way
for jatropha and biodiver-
sity is being irreversibly
damaged. The much hailed
reductions in carbon dioxide
emissions are a far cry from
the truth too: emissions
resulting from the land-use
change of forests and pas-
toral drylands are far larger
than the potential carbon
savings from jatropha.
Large-scale jatropha grow-
ing is neither economically
viable nor environmentally
and socially sustainable1
1 Jatropha: Money doesn’t grow
on trees, Friends of the Earth
International, December 2010
an energetic crop used for the production of
agrofuel. However, we know from the com-
pany’s publications and from information
coming from the local communities that they
also started plantations of “dry beans and
grains, oil-yielding plants, plants for essential
oils, crops for biomass and for forage40.
Whether the jatropha production is meant to
be for local use or for export is still unclear,
since the pieces of information released by
the company on this matter, up until now, are
still contraddictory. On its website, in facts,
the company states that “the project output
will be devoted primarily to meeting the
country’s energy needs in view of increasing
demand”, (…) and that the “surplus output
can be exported and will be a source of hard
currency for the country”41.
However, in August 2009 the engineer Zom-
petta, Responsible for the development of the
biomass sector in Tozzi Renewable Energy,
had declared that the company “initiated
several projects for the construction of both solid
and liquid biomass power plants in southern
Italy. Since 2007 the need of internalisation of
biofuel supply has become strategic in order to
meet the growing price oscillations (in particular
the price of palm oil in 2008 reached an increase
of up to 300 percent). In these conditions of
uncertainty, it becomes very difficult to assess
the profitability and the cash flows of the various
projects and then also negotiate with banks any
funding.”42
Hence the decision to internalise the produc-
tion of agrofuel, focusing mostly on jatropha
that, compared to palm oil, is believed to have
several advantages: it is not edible, therefore
theoretically not in competition with the pro-
duction of food for the local populations, and
40 http://www.tananews.com/2012/11/tozzi-green-re-
ponse-aux-accusations-fallacieuses-et-erronees-lancees-
a-son-encontre/
41 ibid.
42 http://www.notiziariofarnesina.ilsole24ore.com/ar-
chivio_newsletters/Newsletter_07082009.pdf (visited in
May 2013)
30 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
can be grown in arid and otherwise unused
areas.
Whatever the final destination of the jatropha
production will be, according to local sources
interviewed during our visit in Ihorombe,
the company, in mid 2009, started travelling
accross the Region, and approaching several
communities to ask for land to implement its
plans.
A step back: whose land was targeted?
Who decided? According to which law?
On the 17th of August 2012 Tozzi Green
signed a long lease contract with the State of
Madagascar, in the person of Hajo H. Andria-
nainarivelo, Vice Prime Minister in charge of
Development and Country planning.
We had the possibility to access a copy of the
lease contract, which reads as follows:
“The Malagasy State leases to Tozzi Green 6558
ha located in the Rural Communes of Satro-
kala and Andiolava, District of Ihosy, Region of
Ihorombe (…) The land objects of this contract
consist in savanah and it is recognized as avail-
able (…). This lease is agreed for a duration of
thirty years with an annual fee of 3 Ariary per
square metre, for a total of 196.763.448,00 Ari-
ary” (about 10 euros per hectar per year).
According to the new procedures fixed with
the Circolar 321 of 25th of October 2010 de-
scribed in chapter 2 and hereby summarized
in Box 2, the signing of the lease contract
is supposed to be the last step of a long and
structured process.
As explained to us by the Director of Land
Administration at the Ministry of Manage-
ment and Country Planning, who guided us
through the “spirit” of the circolar:
“the circular guarantees an inclusive and trans-
parent process, with the participation of the local
communities. The multiple stakeholders involved
in a land acquisition process, investors and the

Picture 1. A copy of the contract
communities represented by the Municipality
which has the responsibility to inform and con-
sult them, will sign a convention. If the commu-
nities accept that the Mayor signs the convention,
it means that there won’t be any land conflict left
on the ground. In fact, before the signing of the
lease contract at the national level, there must
not be any conflict left”.
When we asked him what happens if a Mayor
signs a convention without the approval of
the people of the community, his firm answer
was:
“It’s impossible because consultation is compulso-
ry. Public consultations are always put in place.
After every consultation, minutes are dutifully
written and they are the base for drafting the
convention. And concerning people’s awareness
and participation to these assemblies, they are
announced to all the communities through local
media”.
Box 2
Instructions regarding the
procedure to follow for large
scale land acquisition
Given the “growing interest on large scale
land acquisition, and the lack of well-deter-
mined procedures, who often cause delays
in the process, confusion for the investors
and prevent the relevant authorities to take
well-informed decisions”1, in 2010 the
State of Madagascar decided to put in
place a structured system regarding the
procedure to follow for large scale land
acquisition.
With this purpose, the Ministry of De-
centralisation and Territorial Planning
issued the Circolar 321/10/MATD/S6/
DGSF.
In synthesis, the procedure to follow,
for a foreign investor interested in
accessing portions of land of 2500 ha
or more, includes the following steps:
i) the set up a business plan; ii) the
submission of a project’s dossier to the
Ministry in charge of land administra-
tion; iii) the evaluation of the project
by an Interministerial Committee; iv) a
field assessment, with inputs from the
local administration and consultation
with local communities; v) the boundary
marking of the targeted land, including
verification of absence of land conflict
on the ground; vi) the finalisation of the
dossier and the recognition to the right
to obtain a lease contract.
1 Circulaire 321/10/MATD/S6/DGSF, 25th
October 2010
In other words, according to the reas-
suring words of the Director of the Land
Administration, by the time Tozzi Green
signed the long lease contract in August
2012 all the possible land conflicts with
the concerned communities in the District
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 31
 Picture 2, 3. Pages 1 and 4 of the Circolar 321 of
25th of October 2010

of Ihosy should have already been solved.

Unfortunately, from our direct observation
and experiences in the villages, as we will see
in the following paragraphs, this is far from
being the reality on the ground.

Moreover, there’s the crucial issue of “bound-

aries marking” (bornage), a mandatory pro-
cedure foreign companies have to undergo in
order to secure their rights on the land and to
validate the lease contract.

As described in Chapter 2, practically speak-

ing, much of the land in Madagascar, follow-
ing colonial times, is not officially registered
as private property. The State, in order to be
able to lease a portion of land to a foreign
company has to mark its boundaries, and to
officially title it as State’s property. This is a
costy procedure, both financially and in terms
of the land conflicts it often produces when
the concerned land is “occupied” by peasants
and herders who reclaim their customary
rights over it, having cultivated it and grazed
their cattle there since the ancestors’ times.
This is exactly what happened with the case
of Tozzi Green. The majority of the people liv-
ing in the villages concerned by BBI Project,
and in the larger areas around, belong to the
Bara ethnicity. They live on cattle farming
and a great deal of Bara traditions and habits
revolve around this. They have been grazing
their herds for century on those lands, that
they consider as belonging to their ancestors.

As described in chapter 2, and as summarized

here in Box 3, starting from 2005 a series of
new land laws were adopted in Madagascar,
with the aim to clearly define the different
legal land statuses.

Until 2005, any untitled land or property fell

in the category of untitled state land, in other
words domanial land, at the disposal of the
State.

32 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


Summary of the recognised
Box 3
land statuses according to the
new land policy
To simplify the comprension, we include here
a list of the existing land statuses according to
the Malagasy Law:
DOMAIN OF THE STATE
• Public domain of the State: i.e. roads,
railways, sea shores, etc..
• Private domain of the State: i.e. private
domain assigned to a public service for its
mission implementation
PRIVATE PROPERTY
• Untitled private property (including cus-
tomary use)
• Titled private property
SPECIFIC STATUSES
• Protected areas, national parks, forests,
etc
But the law 2006-03 of the 24th of november
2006 introduced the status of untitled private
property, meant to protect customary rights.
What to do in the case the concerned land is
not titled but physically occupied or used by
customary rights?
It’s again the Director of the Land Adminis-
tration who attempted to clarify our doubts:
“There is surely a conflict of competence in the
law. If we take for example 2500 ha of land
(the threshold above which the Malagasy law
considers a portion of land as “large scale”)
all the statutes of land foreseen by the law will
surely coexist. Which law to apply then? In case
of insufficient “mise en valeur”43 of the land, the
presumption of State ownership (présomption de
domanialité) will apply”.
But we are not convinced. In fact, accord-
ing to a Malagasy lawyer we interviewed, the
authorisation granted to Tozzi Green to mark
43 enjoyment, use and development of the land
boundaries on the grazing land in the District
of Ihosy, is not in conformity with the new
legislation. What the Chief of the Land Ad-
ministration refers to, as présomption de doma-
nialité, does not exist anymore in the new law,
since the new law recognises the existence of
untitled private property, thus introducing
the presumption of private property for those
occupying the land.
However, to make things even more compli-
cated, we understood that the untitled private
property which protects and recognises the
customary rights, does not refer directly to
grazing land, thus creating a crucial legisla-
tive vacuum.
According to a land expert we had the oppor-
tunity to interview:
“I have the impression that the new land law was
left fuzzy on purpose, in order to leave the State
free to apply one status or the other according
to the need. And this is clear concerning the
issue of grazing land: on one side, the law at-
tempts to increase protection and recognition of
the customary right of land use. But then this
adds up to the perception that grazing does not
produce income for the State, so it’s better to
allocate land to those (i.e. foreign investors), who
have the means to generate added value. The
State doesn’t seem to have a clear vision on the
purpose for which the land policy was designed:
was it done to protect land tenure rights, or to
welcome investments and boost economic activi-
ties? They should have made a choice, but they
didn’t!”.
From these conversations, we realized that
despite significant steps forward, be it on pur-
pose or due to lack of attention, even the new
law are not without shortcomings and omis-
sions. In front of this scenario, and taking
into account that any legislative framework,
in order to be efficient and effective, should
reflect the reality on the ground, and not vice
versa, we decided to start our investigation by
listening to people.
These are their voices.
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 33
Stories from the fields…
W
e arrived in Ihosy the 22nd of March
2013, with the firm intention of
listening directly from the con-
cerned people the impact of BBI project, their
perception, the advantages or disadvantages,
the positive or negative consequences the
project has on the development of the local
communities and to verify the absence of
land conflict linked to the project.
In our quest for information we travelled
from one village to another, driving several
kilometers of red tracks to reach also very
remote communities of the area, directly ob-
serving the state of the art and the reactions
of the people.
Thanks to a well-enough detailed hand-made
map, elaborated by the local communities of
the area, first of all we could have a clear per-
ception of the area concerned by the project.
We understood that three out of the seven-
teen municipalities composing the District
of Ihosy were approached by Tozzi Green in
their quest for land: Satrokala, Andiolava and
Ambatolahy.
Out of these three, the company managed
to settle down in two of them, Satrokala and
Hand made map of the Region of Ihosy
Foto© TerraProject
34 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
Andiolava already in 2010, well before the
signing of the contract lease with the national
authorities in 2012.
During our stay in the area, we directly
visited eleven villages belonging to the above
mentioned three municipalities: Ivaro West,
Bevaho, Fenoarivo, Ambararatabe, Satrokala,
Hazofotsy, Manatamia, Ankotoriky, Ambon-
dro, Bemavo, Ambatolahy.
We spoke to the villages’ inhabitants, with
representatives of local authorities, of peas-
ants’ unions, with workers or former workers
of the concerned company. Most of them did
not expect us, and the majority of the inter-
views were arranged on the spot.
It’s thanks to these people’s testimonies that
we could draw the picture below.
Understanding the value of cattle
farming in Ihorombe
If in the foreign imagination lemurs and
chameleons are referring Madagascar, it’s
really the zebus the animal which holds a
real central role in Malagasy rural society.
And if zebus are important in Malagasy life
in general, they are fully ingrained into the
economic, cultural, spiritual and social life of
the Bara population living in Ihorombe.
“The life of us, Bara people, is totally depending
on cattle. The cattle is used as a bank by Bara
people. They are our savings accounts. We don’t
deposit our money in the bank, and if a special
need arises, for example to go to the hospital, we
will sell the cattle to obtain the money we need.
It’s our cash flow system. (…). Cattle also helps
us during the farming process to till the land,
by stepping on the soil they soften it, making it
easier for us to cultivate. Cattle is the basis of
all our life, including our faith. We believe that
our body is not a body if it can’t kill a zebus. A
wedding is not a wedding if a zebus does not get
killed. We treat deseases thanks to medications
coming from the zebus. When we get sick, there is

Our arrival in Ihosy, 22 March 2013
Foto© Giulia Franchi
a custom called “bilo”, which is considered by the
Bara as the most effective treatment of disease.
We prepare a medication to be used for about
a week. When the treatment is ended we kill a
zebus and the sick person drinks its blood.
When there is a death in the Bara community,
we must do a special ritual called “fampindry
hay” in which we kill a zebus while the dead
body is still a little warm.
At funerals, we do the “lofo”, another ritual, in
which we kill a zebus before the body is carried
to the tomb to be buried, and then we share it
with all the people from the countryside who at-
tend the funeral.
In the Bara community, marriages are arranged
by the parents of the bride and the groom. But
before the couple moves together in a house, they
must kill a zebus and drink its blood to wish the
best to the marriage and receive a blessing from
their parents.
There’s another ritual involving zebus which
is linked to circumcision, and another to make
vows to the ancestors if someone who was sick is
eventually healed.
Our whole life as Bara people is dependent upon
cattle.”
(Mayor of the rural Municipality of
Ambatolahy, District of Ihosy, Region of
Ihorombe)
In other words, Bara wealth, intended as
spiritual, social, and cultural, beside financial
wealth, is not measured in houses or cars or
money, but in the number of heads of zebus
a household or an individual owns. A rep-
resentative of the Chamber of the Farmers
in Ihorombe explained in even more details
the relevance of extensive farming for Bara
people:
“Livestock farmers here know very well where to
find green pasture for the cattle for example in
the dry season. They know the size of the needed
area for their cattle to survive, and they know
where to find it. They’re constantly in search for
green pastures, and this can be found today here,
and during the dry season somewhere else, which
is always wet. And if they have many cattle, and
the land they find is not enough for all, they split
the cattle in groups, scattering them in different
areas. Some people might say that Bara com-
munity should change the way they raise cattle
(and stop the extensive breeding), but who says
so doesn’t understand that zebus are their bank
account, that’s where they deposit their money or
wealth.
They are also means of production and tools that
allow people to help one another in the com-
munity. If a family has 1000 zebus, they share
them with their relatives, scattering the zebus
in different areas to allow the extended family to
make a living. This is fully embedded in the Bara
philosophy. Also, all the market depends on the
cattle, and this is not only in Ihorombe but in
all of Bara areas. If there’s a decline in the zebus
market, all the grocery stores and shops will be
affected because all the money in our Region
derives from the cattle market. There is no writ-
ten survey on this but it can be perceived by our
daily life. As we have seen before, when there is
a bad cattle business, nothing good will derive. I
would say that in our region the 70 percent of
the cashflow comes from the cattle market.”
(Representative of the Chamber of farmers -
Ihorombe)
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 35
What is jatropha? Village after village lava. They built a school there, although here is
the story of an unknown crop the place where they plant jatropha.
Some of us worked for a month with them not so
long time ago. They gave us work for a month
While travelling around the area of the
and that was it. I worked for a day and they paid
municipalities of Satrokala, Ambatolahy and
me 5,000 Ariary (about 1,5 euros). A person’s
Andiolava, we could directly perceive the
salary for a month does not even allow to buy
vastity of the land covered with plantation of
a zebus. That’s why there are not many people
jatropha at different stages of development.
who work for them from our village, wages are
We could also assess and verify the contigu-
not enough to make a living. Just children and
ity of the municipalities’ territories, and how
adolescents from the village work there but the
villages formally attached to one municipality
adults do not go because the salary is not enough.
are often closer to another one.
The job they ask us to do is to remove the weeds
around jatropha but they only ask us
We visited Ambararatabe, one of
“We can not accept to work in order to “soften” us and to
the villages within the municipality
of Satrokala. Since Satrokala is one this situation
take our rice fields and the grazing
areas of our zebus in return.My land
of the two municipalities included anymore, it does
not allow us to live, is among those taken and used for
in the lease contract signed by
it kills us, because it jatropha plantation. I cannot do any-
Tozzi Green, supposely the full
thing. They take your land and that’s
procedure of consultation with the imposes barriers.”
all. In Sakalahy (another village)
communities in the area should
there are even people who complained
have been implemented before the
in court because their lands were confiscated.
Mayor granted its authorisation to access the
Nobody accepts this situation here. Even our
village’s land, and the people’s needs should
zebus have nothing left to eat”.
have been listened to during the consultation
process.
(Quote of the conversations with the inhabit-
Here are the people’s reactions when we ants of Ambararatabe village)
asked about Tozzi Green and the jatropha
plantations:

“We can not accept this situation anymore, it does

not allow us to live, it kills us, because it imposes
barriers. Our zebus have almost no way to get to
their pasture, which is landlocked in the middle
of their (Tozzi Green’s) field. How do we live
in this situation? Even the water, which should
have arrived in our rice fields, was diverted and
no longer irrigates our fields. They diverted it
to plant jatropha. We do not even know what
jatropha is used for. We are afraid it might be to
build bombs. Can it kill us?(…)

All the lands where they managed to plant jat-

ropha belong to someone. But there’s really no
benefit coming from the jatropha for our village.
We know that they built a school, but in Andio-
Jatropha plantation on the road from Am-
bararatabe to Satrokala – March 2013,
foto © TerraProject

36 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 Heading towards
Satrokala, we started
figuring out the real
magnitude of the land
controlled by Tozzi
Green.

Jatropha plantations outside Satrokala village

foto © TerraProject

It was leaving Ambararatabe in the direction the guide accompanying us, these plants
of Satrokala that we made our first face-to- dated back almost one and half year, but they
face encounter with a jatropha plant in Mada- seemed to be very small.
gascar. We were surprised to see that the
plants seemed to be scattered around the area. It’s only by continuing to drive, for several
It didn’t look like what we had expected by a kilometers, heading towards Satrokala, that
jatropha plantation. Despite this apparently we started figuring out the real magnitude of
unorganised plantation, the plants do occupy the land controlled by Tozzi Green.
a large portion of land and the very existence For about 15 km before reaching Satrokala
of the crops prevents herders to access that all the sides of the road were covered with
land now. We were informed that if a plant jatropha plantations, still small, but increas-
of jatropha is destroyed by a zebus stepping ing in size and density the closer we got to
on it, the owner of the cattle will have to pay Satrokala. At the outskirts of the village we
back 40.000 Ariary (about 12 euros). saw plants which were one and half meter tall
with hanging fruits.
To tell the truth, the amount of this fine
varied in the testimonies of different people.
Some told us that the fine amounts to 40.000
Ariary, others to 80.000 Ar., others that they
have to pay the company back with a living
zebus. But most of the people we encountered
during our travelling in the area confirmed
that they are afraid to bring their cattle to
graze because of the money they would have
to pay if a zebus steps on the plants.

Despite the disturbancy posed to the herd-

Fruits of jatropha from plantations outside
ers of the area, the production in this area
Satrokala village foto © TerraProject
did not seem so flourishing. According to

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 37

 1

When we reached the entry of the municipal-

ity of Satrokala we had a clear view of Tozzi’s
presence.

Satrokala is a municipality with an estimated

population of about 10.000 people.
When we entered the Municipality we
realized that this is the core center of Tozzi
Green’s activity in Ihorombe Region.

At the end of Satrokala, a typical Malagasy

village consisting in a main umpaved road
animated by a mass of people and small busi-
nesses, there’s what the people of the area
call “Tozzi Green’s village”, a cluster of mod-
ern infrastructures controlled by guards at
the entrance, functioning as deposits, hous-
ing for the Company’s personnel, as well as
what it was referred to us as a medical center
under construction.
3
Under the canopies, tractors and other
modern agricultural machinery were parked,
together with several cars with the company’s and many refused but we can not oppose it. A
logo. person from Sakalahy (another village) tried to
oppose and complained in court, but ultimately
In the village we spoke with several people, he got scared and stopped his proceeding.
who accepted to tell us a bit what’s going on The truth is that people living in the actual
there. commune of Satrokala do not own much of the
land which is occupied by jatropha (…) and they
“Tozzi green is a company that deals primarily were enabled to earn daily wages. That’s why
with planting jatropha. They have been here for some people appreciate their presence. (We were
four years now. From what we know they could told that about 200 people from the village of
obtain land to plant jatropha through an order Satrokala were employed with Tozzi Green)
coming from our Mayor. Nobody agreed here But the people in the countryside around the

38 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 1. The health center built by Tozzi Green
in Satrokala – foto © TerraProject

2. The village of Satrokala

foto © TerraProject

3. “Tozzi village” – Satrokala

foto © TerraProject

At first, when they arrived, they built a medical

center but only the people who gave them land
for planting jatrophia could be treated free of
charge. However now, even if they took your
land and you or your children are sick, you must
pay. It was only for a year that the hospital was
free of charge, then it became paid care”.
(Excerpts of the conversations with the in-
habitants of Satrokala Village)
2
This story of the health center is a very sensi-
tive issue.
village area do not appreciate them at all. Es-
pecially among the peasants and herders, those Several people we met during our visits kept
who most need land, nobody agrees nor derives telling us that only those who accepted to
any benefit from their presence here. The result provide land to the company were able to be
of their presence among us is that the green treated free of charge.
grass pastures for our zebus no longer exist and
our animals are loosing weight. (…) The grazing However, in order to have a clearer idea we
lands were turned into jatropha plantation, and decided to ask directly the doctor working
they do not allow cattles to approach the areas there. At the time of our visit in Satrokala
where jatropha grows. They punish you when the health center was closed, so we decided
the zebus steps on the jatropha to search for the doctor in his
and that’s why people are afraid “At first, when they house, one on the newly built
and pay attention. (…) When the arrived, they built a cottages in Tozzi’s compound.
dry season comes, our zebus don’t medical center but only When we approached him, he
find anything to eat and start the people who gave gave us an overview, with
dying. Even if you have a ricefield pictures, of the main treat-
them land for planting
and the jatropha is planted next to ments provided by the center.
it, you have to make a long detour
jatropha could be
He showed us several pictures
up to 20 km to get to your ricefield treated free of charge.” of children’s diseases, and the
because it is forbidden to pass tables of the treatments effectu-
through the jatropha fields, even ated since the health center was opened in
with one or two zebus. We do not know what is February 2012. He explained that all the cen-
the use of jatropha. Our only advantage was the ter’s activities are paid by the Italian company,
wages we received by the work of jatropha. materials, personnel’s salaries, equipments.

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 39

To our question “who can access the medical Some other people living in Satrokala told us
services?” he directly answered with no hesi- that, beside jatropha, Tozzi Green is inter-
tation, and with a smile: “Everybody, and free ested in the land because of its underground.
of charge. People will only have to pay a little Many villagers think that what the company
bit for medicines if they need them”. is really after is precious stones, some even
spoke about diamonds.
Another sensitive issue apparently linked with
the large extension of jatropha cultivation at- Rumors about possible alternative business
tracted our attention: the closure of the zebus plans, whose veridicity cannot be confirmed
market in Satrokala. at this stage, keep spreading among the
people, among former company’s workers
We had been told that the traditional cow and through the web. There’s a rumor that
market in Satrokala, which used to attract speaks of the company having requested a
many sellers and buyers from the whole Dis- mortgage to a Bank in South Africa, using
trict, had been suspended. the land in Madagascar as collateral, in order
to implement other plans of exploitation of
Many of the zebus’s herders we spoke to the rich subsoil of the area. Former workers
claimed that the market’s closure is linked to informed us that the jatropha project is be-
the development of jatropha plantations, and ing abandoned, and that about 5 millions of
to the increasing difficulty for sellers to reach jatropha seedlings were thrown away in the
the market place with their herds. first months of the year, as the plan is now
changed. But again, these, for
In Satrokala some of the villag- “We don’t find anything the moment, are just rumors.
ers confirmed to us that: advantageous from the
planting of jatropha, Continuing our overview of the
“There is no more zebus market in because now there is no villages concerned by BBI proj-
Satrokala, the market is com- place for our zebus to ect, we met with people of the
pletely dead. One of the main feed themselves” village of Hazofotsy, who were
reasons for its closure is the fear also lamenting that:
of people to come here with their
cattle, as it may step on the fields of jatropha. “a white man growing jatropha named Gomez44,
Sometimes it did happen that a zebus stepped on took our land. Jatropha is a plant that they grow,
the fields, and the “jatropha vazaha” (the white but we have no idea at all of what it is for.”
man growing jatropha) made the cattle’s owner
pay a fine of 80,000 Ariary or a slaughtered ze- “The mayor sold the land and he didn’t tell us
bus. It was the jatropha that killed the Satrokala anything. (…) We don’t find anything advanta-
zebus market, whereas before the market was geous from the planting of jatropha, because now
flourishing”. there is no place for our zebus to feed themselves
and they are dying. We have about 200 zebus
In Ihosy some people told us that after the and 10 of them died recently because of the lack
cow market in Satrokala was shut down, of food. (…) We don’t accept it at all but we don’t
another market place was arranged in Ihosy. know what to do. We just want them to go back
But then, people from the area of Satrokala where they are from.”
had to travel for several kilometers with their
herds, once every two weeks, and this led to a
sharp increase in the cost of the cattle, and of
44 Gomez is the name of one of the company’s employ-
the meat. ees. He lives and works in Satrokala and everyone in the
villages of the area knows the company by his name.

40 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


And then again, in the nearby village of
Manatamia, in the Commune of Andiolava,
people don’t know Tozzi Green but they know
very well Gomez.“Gomez grows jatropha since
february last year (2012) and he messes up our
land. (…) He never spoke to the community. It’s
the Mayor of Andiolava who sold the land to
him”.
When we asked them “what is jatropha?” they
answered: “Jatropha is something we cannot
step on. (…) People don’t accept it, our zebus are
dying, the plantations disturb us, they trouble
our mind. We just want to be happy and our
zebus to be happy”.
In the village of Ankotoriky we sense how
much colonial times are still a very recent
past in this part of the world. The women of
the village are afraid of talking to some of us.
“We are afraid of white people” is the answer to
most of our questions. “We are afraid of you!”
But with the support of the Malagasy mem-
bers of our delegation we managed to com-
municate with them and their stories are the
same we’ve heard so far: “White people came
and planted jatropha. (…) I think jatropha is a
kind of leave. (…) I don’t know anyhing about
how they got the land, but we didn’t give them
permission because we don’t really like it. Our
zebus are getting skinny and they are suffering a
lot. (…). We are afraid.”
Cattles in Hazofotsy village - foto © TerraProject
In the neighbouring village of Ambondro,
which is part of the municipality of Satrokala,
we were again confronted with the famous
Gomez. “Gomez lives at Satrokala, he is a white
man who took our land to grow jatropha. He
started about one year ago. We didn’t accept it
because this land belongs to us since our ances-
tors. We don’t know what to do with the jatropha
(…) We get no benefit from it. And now our
zebus are suffering..”.
And then in
Bemavo vil-
lage: “Gomez is a
white man living
in Satrokala. He
grows something
called jatropha (...)
I don’t know what
it is but he grows
Cattle raising in Bemavo Village it on our land. He
foto © TerraProject came and measured
the land here and
there. He didn’ t ask the community but he spoke
to the Mayor and the head of our neighborhood.
I don’t know about their negotiations. There is
no benefit for us, they took our land, the land for
our zebus. And our zebus don’t have food now,
and this is a problem because the zebus are our
life here in the Bara community. (…) If possible
they should go away because there is no place left
to feed our zebus”.
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 41
The “special case” of the village of
Ambatolahy

In Ambatolahy, a very large rural municipality

of 1600 square kilometers, which includes 15
villages, the company faced the firm opposi-
tion of the Mayor who, after having held local
consultation with his people, decided not to
grant his authorization to the project.
Arrival in Ambatolahy foto © giulia franchi
We heard the full story from the mayor’s own
words:
“I think it was 2009 when two vazaha (white is a very bad idea to give a large area of land to
men) came to my office, accompanied by a foreigners!”
Malagasy as an interpreter. They wanted the
Municipality land to cultivate savoa (jatropha). To confirm and clarify once for all the posi-
I refused because our Municipality of Ambato- tion of the 15 villages composing the munici-
lahy already experienced something like that, pality of Ambatolahy, in November 2012 the
and we already faced the negative consequences inhabitants of the villages had addressed a
of giving land away. The former mayor before letter of complaint to the Chief of the District
me was overthrown because he gave land to a of Ihosy, of the Region of Ihorombe, to the
foreign company called Land- Président of the Court of Ihosy,
mark45 to grow corn, during “I think that there should to the Ministry of Interior, to the
the Ravalomanana regime46. be a new law regarding Prime Minister Office and to the
The company settled in the land ownership. For large President of the Transition.
commune of Ambatolahy and areas, decisions should
occupied large fields without The letter, undersigned by the
not be immediately taken
any previous authorisation representatives of the villages
from the people. The problem from above” attached to the municipality of
is that those fields were green Ambatolahy, and endorsed by
pasture areas where cattle feed on. About 98% the Mayor reads as follows:
of the people here make a living from raising
cattle. Can you imagine the reaction? If they use After having listened to “the presentation of
the land for their agricultural production, what “Tozzi Green Project”, for jatropha cultivation
will be left as food for the cattle? And there was in the Municipality of Satrokala and Andiolava,
no discussion with the people but everything was and its attempt to expand into the Municipality
decided by the central authorities. This is wrong. of Ambatolahy, we reject this monopolization of
I think that there should be a new law regard- very large surfaces that will result in enslaving
ing land ownership. For large areas, decisions us again. (….). We, representatives of the Vil-
should not be immediately taken from above, but lages of the Municipality of Ambatolahy refuse
there should be first of all a discussion with the any attempt of land grabbing coming from a
local communities. We already experienced it: it company or another. We would like to point out
to the new Presidency that the existing “Land-
45 An Indian investor project set up in the municipal- mark” project which aims to cultivate maize
ity of Ambatolahy, in the District of Ihosy, in Ihorombe in our Municipality has serious consequences
region on our local economy which is mainly based on
46 i.e. the former President who was overtrown after the the cattle and on our social and cultural Bara
Daewoo scandal in 2009

42 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


identity because:
• The zebus is the backbone of our medical
system
• The zebus is our only mean of survival
• The zebus is our tool of cultural exchange
• The zebus is our banking system
• The zebus is our connection to our ancestors
• The zebus is a currency of social and mutual
aid and it is our social cement
Also, we are ready to fight until the end anything
that might destroy our cultural heritage and
identity”.
Despite these statements and the consequent
firm refusal of the mayor of Ambatolahy to
make the municipality land available to the
company for the cultivation of jatropha, and
despite the fact that the municipality of Am-
batolahy is not listed among the concerned
municipalities in the lease contract signed by
Tozzi Green with the Malagasy State, accord-
The letter undersigned by th representatives of
the villages of the municipality of Ambatolahy
ing to the mayor, the company continued put-
ting pressure to expand anyway its operations
within the boundaries of his Municipality:
“there are 5 villages in my Municipality that are
now concerned by jatropha plantation: Jana,
Ivaro west, Anadabo, Maromiandra, Ambinani-
telo, because they are very close to Andiolava
and Satrokala. Regardless our disagreement, the
company tilled the land of Ivaro West village at
night time, and in the morning people found
facts on the ground”.
We went to Ivaro West, in the municipality
of Ambatolahy, where we had a joint meet-
ing with about thirty representatives of
the neighbouring villages of Ivaro, Behavo
and Fenoarivo. From the long chat we had
with them it was clear that the perception
of the vastity of the land we had been driv-
ing through is such only for those who are
unused to think of land in terms of cattle’s
pasture.
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 43
By only looking at a map, or driving through
the land, the Region of Ihorombe seems to
be huge, but they explained to us that, for
example, 100 zebus need about 10 hectares
of pasture land per day, and they cannot be
brought back to the same spot for about two
weeks, to give time for the grass to regenerate.
And each household, in average, has about
200 zebus!

“If something bad happens to our zebus it will

be a catastrophe for us, but also for you in
Antananarivo, as you won’t have any zebus for
your market either”, told us one of the people
participating to the meeting.
The inhabitants of the village of Ivaro West
complained about the fact that in November
2012 Tozzi Green started working in the land
of the village without authorisation and with-
out having ever consulted them:
“Nobody came to ask us permission. And even if
Tozzi had come to do so, we would have refused”.
As previously explained to us by the Mayor,
the Company should not even be there con-
sidering that the village of Ivaro West formal-
ly belongs to the municipality of Ambatolahy,
which is not included in the lease contract the
company signed with the Malagasy authori-
ties.
The inhabitants of the village mentioned
several plots of land being exploited, and in
particular they described to us the case of a
large area, in front of the village of Fenoarivo,
which is traditionally owned and used by the
people of Ivaro. We asked them to show us
the spot, and in order to have a rough idea
of the extension of that land, which clearily
appeared as having been recently tilled, we
drove along its borders and measured an ir-
regular triangular shape of about 1000 metres
on two sides.
We figured it could have added up to about 40
hectars of land.
Land in front of the village of Fenoarivo, tradi-
tionally belonging to the inhabitants of Ivaro
West, foto © TerraProject
In pasture’s terms, 400 heads of zebus had
been left with no easy access to food in that
area. According to the people of Ivaro West,
Behavo and Fenoarivo, Tozzi Green, has been
expanding its activity on the land they use
to feed about 6000 heads of cattle (i.e. about
600 ha), without consultation nor authorisa-
tion from the people of the area.
In September 2012 the inhabitants of Ivaro
West had written a letter to the Mayor:
“We the people of Ivaro West refuse the entrance
of Tozzu Gomezz47 in our village because there is
no land we can give out here. We need the land
to feed our families and our zebus (…)”
and near the signatures: “I confirm that I
refuse jatropha cultivation”.
At the bottom of the letter, upon receiving it,
the Mayor had confirmed:
“from the beginning, we have refused the intro-
duction of this project of jatropha cultivation, as
it does not correspond with the population needs.
October 1, 2012”
During our interview which was held few
months later the endorsement of this letter,
47 To be read “Tozzi Green”. Everywhere people know
the company by Gomez’s name

44 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


The letter of the inhabitants of Ivaro
West to the Mayor of Ambatolahy
in front of the evidences that the company
had started tilling the land of Ivaro West, the
Mayor appeared dismayed:
“I had obtained an order from Antananarivo that
suspends any extension (for the project), and I
provided the company with a copy of that order.
But I am surprised to find out that they were
able to get into our land anyway. I don’t know
what they want to do, I don’t understand. I
think that they should stop. I don’t know if there
was a new agreement from the national authori-
ties, It seems that they could not be stopped even
from the order.”
We also asked the Mayor why he thinks that
the Mayors of the other two municipalities
(Satrokala and Andiolava) accepted Tozzi
Green’s request.
He answered the following:
“Landmark in the past had settled only in
Ambatolahy so the other Mayors may not have
seen directly the negative consequences of it. The
Mayor of Satrokala was the first to let Tozzi
Green come in the area. They might have been
excited to see a big investor coming, and they
might have thought about possible job creation.
Unfortunately, what really happened, was sim-
ply a form of chasing the land owners. People
here make a living from cattle and rice farming.
Jatropha plantation destroys cattle lives. Even
if the company promised schools, hospitals and
roads, and whether they keep their promises or
not, it is not important. How many people do
they really employ for their project? For land
owners in our area, there is no benefit at all”.
And then he added:
“The jatropha project is not good for the people
here. Bara [people] don’t really understand what
jatropha is and what it’s for, it doesn’t have any
relationship with their life, it doesn’t bring any
blessing. It is not good at all because the fruits
of the jatropha cannot be eaten as food, the wood
from jatropha is not even good to make a coffin,
as people say here, it is not right at all. They
have been here for a long time but we don’t know
what the white people want to achieve with this
business. People here are wondering if this is just
an occupation of land, just a way to get a large
area of land. Maybe there is a political reason
behind this. But frankly, this is not good for
Bara people, because it will destroy their entire
economy. If possible it should be stopped.”
In Ambatolahy we also had a very participat-
ed, uninformal, and umprepared meeting in
Meeting with the people of Ambatolahy at the cafè
in the center of the village, foto © TerraProject
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 45
the central snack-bar of the village, in front
of the Municipality.
Many people wanted to share their stories
with us, and the conclusions didn’t differ
from what we had heard from the Mayor, but
they added many details.
“It was September 2009 when they came here the
first time with people from the regional authori-
ties. They were asking for land to grow jatropha,
you know, during the regimes of Ravalomanana
and Rajoelina, they want to give land to white
people. There is no agreement with the people
who are land owners but it is an obligation
from the president of the country. But we raise
so many zebus here. We have more than 50 000
zebus in the municipality of Ambatolahy, and
with the jatropha..... we can’t tolerate.... so we
refused. So they told us that in Satrokala people
had already accepted. But there is no place where
to graze the zebus.... if you mess up with the ze-
bus, you won’t get anything from here, because
it is the wealth that everyone cherishes here. For
example when there is a death in a family, we
kill a zebus. If there’s a wedding, we would kill
a zebus. When there is a new baby born, we also
kill a zebus. When there is no zebus, we cannot
live. We know the size of our land and we do not
agree with the planting of jatropha. We cannot
eat jatropha. After they came we had four large
meetings with all the 15 villages that compose
this municipality. And we prepared a document
with over a thousand signatures proving that
people from here refuse to give land. The paper
is now in the Land Office in Antananarivo.
We know that in Satrokala the Mayor accepted.
But the Mayor of Satrokala comes from An-
tananarivo. White people gave money. White
people have a lot of money (......)”
“In Satrokala if somebody is sick, Tozzi Green car
will take him to the hospital... If that person dies,
Tozzi Green car will take care of it. That’s what
they do. But this is only for those who agree with
them. They do not help people from our munici-
pality. And I know that people in Satrokala are
complaining also. They are suffering because
of the lack of land for zebus. There is no land to
46 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
feed the animals and also the zebus market is
dead. (…) But now it is difficult to send those
people away because they have already done
their planting. However the zebus are really suf-
fering, so it is not right, is it? They said that even
100 zebus are not worth one jatropha plant!”
An interesting fact the people of Ambatolahy
described to us is the ritual that Tozzi Green
followed in order to gain the acceptance
of the communities. We had already been
informed that Tozzi Green had received
some advises from people knowing the local
customs very well, that they needed to respect
some local rituals if they wanted to strength-
en their presence in the area and obtain the
trust of the people.
“When the white people came, they killed some
zebus and this is how they got the land. They
killed a zebus, and the people who participated
in the ritual and received the meat, filled out an
attendance sheet and the Mayor thought that
the people had approved the jatropha plantation
and he approved too. I think that people were
deceived”.
The meat sharing ritual is part of a Bara tradi-
tion which represents a sort of blood pact
among those who take part in it. Tozzi Green
understood very well the strength of it, and
the fact that the ritual would have been and
important step to undergo, through which
the communities were addressing the Gods
and the Ancestors to reassure them that they
were not selling off their land, but that it was
the State taking control of it for the common
benefit. But according to the testimonies we
collected, there was an additional step: dur-
ing the ritual, people who received the meat
signed a paper, and the common perception
is that this was used as the sign that they had
accepted to donate the land.
“It is not right. We have heard of the sufferings
of the communities in the other areas, we have
heard all of them. They are really suffering. My
idea is that it should all be stopped.”

“They have a hospital but it is a private hospital,
there is a kind of trap there.You go there for
healthcare and when you sign there, your land
will be taken away...”
“But in our commune, after the white men came
here to take our land we have made a “Dina” to
protect it.”
And this is how we discovered a very power-
ful social mechanism which was put in place
by the communities of Ambatolahy to protect
their land.
“The Dina is a community rule that protects the
land: anybody who lets white people come to our
land will be judged under this community rule.
The punishment will be that the person will be
no more admitted by the community, he will be
exiled. People are really afraid of this rule be-
cause those who break it will be no more part of
the family and the community. Everyone knows
it. Everyone is aware of it.”
An inhabitant of the village of Maromian-
dra, in the municipality of Ambatolahy, but
located 15 km from Andiolava, asked us to
listen to his story as well
An interesting fact the
people of Ambatolahy
described to us is the
ritual that Tozzi Green
followed in order to
gain the acceptance of
the communities...
“The first time they came on the 17th May 2011,
the second time on the 23rd of June, and then
also in November for the third time. I remember
all the dates. They came to me to ask for some
land to grow jatropha. There was a group of
five people who came to me. I don’t know their
names. There was a Malagasy lady, a white per-
son and other people from Antananarivo. They
said they were representatives from the topo-
graphical department and from the land office.
They told me that according to the map, most
of the land here is government land. Then they
said that they respect our traditions and customs,
and that they will respect all our fady (taboos),
and that we should negotiate and cooperate.
(…) They also said that they know very well the
statuses of the land here, and that whether we
accept to give the land or not, they will eventu-
ally get it!”.
The discussion became very animated, and
other people joined in:
“I see those people from the topographical depart-
ment with the four-wheeler that Gomez gave
them. They go to the countryside carrying a map
and showing it to the people. They said that the
land belongs to the State. But this is the land for
the zebus, it is our main wealth here in the coun-
tryside, all our work depends on the zebus”.
And also:
“When Tozzi Green opened in Satrokala, our
young people from here in Ambatolahy went
there to apply for a job. There are about 5 young
people here who have high school diploma so
when they opened their office, they submitted
their job application. But when the company saw
that those applicants were from the municipal-
ity of Ambatolahy, they immediately threw away
their application.”
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 47
“Win-win” or “take-take”? “Gomez is a white man growing jatropha”
(Village of Hazofotsy)
The metaphor of “the carrot or the stick” (i.e.
to apply good or bad manners, according to “Gomez grows jatropha and messes up with our
circumstances, in order to bend someone to land”
your will) could be used to describe what we
perceived as being this company’s approach “Gomez did not speak to the community, he did
in Ihorombe. not come here and ask for land, it was the
mayor who sold it to him”
On one hand, the (not so tasty) carrots are (Village of Manatamia)
the medical services provided in Satrokala
(percieved by many as having a discrimina- “Gomez makes our life difficult. We want him to
tory access policy), or the illusion of offset- go away”
ting the loss of land with the creation of a few (Village of Ankotoriky)
jobs (considered by many locals as temporary
and underpaid). “We don’t know Gomez in person but we just
On the other hand, the stick is “Gomez”, but know his name. He lives in Satrokala, he took
more than him in person, it’s rather the our land away and now we have less land”
perception of him which has slowly spread
among people in the country- “We heard that Gomez is very
side, to function as a strong scary person. We are afraid of
The project Tozzi Green him”
deterrent to any form of opposi- is implementing in
tion to the project. (Village of Ambondro)
the area is concretely
Gomez is a Nicaragua-born em-
preventing local herders As evident from some of the
ployer of Tozzi who lives, since from accessing the land responses, an aurea of mis-
the beginning of the project, in and its resources tery and fear is surrounding
“Tozzi’s village” in Satrokala. his figure, embedded in the
dramatic heritage of colonial
In the remote villages we visited, nobody times which still affects the relationship of
(or few people) knows Tozzi, but everyone the local people with foreigners entering their
knows Gomez, mostly by his reputation. He’s territories.
described by many as bad-tempered vazaha
(white man) who cultivates jatropha and In brief, what we could sense from our visit
takes people’s land. This, as follows, a picture in Ihorombe, is that the project Tozzi Green
of Gomez, according to people’s perceptions: is implementing in the area is concretely
preventing local herders from accessing the
“Gomez is a very famous person, but we do not land and its resources; it affects local produc-
know the man in person. For us Gomez is a tion for local consumption, turning a tradi-
wicked person because he steals our land and he tional and self-sustained social and economic
prevents us from planting our lands” system into a large-scale energy production
system, radically cut off from the context; it
“Gomez is really evil because he steals land and to pretends to offset the loss of land with the
do his job he did not even consult or ask for our creation of a few jobs; and it makes the ap-
permission” plication of a more just land tenure system,
(Village of Ambararatabe) which really takes into account customary
rights, as an increasingly remote prospect.

48 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

3.2 Delta Petroli – Italy
“Large scale land acquisition? Just a new form of Region: SOFIA
colonisation” Capital: Antsohihy
(Abstract of conversation with a representa- Area: 52 504 km2
tive of a peasants’organisation in the Region Population: 1 772 830
of Sofia, Antsohihy, 26th of March 2013) inhabitants

700 kilometers north from Ihosy, driving for

several hours through hills that seem to be
covered with hundreds of different shades of
green velvet, after crossing the magnificient
Sofia River that gives the name to the corre-
spondant Region, one reaches Antsohihy, the
Region’s capital.

With an area of about 50 500 km², with its

more than 400 thousands hectars of arable
land, and the apparently unitilised endless ex-
panses of green pastures (which actually feed
about 800,000 heads of cattle48), the region of
Sofia is tempting to many.

It was the region of Sofia which, in Novem-

ber 2008, propelled to the international news
after the press revelation of another agribusi-
ness project, beside the well known Daewoo Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
scandal, to be promoted by the Indian com-
pany Varun who aimed to obtaining control of
Region is increasing. Once in Antsohihy we
465.000 ha of the precious land in the region.
met with the Director in Charge of Regional
It is a fact, confirmed also by the local au-
Territorial Management at the Region of
thorities, that Sofia, since 2005, is one of the
Sofia.
regions in Madagascar who is receiving the
majority of solicitations and demonstration
After giving us a picture of the raising inter-
of interest for land exploitation by foreign
est on land coming from foreign companies,
companies.
and basic figures on the ongoing and stopped
projects, he shared his vision and expecta-
American, Italian, Swiss, Lebanese, Indian,
tions on foreign investments with us. Inter-
Australian and Norwegian companies, each
estingly enough, he clearly distinguished
of them with its own specific agenda and pro-
between “land grabbers” (by his own words),
ductive drive, has been crossing the Region
and “win-win” investments (quoting the well
since 2005 in quest for land. Not all of them
known category created by the World Bank).
ended up signing a contract, but many did (or
According to him the win-win investments are
are in process of doing so), and the pressure
those foreseeing a reciprocal interest, both
on land and local peasants and herders of the
for the investor and for the local communi-
48 http://www.sofia.gov.mg/index.php?option=com_con ties. In details, he spoke of the creation of
tent&view=article&id=3&Itemid=5 local jobs, building of infrastructures (schools,

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 49

health centers…), transfer of innovative
means of production, benefits for the local
administration (new 4x4 cars, computers..) as
a way of offsetting the reduction in access to
land for the local communities.

When listing the large scale on going invest-

ments, he referred several times to the Delta
Jatropha project, explaining how the origi-
nal freeze that the project had faced, due to
a land tenure problem, has now been fully
solved and the project was ready to go in full Office of the Region of Sofia © Giulia Franchi
production, with large benefit for the local
communities. We’re curious, and decided to on the other side, Delta Petroli, since 200650
go and visit it. was developing its interest in researching the
possibility to produce energy through the
A quick history of the project transformation of energetic crops, and espe-
cially jatropha. One of the provincial priest,
The creation of a Malagasy company called spending half of his year in Italy and half in
Delta Jatropha Madagascar dates back to Madagascar, crossed his path with Gianfranco
2008, and it is the result of cooperation Pazienza, researcher of ISMAR-CNR on the
between, on one side, the Italian company cultivation of jatropha, which eventually led
Delta Petroli, established in 1979 for the him to Umberto Morpurgo, President of Delta
distribution of traditional fuels with a later Petroli.
involvement in the development of agrofuels,
and the Capuchins monks of Antsohihy on Delta Petroli had the capital, the Capuchins
the other. had the land (or it seemed so at
Delta Petroli had the time), and could count on their
A curious matching, which is strong presence in the country.
the capital, the
confirmed by the information Capuchins had the After a mission of the italian delega-
circulated through the press land (or it seemed tion on the field , the agreement
at the beginning of the project,
so at the time) was made, and the Capuchins would
on the final destination of the
produced jatropha, meant to be have received between the 5-10%
exported to Italy for the energy needs of the of the profits, and they would have contrib-
hospital “Casa sollievo della sofferenza” of uted to the project by providing the land as
San Giovanni Rotondo, created by Padre Pio . 49 a collateral. The company’s headquarter was
According to the testimonies of former proj- established and set up in the convent of the
ect workers, this joint venture was born from Capuchins in Antsohihy.
the meeting of coinciding interests: on one The project intended to cultivate jatropha,
side, apparently the Capuchins were, at the with a foreseen production of 40.000-70.000
time, in search of innovative ways to sup- tons of product from the third year on 30.000
port their work and presence in Madagascar, ha of land, with a total investment of about
without depending from foreign donations; 50 million Euros. It foresaw the follow-
ing objectives: implementation of jatropha
49 http://www.temoignages.re/delta-petroli-investit-
dans-le-jatropha-pour-plus-de-50-millions-d-eu- 50 http://www.scianet.it/ciapuglia/svl/
ros,32411.html#forum277126 documentiRead?doc_id=1406&tpl_id=5&tpl=99

50 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


plantations; construction and exploitation
of a plant for crude oil extraction; set up of
agricultural villages; rehabilitation of the port growing social unrest:
of Ampasindava and construction of 3 km of
pipeline; rehabilitation of roads and trails.
But things didn’t go as smoothly as forecasted. Delta jatropha installed in Sofia complain about
By 2011, in fact, which was supposed to be
the first year of harvest, the contract lease
to secure the land ownership had not been
signed yet, several conflicts and protests com-
ing from the workers lamenting that they had
not been paid for many months had already
exploded since 2009, and cases of mis-
management of the funds led the company,
unable to secure their investments, first to
downsizing the project (without land securi-
sation, apparently the company kept sending
from Italy the sum of 6000 euro a month for
the current expenses), and then to suspend
it, leaving many people jobless after just few
months, and most of them unpaid for the pre-
vious salaries. The news of the disappointed
expectations and of the company’s defaults
The Sofia River, in the Region of Sofia
foto ©TerraProject
in respecting workers’ rights, by then, had
bounced through the national media creating
“(…) The hundreds of employees of the company
this situation. In December 2007, the com-
pany had arrived in the region to establish its
headquarters in Antsohihy and its first site in
the district of Analalava. At the time, they had
recruited 200 people. And in July 2008, recruit-
ment had continued with the opening of other
sites. (…) Again, hundreds of men and women in
these areas were recruited. (…)
But since 2009, the situation has changed. The
salaries of employees began to experience delays.
In March 2009, the company completed the
downsizing of staff. And in June 2009, this deci-
sion had concerned up to 85% of the employees.
Besides the massive layoffs, the company has not
respected the rights of workers who were kept
on duty. Dismissed workers have not received
their final settlement. They have not obtained a
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 51

Municipality of Ankerika – Mayor’s Office.
One of the Municipalities concerned by
Delta Petroli Project foto © TerraProject
certificate of employment. And the company has
not given any notice before dismissal. (…) In
October 2010, representatives of the company,
and two or three Malagasy not known by the
villagers were on site to investigate the situation
and pay a portion of staff salaries. They prom-
ised to pay the rest later. But a year later, in the
month of October 2011, this promise has not yet
materialized. (…). Even the most optimistic seem
to have given up hope51.”
According to the testimony of a public officer
in Ankerika, one of the municipality con-
cerned by the project:
“They first came here long time ago for the proj-
ect, we had a big meeting, the projects manager
explained that it would be a tree plantation for
jatropha and that they would be using the graz-
ing land for the plantation, assuring us that they
did not come here to kill our cattle, but to protect
them. At the time they said they would be here
for 90 years. After that they never came again.
The chief of the project was a Capuchin Father
(according to what people told us, the mayor
of Ankerika is the brother of this Capuchin’s
Father). They had recruited around 1000 work-
51 “Filiére jatropha dans la Sofia: appel au secours des
employés de Delta jatropha” Article from La Gazette de la
Grande Ile, 12 October 2011. http://www.lagazette-dgi.
com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=
16292:filiere-jatropha-dans-la-sofia--appel-au-secours-
des-employes-de-delta-jatropha&catid=45:newsflash&It
emid=58
52 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
ers, but they didn’t pay the salaries, so people
went on strike, and they stopped the project”.
Then things somehow got back in track.
According to former workers, the negotia-
tion was held directly between the Italian
investors and the Deputy Prime Minister of
Development and Country Planning, Hajo
Andrianainarivelo who, in November 2012
participated in the public ceremony for the
delivery of materials to the General Director-
ate of Land Services in the premises of topo-
graphical services at Anosy in Antananarivo.
This is how the local media reported the news:
“During the official ceremony, Deputy Prime
Minister of Development and Country Planning,
Hajo Andrianainarivelo thanked the investors
stating that this act helps greatly in land tenure
and administration in general. He continued, I
hope everyone can find interest in a win-win
spirit with this partnership, to develop Mada-
gascar and its investors. (…) For its part, Delta
Jatropha Madagascar has signed a commit-
ment letter addressed to the land services on the
donation of four motorcycles, four computers, a
vehicle and a petrol station, all with the aim of
improving services in districts for computeriza-
tion.52“
According to the documents we manage to
view, the environmental permit for the proj-
Environmental Permit Delta Petroli. The permit was
released in June 2010, but the contract lease on the
land is still pending. foto © TerraProject
52 http://www.vpdat.gov.mg/2012/11/remise-de-mate-
riaux-pour-la-vpdat/

ect had already been granted in June 2010, on
a surface of 19.400 ha, but with the expecta-
tion of extending it to 30.000 ha. The contract
lease to secure the land tenure had not been
signed yet and, according to our information
collected from the field, is still pending (in
April 2013).
However the project started again in February
2013. The municipality officer in Ankerika
didn’t seem to have much information on
what’s going on in the area, nor on the proce-
dure for which the project had started again.
“The project is starting again now. (…) With
the Municipality staff there was no discussion.
(…) The company did not pay anything to the
Municipality for the use of the land, nor to the
people. Maybe if there’s something they are pay-
ing is somewhere else… They didn’t give time or
duration of when it would be done, there is no
contract signed on this, maybe they will do when
the project will really start in full implementa-
tion.”
Concerning the direct benefit for the commu-
nity the Officer mentioned that:
“The first benefit will be the creation of jobs for
the community in the area, and also they said
that they will repair the roads, even in very re-
mote areas. (…) But at the moment, since it has
just started, there’s not yet tangible benefit nor
negative impact either. One good point is that
After a long drive
through very remote
rural tracks, we
reached the spot.
Rural Village of Befandrama. This village did not exist
before 2008, and it was built by Delta Petroli as a
working site, for people employed at the plantation
of jatropha. People living here do not belong from the
same community but they come from all Sofia Region.
foto © TerraProject
the company is taking all the cattle manure for
the plantations, to use it for compost, so they can
contribute to keep the area clean.(…) No, they
don’t pay anything for this, not yet. Maybe we
will negotiate later on…”
In order to better understand we decided to
check on the field and to move from the mu-
nicipality office to the village of Befandrama.
After a long drive through very remote rural
tracks, we reached the spot.
Right from our arrival at the entrance of the
village we sensed that Befandrama was not
a village like the others we had visited so far.
It looked different and the atmosphere was
different.
In fact, Befandrama is not a village in the
traditional sense; it’s rather a working site.
It didn’t exist before 2008 as it is one of the
rural villages foreseen by the project.
BIRAO JATROPHA BEFANDRAMA (Jatropha
Office – Befandrama) states the billbord on
the door of the main hut at the center of the
cluster of huts surrounding it.
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 53
 1 2
We learnt from the lady responsible for the
site, that the village was inaugurated on the
12th of August 2008. At the beginning 23
people coming from all around the region
of Sofia where gathered to live there and
build the site. Four similar sites were built in
the first project’s attempt, with about 1000
people who accepted to live there in search of
job opportunities. Then the project stopped.
The site’s responsible at first refused to tell
us the reasons of the interruption, but then
54 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
1.Rural Village of Befandrama,
Region of Sofia, photo © Ter-
raProject
2.Rural Village of Befandrama,
Region of Sofia, photo © Ter-
raProject
3. Nursery of jatropha plants in
Befandrama, Region of Sofia,
photo © TerraProject
she added that an unsolved issue with the
contract lease was at the base of the freeze of
the project.
Now everything seems solved, she mentioned
the signature of a contract lease for 30 years,
that guarantees the company’s investments
and allowed the re-start of the operation in
two of the four original sites, Befandrama and
Bekifafa. (We did not find official evidences
that the lease contract had effectively been
signed)
This new phase of the project started in
February 2013 and will last 12 months untill
March 2014, with the expectation of plant-
ing 3.150.000 plants of jatropha. In total 300
people are located in the two sites, but other
300 will be shortly hired, in order to reach
the objective of cultivating 2000 ha of land by
March 2014.
In describing the project she refused to
answer to some basic but harmless questions
concerning the purpose of producing jatropha
(export or internal market), the cost of labour
force, and so on, but she was very enthusi-
astic in describing us the benefits brought
by the project to the communities (even if
it would be more correct to say individuals
because people living here are not a com-
munity in a traditional sense, but a group of
individuals gathered from other places for the
purpose of working and get a living).
The main benefit is considered to be, as it is
often the case with large scale agricultural
investment projects, the provision of work
opportunities for local people.
Moreover, she mentioned that
“At the local level there’s a lot of advantages
brought by the project, the Land Administra-
tion received donations: 2 4x4, motorbikes and
computers.”
But in the case of Delta Jatropha project, also
the securisation of the area is presented as
one of the positive side effects. She explained
to us that the project area used to be very
heavily affected by cattle thievery, and the
creation of these villages functions as out-
posts with the direct effect of discouraging
cattle smuggling in the area. She also men-
tioned a significant work of awareness raising
against the plague of de-forestation and forest
firing, to promote among the communities
more sustainable forest management methods.
We asked some questions about the basic ser-
vices for the workers there, as we noted, for
example, that there was no electricity for the
workers’ houses.
She explained that there is a generator for the
office, and concerning drinking water, people
living here can access the Befandrama River
(!). For the moment they don’t have health
services on site. She also assured us that this
is only temporary, because the idea of the
company is to build a big farm, and:
“hopefully we will have electricity, wells, a para-
medical and one doctor to come and live here.
Hopefully in 3-4 months.”
The project is only at its preliminary stages:
“the cultivation of jatropha for fuel production is
not a traditional culture here. It was a tradition-
al crop, but not for fuel. It was used for fencing
and cosmetics. We didn’t know that it could be
used for fuel. So for now we are only looking at
the production, how to produce it more and bet-
ter. We have not yet transformed the production
into fuel”
In terms of land she told us that
“this land didn’t belong to somebody. It’s the
Municipality which is in charge of this plot, so
it’s up to them the management of this area,
and now it was registered under the name of the
Society Delta Jatropha”.
“People of the village”, she said, “are very satis-
fied. There’s a lot of people to register for work-
ing. And also those former employees who were
working here from the beginning, even after the
difficulties and the interruption, they came back
to apply for the job again. This is the proof of
how much they are satisfied!”
While we’re speaking there’s nobody working
on the fields and she explained us that it’s
lunch break. So we take the opportunity to
look around and visit the nurseries.
At two o’clock groups of people started work-
ing again, and we got the chance to approach
individually some of them. We managed to
know from them their salaries: 160.000 ariary
per month (about 53 euro) as chief of staff,
and 130.000 ariary (about 43 euro) for regu-
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 55

Nursery for jatropha plants, Delta Petroli project, generation
Rural Village of Befandrana Foto © Giulia Franchi
lar workers. Some of the people we spoke to,
were among the small group of workers that
was allowed to continue working when the
project had stopped, mostly as guardians and
care takers for the sites and the plantations.
They also did not receive their salary for a
long period, and then started being paid again. would have complemented the 19.400 ha, either
Many of them had worked as builders for a
construction company before: “the pay was
better there, but probably this job will be more
secure. It’s true that they already stopped once.
There was a fraud, a management problem.
That’s why it stopped. The Capuchin Father who
was managing the project has now moved to
another place. He’s not the manager anymore.
Now they said that they will stay for 30 years.
Hopefully the project will continue. I don’t want
to think of the possibility that it will stop”.
The life in the village is thouroughly planned
and organised:
“There are some rules to follow to live in this
village. No fighting, no thieveries, nobody is al-
lowed to steal others’ wives”.
For an overview of the risks implicit to this
project, it is worthed to report an abstract of
a Study carried out in 2011 by the Observa-
toire du Foncier a Madagascar, in cooperation
with the University of Montesquieu and the
University of Antananarivo on the case of the
project Delta Jatropha53:
53 L’Etude sur la pertinence et l’efficacité des outils EIE
pour la régulation des grands investissments agricoles:
56 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
“(…) Compared to other districts of Sofia Region,
the District of Analalava is the largest, cover-
ing the 19% of the total area. Despite this large
area, the District is experiencing a shortage of
arable land, mainly due to its soil characteristics.
As a result, land disputes are becoming more
numerous. These conflicts arising from a lack
of availability of land is exacerbated by the fact
that land titles (..) are often handed down from
to generation. It should be noted that
with respect to this situation, State ownership
was the key criterion in choosing DJM (Delta
Jatropha Madagascar) plots project. In the
words of some former executives of DJM, includ-
ing two former directors, the State ownership
has also been the reason for which DJM only got
19.400 ha out of the coveted 30.000 ha. Accord-
ing to the same people, the 10.600 ha which
were falling in the category of private property,
either the owners had titles for those parcels, ei-
ther the land in question was subject to the right
of usufruct (…).
To return to the land disputes between DJM and
local populations, these could be caused by the
lack or unavailability of arable land. As already
mentioned, the District of Analalava that hosts a
large number of DJM plots, is the largest district
in the area of the Sofia Region, but has a lack of
arable land. With the occupation of 19.400 ha,
farmland will be even rarer. Three fundamental
elements need to be taken into consideration: i)
rural population is strongly attached to its tradi-
tional activities, riziculture in particular. Indeed,
people are moving towards other activities, not
because they want to change, but because they
see the opportunity to improve and to better
finance their traditional activities; ii) along with
this, it should be noted that the population of
working age is estimated at 46% of the total pop-
ulation (Sofia Region). DJM or any other project
of this kind can not absorb all the available labor
force, often with little or no skills, that will basi-
cally move towards agriculture. This means that
the need for land will be increasingly important
cas de la société Delta Jatropha Madagascar
 Delta Petroli Project workers – Village of Befandrama Foto © TerraProject

over the years as new generations will follow of the land where the project is being imple-
roughly the same pattern. (…)This could create mented is traditionally a grazing area, and in
tensions between locals yearning for land, which the near future this land occupancy could lead
could covet the land that is known to be operated to serious clashes with livestock producers.
by ‘foreigners.’”
Peasants’ organisations are there to protect
On the issue of land conflict we had the peasants’ right, and as they did in the case of
chance to question a representative of a peas- Varun, where they helped some local peasants
ants’ organisation in the area. to obtain official registration
He lamented the fact that while Foreign investors of the land they were using in
Malagasy small holder peasants easily obtain land order to protect them from the
experience a real problem of land lease contracts for the risks of additional expansion of
access, and the procedure to ob- implementation of their the company’s project, they are
tain official titling papers is long willing to do the same in case
projects, and receive
and expensive for them, foreign herders of the area where Delta
investors easily obtain land lease
support and facilitation Jatropha is being implemented
contracts for the implementa- from the State. will issue a complain to them.
tion of their projects, and receive
support and facilitation from the In general, the perception of
State. According to him, Malagasy peasants the representatives of small scale peasants
don’t get the same rights as foreign investors, towards large scale land acquisition is that
and he wonders what are the real benefits a new form of colonisation is taking place,
coming from these deals for the central au- worsened by the weak functioning of the de-
thorities. centralisation measures that the transitional
goverment declared to put in place. Despite
From direct experiences of what happened the formal attempt to strenghten a decen-
with other large scale land acquisition in the tralised governance system, most investors
area, such as the project implemented by continue to refer to the central government
the Indian company Varun, who’s aiming to in Antananarivo, and the wide perception, at
expand its operation on 465.000 ha of land54, the local level, is that decisions keep being
the peasants’ organisation’s position is that taken from above, with little or no consulta-
there is a high risk of future land conflict tion with the concerned communities on the
linked to the Delta Jatropha project. Most ground.

54 http://echogeo.revues.org/11649

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 57

 Mining Industry
Region: ALAOTRA MANGORO
Capital: Ambatondrazaka
3.3 Ambatovy – joint venture Area: 33054 km2
Canada/South Korea/Japan Population: 1 112 000
inhabitants
“Ambatovy is already a major contributor to
Madagascar’s national prosperity and a source
of revenue for its people and government “
(Abstract from the Company’s website)

Ambatovy SA mining project is a joint venture

between the Canadian companies Sherritt In-
ternational Co. and SNC-Lavalin Internation-
al Inc., the South-Korean Korea Resources
Co. and the Japanese Sumitomo Co., for the
extraction of nickel and cobalt.

With an investment of about 6.9 billions

of US$ coming from several banks such as
the European Investment Bank, the African
Development Bank, and the Japanese Bank
for International Cooperation (JBIC), Am-
batovy is the largest foreign investment in
Madagascar ever, and one of the biggest in
sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean re-
gion, ranking among the largest nickel mining
entities in the world.
According to the website of the company, Am-
batovy is expected to produce 60,000 tonnes
of refined nickel, 5,600 tonnes of cobalt and
210,000 tons of ammonium sulfate, to be
used as fertilizer, per year, for a period of 29
years55.
The operational sites of Ambatovy are located
in two main areas:
• The Mine Area, in the village of Ampit-
ambe, in the Municipality of Ambohibary,
District of Moramanga, Region of Alaotra
Mangoro, covering an area of 7596 ha,
rented with a long lease contract dated 3rd
of March 2008, for a period of 50 years
55 http://www.ambatovy.com/docs/?p=110
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
• The Plant Site, a huge industrial complex
covering more than 320 ha (the size of
250 football fields), located 11 km south
of the Port of Tamatave, in the District of
Toamasina, Region of Atsinanana.
A 220 km-long pipeline links the Mine to the
Plant Site.
One of the first testimonies on the impacts of
Ambatovy project on the local population was
the article signed by Beatrix Gramlich “Ger-
aubte Erde” (Stolen Land), which was pub-
lished in Kontiente - the Mission-Magazine, n°
1 of 2012.
The attention on the project’s impacts was
publicly raised in April 2012 by the Canadian

58 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


Night view of Ambatovy industrial complex, District of Toamasina, photo © TerraProject
NGO Mining Watch Canada56, and they were
also documented in detail in November 2012
by the report “Madagascar: nouvel eldorado des
compagnies minières et pétrolières”, issued by
Friends of the Earth France.
The impacts of this project are now well
known by the communities of the concerned
areas. The mine is situated in a highly sensi-
tive ecological region, with several endan-
gered endemic species. A forest area of about
2500 ha, including protected zones, was
directly affected by the construction of the
pipeline and project infrastructures, and
there are serious concerns on the impact of
the project on water resources, with the Man-
goro and Ivando rivers already drying up and
an increased risk of pollution and mortality
rates of the fishes in the rivers of Ranomainty
and Torotorofotsy, which are supposed to
provide Tamatave with drinking water.
56 Another Mining Horror Story? Sherritt International
Corporation’s Ambatovy Project in Madagascar, Mining
Watch Canada, 10th April 2012, http://www.mining-
watch.ca/article/another-mining-horror-story-sherritt-in-
ternational-corporation-s-ambatovy-project-madagascar
The mine is situated
in a highly sensitive
ecological region,
with several
endangered
endemic species
The project’s impact on people’s access
to land
We visited the project area in April 2013,
and had the opportunity to interview several
representatives of local authorities within the
concerned area.
We met with a public officer of the municipal-
ity of Andasibe, one of the concerned munici-
palities in the District of Moramanga.
According to him, five villages within the
municipality of Andasibe are directly affected
by the Ambatovy project.
“It is not clear to me whether the land used by
Ambatovy is state-owned or managed by the For-
est Service. What is certain is that the negotia-
tions on the land use were held with high leaders
of this country at the central level. Since people
living in these areas do not have the financial
means to officially register their land, in absence
of registration papers they were expelled from
the land where they’ve been living for decades,
with the purpose of developing mining activities
and facilitating the passage of the pipeline. In
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 59

Bridge on the River Mangoro, Region of Alaotra
Mangoro - Photo Giulia Franchi
the village of Menalanga about 50 households
were displaced. Ambatovy had announced that
displaced people would have had their houses
reconstructed in the same materials as before.
But the people did not agree because if you have
to move from a place where you have lived for de-
cades, you should at least be recognized the right
to live in better conditions than before. What
they received did not compensate for what they
have lost. Moreover, there was no law that could
regulate this aspect of the project, no agreement
was made before, in order to set in advance the
amount of compensations.
It seems clear to me that people no longer have
the right to secure their land. Why is it so easy
for big companies to obtain the right to use the
land, while people who live in these areas do not
have possibilities to secure their rights? During
the lease term, the company will have all the
rights to the land and at the end of the contract,
they will deliver it back to the State.
I have never seen the contract or any other of-
ficial document on this project, despite a big part
of the territory of our Municipality is concerned
by the pipeline.
Nobody ever came to see our administration,
and I do not even know if they have a permit to
proceed with their activities.
The 220 kms-long pipeline is buried under-
ground, and they planted eucalyptus trees and
grass on top of it. I was told that the cost of the
pipeline was $ 1 million per kilometer. Nobody
60 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
was consulted on the project before, and they
only approached us when they began to build the
pipeline that runs through the village. That was
in 2005-2006.
An Environmental Impact Assessment was made
by the National Office for the Environment, in
partnership with Ambatovy, but there was no
involvement of the communities in the process,
and local authorities have never been included in
the development of the project.
If we had been consulted, we would have cer-
tainly refused such a project, because it passes
through an area of protected forest, and everyone
here knows this. We would never have accepted if
someone had asked our opinion!
There has never been any agreement between
the authorities at the local level and the project.
If there was one, it must have been made at the
central level with the Ministry of Mines and the
Ministry of Country Planning”.
Whose economic benefits?
According to a public officer of the Munici-
pality of Andasibe,
“Our Municipality has not received any money
as royalties yet. We heard that we would get
some, but we do not know how much or when.
People at the beginning thought that the project
would bring some advantages to them, but now
everyone realized that there is no benefit for the
people and everyone is truly disappointed here.
Even in terms of work, the project did not pro-
vide additional employment, as even during the
construction phase several workers came from
abroad. There’s no positive development impact
linked to this project. This project is governed by
the Mining Law and the Law of Large Mining
Investment (LGIM)57, amended by respectively
Law n°2005-021 and n°2005-022 which favors
companies with the possibility to pay lower taxes
57 http://www.droit-afrique.com/images/textes/
Madagascar/Mada%20%20Loi%20grands%20investisse-
ments%20miniers.pdf)
 Municipality of Ambohibary. Photo © Giulia Franchi

to municipalities. No matter how low, but the the coming years. We were expecting to receive
company has still the duty to pay some. However, 500.000.000 Ariary (about 160.000 euro) as
so far Ambatovy has paid nothing to us.” per production taxes from Ambatovy. Our plan
Beside Andasibe, two other municipalities are would be to use all these revenues to improve
concerned by the project: Ambohibary and services and infrastructures inside the Munici-
Morarano, and the percep- pality. However, even though
tions from the local auhori- Ambatovy has been working
“People at the beginning
ties there do not differ much for few years here, we did not
from the perceptions in
thought that the project receive any of those yet. Firstly,
Andasibe. would bring some advantages their presence here was more
to them, but now everyone a pilot research phase. At
According to the of- realized that there is no that time they paid the tax
ficer we interviewed, in benefit for the people” on land: in 2006 they paid
fact,“Ambohibary is the 4.000.000 Ariary (about 1300
municipality that obtained the euro), in december 2010 thay
most of the benefit, but even the local authori- paid 11.000.000 Ariary (about 3600 euro) for
ties of that town told me that the benefits they 2008 and 2009, and in January 2013 they paid
received do not match at all the losses.” 11.000.000 Ariary for 2010 and 2011.

We travelled to Ambohibary, where the mine

area is located, to verify these words, and we
met with a public officer of the municipality of
Ambohibary, to question him about royalties,
revenues and financial benefit produced by
Ambatovy for the people of the municipality.

“We had a lot of hope for changes here coming

from the Ambatovy project. Our Municipal-
ity already drafted the provisional budget for

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 61

 When they started the activities here they paid pay. Until now we cannot register any positive
(in 2009), 278.033.000 Ariary (about 90.000 impact of this project on people’s lives because
euro) as per construction taxes, and we used many were displaced and properties, such as rice
them in 2010 to build two schools, and one fields, were destroyed”.
house for the community, a small rural hospital
and a bridge. So far that’s all we received, but As it is often the case with mega projects that
they still owe us money. They have asked an imply compensations, disputes and conflicts
authorisation to extract stones for construction. develop within the communities to access
They extracted about 6000 cubic metres of stones, resources:
but so far didn’t pay the taxes foreseen for this
activity”. “some conflicts arose at the local level linked to
the compensations. When compensations came,
“We went to Antananarivo to ask for clarifica- some people overestimated the size of their
tion on the taxation process and they told us destroyed ricefields, and so their neighbours did
that Ambatovy extracts an average of 48 tons of not get any compensation. And this happened
raw materials per day. I think that they extract a lot during the compensation phase. There are
more because the prevision foresaw more than still people who did not receive anything for their
100 tons per day. According to the procedure, losses. Also concerning land there was a conflict
the Region is supposed to collect the taxes from because of the status of this kind of land. There
Ambatovy, and then to transfer the 60% of them was some dishonesty, when Ambatovy came to
to the three concerned municipalities. All these search for the land owners, people claimed to be
taxes have not yet been given to us, so we’re only the owners even when they were not. So it was
talking about previsions here. only those who wrote their name in Ambatovy
registers who could be compensated.
“The State receives a lease fee from The compensation for those who lost
Ambatovy (about 250.000 dollars “The State receives rice fields is calculated twice a year
per year) but they only transfer a lease fee from on the foreseen production of those
a small part of this back to the Ambatovy (about ricefields, and Ambatovy twice a
Municipalities. From the cen- 250.000 dollars per year distributes the same amount of
tral government, we just receive year) but they only rice that they could have produced
12.000.000 Ariary (about 4000 transfer a small part in the exploited ricefield. However,
euro) per year now. The municipal- the fact of distributing rice does
of this back to the
ity has no special authorisation to not compensate for the loss of land,
enter the site and evaluate what
Municipalities” and also for the relocation of people.
they are doing. Sometimes Ambato- The lands where Ambatovy wants
vy organises collective visits and that was the to move people to, are not the same as the lands
only time I, as Municipality Officer, could access people used to live on, they are not fertile and do
the site. They keep very secretive about what not have real access to water. They are located at
they do, even regarding the stones’extraction. the bottom of the hills so, when it rains a lot, the
They never really tell us where they extract them, rice crops get lost because of too much water.
because they claim that It can be dangerous
for us, so they don’t share any information on Concerning Ambatovy land lease, I don’t know
this with us. We cannot see what Ambatovy is much about what’s written in the contract,
really doing. We were informed that they have because everything was negotiated at the central
started exporting, but so far no production tax level”.
was paid to us. Since the first exportation was
implemented in December 2012, maybe in the
coming months Ambatovy willl come to us and

62 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

The reactions of the local communities
and civil society organisations In 2009, the TARATRA60 Moramanga project
was initiated by the Bishops of Madagascar,
to advocate for a good governance of extrac-
A great sense of distrust and disappointment
tive industry: incomes of mineral resources to
for the unmet expectations is evident in all
be managed in transparency by the authori-
the conversations we held with the local
ties at all levels, and the incomes of extractive
authorities and members of the communities
industries to benefit to the population inside
within the concerned area. Some peasants,
and around the extractive zones. The Taratra
supported by local organisations and com-
project’s main activities are the reinforce-
mittees started issuing complaints against the
ment of inhabitants capacities through
company, demanding a serious recognition of
visits on the field and regular meeting of the
the damages which are being caused to the
network, members of the Regional and Local
communities and the environment.
Authorities, representatives of Decentral-
Already in 2007, a treatment for mosquito
ized Technical Services, members of the civil
spraying with toxic products based on delta-
society organizations, the collective commu-
methrin and cypermethrin carried out by the
nity leaders, representatives of the teachers,
company, caused a sharp increase in the mor-
members of the Justice and Peace Commis-
tality of bees in the area, with a consequent
sion, and representatives of Ambatovy.
sharp decrease of the impollination activity,
with serious consequences at the level of
Further to a workshop about the impacts of
agricultural production. Only in the area of
the big mining projects, after “the sulfur diox-
Tamatave it was reported the loss of over 40
ide leak that occurred on 23 February 2012 fol-
tons of honey per year, 2000 tons of rice per
lowing a negligence from Ambatovy plant”, sev-
year, 2000 tons of coffee etc...58 Moreover,
eral civil society organizations - Association
it was reported by the Park of Ivoloina that,
des Originaires de la Province de Toamasina
due to the same reasons, the frugivorous
(ADOPT), Collectif des Cadres de Toamasina
lemurians of the park had to be removed
(CCT), KMF/CNOE-Education des citoyens,
from the site because the lack of pollination
Solidarité-Action-Vigilance-Progrès (SAVP),
sharply decreased the availability of fruits.
Action Citoyenne Toamasina (ACT) – signed a
All this, led the Association des Agriculteurs
common statement on 5 April 2012, “ring the
et des Apiculteurs (F.M.M.T.-Fikambanan’ny
alarm bell regarding the working mining com-
Mpamboly sy Mpiompy Tantely) representing
panies abuses that lead to have a doubt about
the impacted communities, to issue a strong
their willing to search for the actual development
complaint to Ambatovy. Although the media59
of population living inside their establishment
keep publishing information about Ambato-
area, declare that if the current practices go on,
vy’s compensatory measures for displaced
they will be more destructive than profitable
families (building of houses and support in
(..), demand a concerted vision building on the
land titles acquisitions), land conflicts are
preservation and exploitation of the common
still currently ongoing involving the peasants
national heritage, soil, subsoil, sea, water, air…
and the company Ambatovy.
and remind that the Malagasy citizens should
stay permanently vigilant about their heritage
58 “Madagascar: nouvel eldorado des compagnies minières merchandizing”.
et pétrolières”, Friends of the Earth France, November
2012
59 Ambatovy: Double événement à Vohitrambato, La
Gazette de la Grande Ile, 13 Novembre 2012 http://www. 60 http://www.devp.org/en/articles/taratra-project-
lagazette-dgi.com/index.php?option=com_content&task= good-governance-exploitation-madagascars-natural-
view&id=27107&Itemid=55 resources

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 63

3.4 Mainland Mining – China
Region: ANALANJIROFO
“What we extract here is dust. A very precious dust!” Capital: Fénérive-Est
(Mainland Mining project worker) Area: 22 380 km2
Population: 816 167
Mainland Mining, is a Malagasy subsidiary inhabitants (in 2002)
company of the China Geo Engineering
Corporation, and it’s associated to a Malagasy
businessman, according to a local newspa-
per61.
Landed in Madagascar in 2007, to exploit
ilmenite and zirconium, Mainland Mining
obtained an exploration permit on 26 000
mining squares (carrés miniers), distributed
on about 850 km along the eastern coast of
Madagascar, from the river Manambalahana
(in the North) to the District of Vangaindrano
(in the South), crossing five Regions: Analan-
jirofo, Atsinanana, Vatovavy Fitovinany,
Atsimo Atsinanava, and Anosy.

The company started its exploitation activi-

ties in the Region of Analanjirofo, obtain-
ing in 2007 an environmental permit for a
pilot project on one mining site of the size of
about 2.5 km per side. After having success-
fully completed the pilot phase, the com-
pany requested and obtained in 2009, a new
environmental permit for the exploitation of
an extended perimetral mining area, in the
Region of Analanjirofo, which concerned 13
mining squares of about 625 mt per side (as
per the newly adopted Code Minier).
We visited the District of Fénérive Est in
the Region of Analanjirofo at the beginning
of April 2013, to verify the status of devel-
opment of the project in the area, and the
impact on local people.
We were told by several sources that, unlike
other large scale mining projects for which
companies tend to remain in the country for
decades, given the huge tract of coast granted
61 http://www.lagazette-dgi.com/index.
php?option=com_content&view=article&id=17597:main
land-mining-ltd-a-manakara-rakamisilahy-martial-desa-
morce-la-crise-&catid=64:newsflash&Itemid=67
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
to Mainland Mining for activities of explora-
tion, the company keeps a different approach:
it identifies one site, it explores it, it exploits
it, and then it moves to the next site. Mean-
while, the extracted material is loaded on
trucks on a daily basis, carried to the port of
Tamatave, stored there and then shipped to
China.
According to a well informed person we had
the opportunity to interview, in 16 months
of operation between 2011 to 2012 Main-
land Mining extracted, in the sole region of
Analanjirofo, about 100.000 tons of pre-con-
centred material.
The port was pointed to us as a crucial step
for the identification of the effective amount

64 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 Toamasina (Tamatave) is Madagascar’s main port and it is
connected by rail with Antananarivo. © TerraProject

This has posed serious concerns on the

transparency of the process, and the effective
revenues that the local authorities manage
to obtain from this activity. From several
testimonies we were informed that there were
also some cases of blank passes released by
the Mayors, who had become aware of what
they had effectively signed only when the
documents would came back from the port.
A public officer in the municipality of Ampa-
simangoro, one of the project’s sites in the
District of Fenérive Est, confirmed to us that
the royalty issue is quite crucial:
of extracted material, which has direct impact
on the royalties that the local authorities of
“Ampasimangoro covers an area of 215 sqkm,
the concerned Municipalities are supposed
with 25 villages, two of which are directly
to receive. Since the royalties are measured
concerned by Mainland Mining’s operations:
in percentage of the production, it’s quite
Ambatovola and Antanambao. We don’t really
crucial for the municipalities concerned by
have any control on how much the company
the extraction sites to have detailed informa-
extracts, as we only receive a declaration from
tion on this.
them stating the figures, and we have no means
to double check. As for royalties, we don’t receive
While at the beginning the trucks on their
them directly from the company but through
way to the port were supposed to receive a
the mining department in the Region, which is
laissez passer from the Mayor, who would
supposed to deliver to each municipality the 60%
release it after having verified the transport-
of the relevant production. Speaking in numbers,
ed amount, this procedure seems not to be
we are supposed to receive the 60% of 400 Ari-
mandatory anymore, as the sole responsible
ary per extracted kilo (about 0.10 euro per kilo).
for the measurement is the Malagasy Mining
Since they claim to have produced about 2000
Services based at the Port.
tons per year from this site, (but we believe it’s
more) our Municipality was supposed to receive,

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 65

since 2008, the 60% of about 800 millions Ari-
ary per year. We received, instead, a transfer of
80 millions first, then of 45 millions and finally
of 30 millions in total. This is all. We’re fighting
to get the rest of the money, as they would allow
us to provide services for the communities. Our
Municipality counts about 42000 inhabitants,
and only about 40 people from here were hired
for the project, as many workers are coming
from outside”.
Ironically, despite claims of this kind, a
discussion is currently occurring about the
royalties to be dispatched between the central
State and municipalities. The World Bank
Director in Madagascar declared62 that the
current law foresees too generous contribu-
tions transferred to local municipalities, and
their weak capacity of spending them must be
taken into account.
The municipality officer also informed us that
“in 2012 the company stopped its operations
because the company didn’t respect the agree-
ments”.
In december 2012, in fact, the Office National
pour l’Environnement had suspended the
environmental permit for the exploitations
in Fénérive Est for non-compliance with
the environmental operating standards. The
company, which was supposed to restore en-
vironmental and social sites affected by their
operations, and to rehabilitate the portion of
the Road RN 5 used for the transportation
of ilmenite to the Port, had not fullfilled its
obligations. Linked to this, the Environmental
Office refused to grant another environmen-
tal permit for the operations in the site of
Manakara, until the situation in Analanjirofo
won’t be regularized.
However, few months later, in April 2013,
62 Ressources naturelles - Retouche du code minier évo-
quée, L’Express de Madagascar, 12 March 2013, http://
www.lexpressmada.com/5472/ressources-naturelles-
madagascar/41649-retouche-du-code-minier-evoquee.
html
66 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
Coastline near the Municipality of Ampa-
sina Maninguri, Region of Analanjirofo,
where Mainland Mining obtained explo-
ration permission to extract ilmenite and
zirconium photo © TerraProject
the Office National pour l’Environnement
took the decision to lift the suspension of the
environmental license, claiming that “several
checks had been carried out and the results were
“satisfactory”63.
At the time of our visit, in April 2013, the
restauration works for the RN5 were just at
the beginning and the Vice Mayor of one of
the project’s site had informed us that “the
holes made in the ground for the exploitation
activities, which were supposed to be filled were
instead left there.”
However, from the information gathered
from the field, the road reparation and the
site restorations were not the only faults
behind Mainland Mining’s operations and
behind the decision of licence suspension.
Apparently the company had also violated the
limit of 25 metres from the sea for its exploi-
tation in Fénérive Est, added to the fact that,
despite in Manakara it only held an explora-
tion permit, the company had already started
exploitation activities, raising the protests of
several local communities in the area.
63 http://www.tananews.com/2013/04/mainland-le-
permis-de-lone-a-ete-debloque-celui-du-ministere-des-
mines-suivra/
 A Malagasy press article64 dated 29th of surface of the land belongs to the people, and
December 2011 reported, in fact, of a strong the underground belongs to the State.
demonstration held in Manakara on the 27th
of December 2011 with the participation “In order to exploit what’s underground, the com-
of 7000 people coming from Manakara and pany only needed to obtain an environmental
from the rural surroundings, who carried permit for exploitation. Once obtained that, they
seven banners against the ilmenite exploita- simply searched for people who own or occupy
tion by Mainland Mining. The the surface, agreed directly with
local authorities decided to “They call it a them for compensations and went
organize a public consultation: development project on with the activities. The local au-
nobody raised their hand when thorities were used as intermediary
but there’s no direct
they asked who agreed with the to define adequate compensations.
exploitation.
benefit for the people The compensations were measured
of this Region” in number of trees. For example,
As stated by a well informed depending on how big and old a
person we interviewed: tree is, people were paid between
“They call it a development project but there’s 100.000 to 500.000 Ariary (from about 30 to
no direct benefit for the people of this Region. 150 euro) for each coconut tree which had to be
The company accepted to start re-building the uprooted to give space to the mining operations.
road (and they are the only ones using it) only Practically speaking, the company was compen-
after a big pressure, in order to avoid a complete sating people for the loss of crops, not for the loss
failure of their plans, because if they didn’t solve of land, as the company claims that, after using
the problems here, the other regions where they the land, it will be restored and given back to
intend to develop wouldn’t accept their pres- the State.”
ence. In Manakara for example, people are not
willing to accept the project, and when they This was confirmed by a citizen of Ampasi-
started the prospection, there was a big reaction mangoro:
from the people there. There are a lot of political “The company organised here a system of com-
interests behind this project, which is pushed by pensation based on counting the number and
high ranked politicians at the national level. No types of planted trees and crops (vanilla, coconut
matter how much the technicians of the Environ- …) and then agreeing directly with the owner on
mental Offices try to raise technical issues and the price of each cut tree. The company would
search for concrete solutions, politicians step in use the land until they need it, and the owner
and give their green light. There’s never a real (or occupier) doesn’t have any right on that land
solution”. anymore. Obviously this creates some problems,
especially with the land which is inherited and
What about the land? currently owned by several people. The munici-
pality could mediate in the discussion, but prac-
From the information gathered from the field, tically speaking all the negotiations were made
we understood that the company doesn’t pay by the company directly with the concerned
any land lease to the State for this project. people. Surely Mainland Mining came here with
When they first arrived in 2006, apparently an agreement signed by the Vice Prime Minister,
no question on land occupancy was posed, but with no lease contract on the land, and no
and they applied the principle for which the land taxes are paid to the municipality. I think it
was an agreement directly made with the current
government.”
64 http://www.laverite.mg/index.php/inona-no-
vaovao/30833-fitrandrahana-fasimainty-nitondran-
ny-mponina-sora-baventy-ireo-iraky-ny-governemanta

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 67

Forestry
Region: SOFIA
Capital: Antsohihy
3.5 Mada Woodlands – Norway Area: 52 504 km2
Population: 1 772 830
“Here they have the land and the climate, they inhabitants
have water, they have provided labor - and not
least, they want us here. In our eyes these are
obvious reasons to implement a big commitment
in a field with huge potentials such as the re-
establishment of forests.”65
(Øystein Hansen, President and Director Gen-
eral of Mada Woodlands)

That Madagascar is heavily affected by

serious deforestation and habitat destruc-
tion, with approximately the 85% of original
forests being already lost has become increas-
ingly evident to us while driving throughout
the country.

Of the fact that the region of Sofia is large,

with a “significant amount of available land and
a lot of investment potentials” we were already
informed during our meeting with the Direc-
tor in Charge of Territorial Management of Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
the Region.

But that deforestation (and then reforesta-
tion) can become a really profitable busi-
ness for foreign companies investing in the
area, became a fact under our eyes when we
reached the District of Mampikony, in Sofia
Region. We went there with the idea of un-
derstanding more about the interesting case
of Mada Woodlands 66.
Mada Woodlands is a forest - and refores-
tation company in Madagascar, owned by
Norwegian investors, who has been active for
about six years with a large scale reforesta-
tion project of eucalyptus and acacia on a
65 http://www.nho.no/getfile.php/bilder/RootNY/
filer_og_vedlegg1/Afrika_fra_mulighet_til_marked_
april2010b.pdf (pag. 22)
66 http://www.madawoodlands.no/english.html
foreseen extension of 50.000 ha of land.
According to their website, MWL (Mada
Woodlands) is committed to plant, grow and
cut forests on a renewable and sustainable basis,
and always based upon the local conditions
and requirements. MWL will not contribute to
additional exploitation of the remaining forests,
rather play an important role in reestablising
the rainforest. (…) MWL also have contributed
to several humanitarian and social projects in
Madagascar.
A lot of the company’s communication work
is focused on highlighting the positive im-
pacts of their presence in the area in terms of
sustainable development and support to the
local communities.
In July 2011 a big echo to Mada Woodlands’

68 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 Sofia Region at sunset foto © TerraProject

social committments was granted by the
visit of the First Lady Mialy Rajoelina to the
District of Mampikony, to participate in the
ceremony of inauguration of a school built by
the company in Antsirasira.
to environmental protection and social develop-
ment”. Moreover, “to encourage students, she
handed to the 60 schoolchildren 10 kg of rice,
soap, 1 liter of oil, condensed milk, books, school
kits and colored pencils”.

The First Lady went a long According to several reports

The First Lady went
way from Antananarivo to from the local media, that
a long way from
show her political support covered that occasion MWL,
to Mada Woodlands Project, Antananarivo to show her no matter the well known
and she committed to it as political support to Mada difficulties in engaging in
Ambassador through her Woodlands Project Africa, intends to help people
charity association FITIA. In and their own culture, to un-
the occasion of her visit on derstand them. Especially in the
the ground, she publicly advocated for the environmental field. For MWL, the forest is an
project and, recognizing in her speech67 that important keyword. (…) the threat of polluting
“education is the only way out of poverty”, she with carbon dioxide the atmosphere is real. Tree
presented the project as a “strong contribution roots aerate the soil, therefore, the restoration
of the forest is important. Not only to preserve
67 http://www.actumada.mg/index.php?option=com_ the endangered species but also to deal with the
content&view=article&id=1197:a-mampikony-avec- phenomenon of erosion. It also prevents the loss
mada-woodlands-mialy-rajoelina-sengage-sur-un-grand-
of arable land as desertification gaining ground.
projet-de-reboisement&catid=46:articles-photos

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 69

MWL’s ambition is to contribute to act humanely,
financially, materially, in projects that can
reverse this negative cycle. But MWL not only
invests in plant and machinery. It does so for the
future of the Malagasy society68.
An excellent committment. If Mada Wood-
lands was an NGO or a charity association.
Mada Woodlands: charity or business?
Mada Woodlands, is a subsidiary of Os Skog
AS, a norwegian forestry company with long
experience and expertise in forest manage-
ment in the Nordic countries69, providing
several services to their clients including the
purchasing and sale of timber.
Other shareholders are Sauda Maskinering
AS70, a machining company acting as sub-
contractor primarily for marine and offshore
industry, but also equipped for land-based
industries, and focused on advanced cutting
machineries, and Hansen and Røssevold
Holdning, a Hagavik-based company operat-
ing in logging. It seems to be a family com-
pany, by the names of the Chairman, Deputy
member and CEO, and with no official web-
site availabe, beside some data in the portal
companybooknetworking71.
Despite the apparent low profile kept by Han-
sen and Røssevold Holdning in the project,
according to the Norwegian online newspa-
per Grannar72 the all idea of the Madagascar
reforestation project came from Øystein Røs-
sevold Hansen.
“I saw a great need for plant cultivation in the
area, and then realized that there could be a
business in this. (…) We bought seven properties
68 http://www.madagate.com/reportages/
environnement/1929-madagascar-association-fitia-et-
mada-woodlands-main-dans-la-main.html
69 http://www.osskog.no/About.html
70 http://saudamaskinering.no/
71 http://www.companybooknetworking.com/hansen-
roessevold-holding-as/finances
72 http://grannar.no/2009/10/plantar-stort-i-afrika/
70 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
Village of Amparimanonga, concerned by Mada
Woodlands reforestation project - foto ©TerraPro-
ject
totaling 40,000 hectares. (…). It takes long, but
still not the same timescale as in Norway. In six
to eight years, about 10,000 plants can provide
500,000 cubic of timber”73.
In brief, Mada Woodlands was set up by
Norwegian businessmen and companies, to
contribute to environmental protection and
human and social development of Madagascar
through a reforestation project seasoned with
social and economic benefits for locals such
as school and jobs. But this would still imply
a good business for them. And to confirm the
positive development impacts implicit in the
project, even NORAD, the Norwegian Agency
for Development Cooperation, granted its
support to Mada Woodlands.
But it is thanks to NORAD’s funding of the
enlighting report “Africa: from opportunity to
market”74 released in 2010, that we can clear-
ily understand, black on white, the objectives
of Mada Woodlands’ investments:
The report, presenting 23 examples of Norwe-
73 Translation from norwegian by the report’s authors
74 http://www.nho.no/getfile.php/bilder/RootNY/
filer_og_vedlegg1/Afrika_fra_mulighet_til_marked_
april2010b.pdf
gian companies with operations in 17 Afri-
can countries south of the Sahara, is edited
by NHO, The Confederation of Norwegian
Enterprise (i.e.Norway’s major organisa-
tion for employers and the leading business
lobby); Innovation Norway, the Norwegian
Government’s instrument for development of
Norwegian enterprises and industry; and the
UNDP Nordic Office.
The philosophy behind the report is blatantly
clear: “Africa represents a huge market, and
it’s not that people cannot pay.
In fact, it is expensive to be What does preserving and
poor. In the slums of Kenya
restoring forests have to
people pay 5 to 10 times more
do with producing timber
for water than what it costs in
big cities like New York and and carbon offsets?
London. In Niger 1 out of 3
inhabitants has a cell phone. Courageous and
innovative companies see market opportunities
and find profitable niches”.
The report is actually meant to be a practical
guide for companies interested in seeking in-
vestment opportunities in Africa. The editors
are willing to present some successful cases,
and to do so they asked 23 companies to pro-
vide first hand information on their project,
including goals, strategies, risks.
What follows is Mada Woodlands project, in
their own words. These are the objectives of
what we have known so far as a courageous
effort from philantropic enlightened busi-
nessmen to revert the devastating de-fores-
tation process in Madagascar and contribute
to the social and economic development of
Malagasy society:
First of all the title: Mada Woodlands: Planta-
tions for the production of Timber and Carbon
Offsets. Wasn’t it a reforestation project?
What does preserving and restoring forests
have to do with producing timber and carbon
offsets?
And then ahead with the project’s description:
“Mada Woodlands (MWL) was established as
a Malagasy forestry company by Norwegian
investors in 2008. MWL driver is the establish-
ment of plantations for the production of timber
and carbon offsets in Madagascar. (…) MWL
currently has agreements on 50,000 hectares of
land for plantations in the region of Sofia south
of Madagascar. Currently, the investments come
from MWL, with the support by Norad. Once the
trees will be harvested or certified for carbon off-
sets, we will start to produce more value. Current
time in relation to logging is 5-8 years, while al-
ready after about a year we will be able to certify
trees for carbon offsets.(…)
The strategy going forward is to
ensure the quality and increase
production and to establish
operation in the new areas.”75
In other words: thanks to the
carbon offsets (i.e. the sale of
carbon credit certificates), the planted trees
start to become profitable for the company
already after one year, when the first certifi-
cates can enter in circulation.
Therefore the offsets (the sale of certificates)
are the annuity for the first few years, until
the trees will be ready to be cut for the sale of
timber (in 5 to 8 years).
Interestingly enough, the link between re-
forestation and the carbon credit mechanism
was the topic of a conference organised by
the Ecole Supérieure Des Sciences Agronomiques
in Antananarivo on the 8th of may 2013
titled: Overview of reforestation in Madagascar -
Case study MADAWOODLAND.
The discussion was aimed at answering the
following question: will the new opportunities
in the fight against climate change, via CDM
and carbon credit certification, inject new
momentum for reforestation in Madagascar?
Given that the speaker was the Business De-
velopment Manager of Mada Woodlands, we
can imagine what the answer was.
75 Page 22 of the above mentioned report
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 71
The project, according to the
concerned people

We drove to Andilandalina, in the area of

Ambatobe, one of the villages concerned by
the project.

Inhabitants of the village told us the story

from the beginning. These are abstracts of
our converstation with them:
“Mada Woodlands came here five years ago,
they called for a general assembly with people
from the villages of Ambatobe, Antsirasiva and
Amparimanonga. They asked people for land. We
gave them the land but we did not received any
money. They compensated us with a salary for
working on the land. The salary was 2500 ari-
ary per day (a bit less than 1 euro), with salary
being given at the end of the week.”
“In this area they planted 333 ha of land, but
they are not just planting here, there are many
more villages, also in the Region of Boeny, not
only in Sofia. When they came they said that
there is no more forest here, and that they were
only going to restore the forest, that they were
not going to take our land, and that we will be
able to use the wood for firewood. The trees were
planted 3 years ago. We are not yet allowed to
cut them now but hopefully later on they will
allow us.”
“We don’t know what plans they have for the
wood. Maybe they want to sell it, but we don’t
know where.”
“This project was a partnership between the
Region and the company, that’s why we had to
accept it. The Chief of Region came here when
they started the plantation and he assured us
that he was going to make sure that the company
respected the clauses in the contract”
“The positive impact for us is that when the trees
will get bigger we will be able to ask the com-
pany to collect some wood because we don’t have
anymore. The Chief of the Region will help us to
obtain it.”
“They told us that there will be more rain because
of the wood, and this will be good for our crops”
“Mada Woodlands also built a food shop in our
village, so we can buy our food from their shop.
The general director of Mada Woodlands sends
the goods here, they pay one person to run the
shop, and the money go back to Mada Wood-
lands.” “The land of the project was grazing land
for our cattle before, then when the project ar-
rived here, they established a nursery there. Now
we are not using it as grazing land anymore as
there’s not enough food for the cattle here, so we
have to take them very very far. It’s a big prob-
lem but hopefully, when the trees grow, we will
be able to use the wood at least.”
Nobody seems aware that Mada Woodlands
has already an agreement with the central
government that authorises them to cut the
trees they have planted when they are ready
to produce timber for export back in Norway.
The situation and perception of the project
is not very different in the next village we
visited, in Amparimanonga.
“Mada Woodlands came at the end of 2008, or
beginning of 2009 in our village to ask for 2000
ha of land. That land was grazing land for cattle
before, and now there’s no cattle going there
anymore. They promised us that we would get
schools and drinking water. But only one school
was built in Antsirasira.

72 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

Village of Amparimanonga, Region of Sofia, concerned by
Mada Woodlands Reforestation Project © TerraProject

“At the beginning, when the work started, they

hired a lot of people, paying them 2500 ari-
ary per day. The ambassador of Norway came
with the Chief of Region, for the inauguration
ceremony. But when the former government
collapsed, the project stopped. Then the wife of
the new president came for inauguration again,
but then the work stopped again. We don’t know
exactly what happened, but apparently the man-
ager of the company did not pay the workers.
“The promises that the company made were not
respected here, no drinking water, no bridges,
no schools, and the population in the area is not
willing to work for them anymore. Some of the
plantations were also put on fire…”
“In this area there was also a land conflict be-
cause they planted the trees on the grazing land,
and in places that were already planted with rice.
Then people started going to court, and eventu-
ally the land was given back to the former owner,
the Norwegians left and the project stopped in
this area. They are still working in other areas.”
“The good aspect of the project was that since they
came here during raining season, when there is
no food, people could work and get some money.
But then they did not keep their promises, and
people got really upset. “
Burnt trees of the Mada Woodlands Planta-
tions. Region of Sofia Project © TerraProject
Finally, we met with a representative of the
local peasants’ association, which was estab-
lished by peasants 21 years ago.
“Mada Woodlands obtained the permission here
during the former presidency. We, Malagasy
peasants have no easy access to land so we use
every land that seems available. What we want
is to receive land to use, rather then working for
foreigners. Because of those large scale invest-
ments, land is not enough for peasants to work
on, and most of the time we are obliged to lease
the land, or work for the foreigners. These com-
panies should give the land back to the Malagasy.
Peasants should control it.”

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 73

Pharmaceutical
Industry Region: ITASY
Capital: Arivonimamo
Area: 7 651 km2
Population: 831 124
3.6 Bionexx – France inhabitants

“I’ve been living and cultivating this land for 81

years. I’d rather die than give up my land”
(Abstract of a conversation with an elder
inhabitant of Faharetana Village, Faharetana,
20th of March 2013)

The territory of Faharetana extends over 650

ha, including five communes in the District of
Imerintsiatosika, in the Region of Itasy, about
100 kms from Antananarivo in the center of
Madagascar.

In legal terms, it consists of three lots: Fa-

haretana 1, on 90 ha, (registered in the land
registry with the title n°183-C), Faharetana
2, of 486 ha (title n°184-C), and Faharetana
3, of 71 ha (title n°185-C). According to the
legal certificates, several Malagasy families
have been living here for decades, occupying
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
and cultivating the land, without any conflict Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
with the formal land titles owners.
land, and so people were allowed to continue
But the village of Faharetana came under the
using the land. The Constitution of that time,
spotlight in 2011 and in 2012, when agents of
and the existing land laws, encouraged rural
security forces entered in the village and ar-
communities to work and enhance the land
rested the peasants who were resisting against
value by using it, enjoying it and developing
a forced eviction, linked to the establishment
it. Therefore the inhabitants of Faharetana
in the area of the company Bionexx, inter-
did nothing wrong by cultivating it.
ested in the production of artemisia.
In 1983, the land of Faharetana was provided
A quick background on the land of as contribution of the Malagasy government
Faharetana to the mixed Lybian-Malagasy company
LIMA Holding, with the Malagasy State as
The legal status certificate of Faharetana’s majority shareholder. Eventually this com-
land show that, since independence (1965), pany was converted into the limited liability
this land belongs to the State. Between 1965 company Lybian African Investment Com-
and 1983, the State had set up in this area pany Madagascar “LAICO MADAGASCAR”.
a “State Farm”, for breeding chickens and In 2009, the company LIMA Holding, which
pigs. This activity did not need large areas of had became LAICO Madagascar, rented all

74 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

 MCB Equity fund just got a minority stake.
For a period of time also UNDP was among
the partners.

We were told that both LAICO MADAGAS-

CAR SA and Bionexx involve Malagasy co-
shareholders, but so far no evidence on this
was found.

In 2009 - 2010, LAICO MADAGASCAR SA

passed its long lease contract for 650 hectars
in the area of Faharetana to the company Bi-
onexx, interested in cultivating artemisia to
be exported to the European pharmaceutical
companies such as SANOFI and NOVARTIS
Peasants of Faharetana village photo © TerraProject
for the production of an antimalarial drug.

the land to the Bionexx company. To our Impacts of the projects, and local
knowledge, peasants’ rights were not taken conflicts
into account in this transaction. Yet accord-
ing to Malagasy law, the families who had After obtaining control over the land, Bion-
developed the 250 ha of land had rights on exx immediately demanded the peasants to
it. The enhancement, development and use of evacuate the land in order to develop the
the land (mise en valeur) is protected by the plantations of artemisia, in addition to the
succeeding Constitutions76 several hectares of plantations it
and laws in office77, especially Bionexx is a Malagasy already controls in other re-
since the land in question fell incorporated company gions of Madagascar, despite the
within the private national with capitals coming fact that the peasants occupied
domain. and developed those lands for
from different origins
Bionexx is a Malagasy in- decades.
corporated company with
capitals coming from different origins. Es- Peasants firmly refused, claiming their rights
tablished in 2005, it is funded by a Malagasy to occupation, use and development of the
bank with the support for the credit guaran- land since decades. People living in Fahare-
tee service of ARIZ, of the French Develop- tana consider this land as inherited by their
ment Agency (AFD)78. The Mauritian funds ancestors, and as their only mean of survival
as they cultivate crops to feed their families
76 Article 30 of the Malagasy Constitution of 31 de-
and to meet their basic needs. Most families
cember 1975 - Preamble to the Constitution of the First
Republic of 29 April 1959 claim that they have peacefully lived thanks
77 Law of March 9, 1929 and Order of 29 September to the fruits of their work in these plots for
1926, Articles 11, 26 and 31 of Law No. 60-004 of 15 many years, and any limitation on their ac-
February 1960 on the national private domain, Article 30 cess to land directly affects their food security
paragraph 5 of the Law No. 2008 -014 of 23 July 2008 on and income.
the private domain of the State, of decentralized govern-
ments and legal entities of public law, Law No. 2006-
031 of 24 November 2006 governing non-titled private Peasants are determined to fight for their
property rights, but because of this resistance, in Au-
78 http://www.afd.fr/webdav/site/afd/shared/ELE-
MENTS_COMMUNS/infos-projets/Telechargements/ Societe-BIONEXX-ARIZ.pdf

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 75


gust 2011 they started being intimidated on
a daily basis, threatened by Bionexx private
guards, beaten by the policemen, persecuted
by the EMMO-REG forces. Some peasants
were also jailed for several days, and trials on
those cases are still underway.
We visited Faharetana at the end of March
2013, and we had the opportunity to listen to
the testimonies from the community mem-
bers:
“I’ve been a farmer for 16 years. We used to
cultivate rice on our land, and about the 80% of
the income of many people depends on this. In
2011 the Bionexx company came here to plant
artemisia. They never consulted with the popula-
tion, they just came and took our land. When we
started complaining they told us that we could
rent some plots of land from them if we wanted,
and to do so we had to pay 400.000 Ariary per
hectar per year (about 135 euro). We refused. We
are Malagasy, we have used these lands for de-
cades and we have the right to do so. That’s why
we started opposing the company’s operations
but then they came here with military forces and
guns and prevented us to cultivate our land”.
“I’ve been living here for 80 years. This land
belongs to our ancestors and we’ve been using
it for more than 100 years. I inherited the land
after independence and we continued to cultivate
the land as our now deceased parents had done.
76 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
The land in front of Faharetana
village, where the people of the
village used to cultivate rice.
Now it is exploited by Bionexx
for the production of artemisia
photo © TerraProject
Although many titles owners have succeeded, we
lived peacefully and we had the freedom to con-
tinue growing our crops. But now with Bionexx
we suffer the worst suffering, we are prosecuted
and threatened. Even our family tombs were
destroyed by machineries. I prefer to die than to
live in this situation”.
According to the legal situation certificates
of the land, in fact, different owners of land
titles have succeeded on these lands before
1965.
“I’m 62 years old. I live here in Faharetana and
I always lived here. What hurts the most about
Bionexx being here is the fact that the company
has no consideration for us Malagasy people.
This land is our ancestors’ land and with the ar-
rival of Bionexx we had to start fighting against
their land grabbing. They even put four people in
jail and several had a conditional sentence. This
was a land conflict but in court this was treated
as a correctional act. We don’t know what to do
because opposing forces are note equal, and we
still live in fear because the intervention of the
police has shocked us a lot. We want Bionexx to
leave from our territory, they didn’t respect us
and just caused a lot of damages.”
A lady from Faharetana stated:
“Since Bionexx came there, we have experienced
a lot of problems that have a negative impact on
our family life, and even on our food consump-
tion. We do not eat rice every day anymore but
cassava. We no longer can afford to send our
children to school because we have no income at
all to pay the fees. When this company was not
here, the rice we produced was enough for us to
eat and to sell, we even had a few reserves and a
surplus. Now there is nothing. For us, as moth- LIMA HOLDING Company, consisting in
ers, the presence of this company disrupts our Malagasy people representing the Malagasy
daily lives. Our wish is that Bionexx goes away“. State, sold the land to LAICO and it was the
Bionexx claims that few hundreds peasants General Director of the Treasury Department
are affected by this project, while peasants who signed the bill of sale, despite he does
speak of several thousands. not have any power in the case. This is why
a public statement of the case was released
Legal documents mention an agreement by TANY and SIF on the 22nd of April 2013,
signed in 1983 which should have included which reads: “If there really was a sale of land
details on the future of the occupants of the to the company LAICO, the Board of Administra-
land in the process of transfering the control tion Board of LIMA HOLDING and the Director
of the land from the Malagasy government to of the Treasury were not entitled to do so. It is
LAICO Madagascar. the Minister in charge of the Land and / or the
Head of Government who sign (s) the decree
According to some testimonies, when the of sale for the land falling within the State’s
inhabitants of Faharetana domain79. All this means that
tried to obtain this docu- the rights of the communi-
ment at the Arivonimamo ties (Fokonolona) resulting
“I’m 62 years old. I live
Land Service, an officer said from the development and use
here in Faharetana and I
that he could not provide it of the land, are based on the
to them because he was sure always lived here. What ownership of the land to the
that the peasants would file hurts the most about State. Therefore, it’s necessary
a complain if they had the Bionexx being here is the to go back to previous phases
agreement in their hands. fact that the company has in order to solve the problem
But when a lawyer was sent no consideration for us because current reality can
to ask for it, the officers of Malagasy people” not cancel previously acquired
the Land Service, respon- rights. These people can not
sible for the conservation provide a livelihood for them-
of land and of the related selves because they’ve seen
archives, denied to be in possession of such a their means of production having been taken
convention. away from them.”

According to the extract from the Companies’
Registry, the corporation LAICO Madagascar
SA is a Malagasy incorporated company man-
aged by five men of Libyan nationality. Does
this company, managed by foreigners, own a
permit to land acquisition under Articles 18
and 19 of Law 2007-036? Although LAICO
claims that it has acquired these areas after
the liquidation of the company LIMA HOLD-
ING, the registered title in the Registry is
still referring to LIMA HOLDING, in which
the Malagasy government is still the majority
shareholder.
Announced since the last quarter of 2012, a
roundtable was held between representatives
of the companies LAICO and Bionexx on one
side, and peasants and the platform Solidarité
des Intervenants sur le Foncier - SIF, on the
other side. No agreement was reached so far,
and the respective lawyers are continuing
discussions. At the end of July 2013, peasants
have started again to cultivate some portions
of the disputed land, but they remain vigilant
because do not feel immune from new at-
tempts of eviction.

In our search of records to the Tribunal of 79 Art. 27 of the law n° 2008-014 of the 23 august 2008
Commerce, the General Assembly of the relative to the State private domain

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 77

Tourism
Region: DIANA
Capital: Diégo-Suarez
3.7 The case of Nosy Be Area: 20.942 km2
Population: 680 000
inhabitants
“Nosy Be is outlaw”
(Comment from an expert on land legislation
in Antananarivo)

Nosy Be is Madagascar’s largest and busiest

tourist resort, an island located about eight
kilometers off the northwest coast of Mada-
gascar in the Mozambique Channel. Once a
major location of plantation of sugar cane
and production of its derived products (most-
ly sugar and the once famous rhum Dzaman-
dzar), the island’s main activities are now the
large scale plantation of Ylang Ylang for the
production of essential oils, and tourism.

Nosy Be is today the most developed touristic

destination in Madagascar, and the only place
of the island where all-inclusive large re-
sorts can be found, served with direct weekly
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
flights from Europe (mostly France and Italy). Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf

We reached the port of Nosy Be main city,
Hell-Ville, on the 28th of March 2013 after
half an hour boat trip from the small port of
Ankify, in the nortwest of Madagascar.
A tasty cake
Nosy Be is today a cake, and a very tasty one.
We don’t mean it as a metaphor of the sweet
scents of ylang-ylang that can be smelled
throughout the island. No, it’s literally sliced
as 325 square kilometers large cake could be,
with several actors controlling their slice.
According to the information gathered at
the Topography Department of Nosy Be, the
inland of the island is already shared among
several investors, some of them since many
decades. For several years, a bit less than half
of the inland of Nosy Be has been the histori-
cal estate of the sugar industry in Madagascar,
whose creation dates back to the beginning of
last century. Nationalized in the 1970s within
the SIRAMA, the company experienced an
inexorable decline since the mid-1990s, to
reach its stop in 2006. The company owned
6321 hectares of land, out of which about
1800 for sugar cane plantation. After the
suspension of the sugar operation, the land
of SIRAMA became the object of desire for
many foreign investors (French, Chinese,
Indians), who are slowly taking control of
parcels of it to develop touristic infrastruc-
tures. An example of this is provided by the
Indian group Pearls, who was already granted,
through a long lease contract, the control
over about 400 hectares of land to build a
luxury golf resort overlooking the island.
Another third of the inland is controlled by
foreign companies cultivating ylang ylang

78 | Land grabbing in Madagascar


for the production of perfumes and essen-
tial oils. It’s the case, for example, of the
Société de Produits à Parfums de Madagascar
(SPPM), 3 km northeast of Hell-Ville, an in-
dian company producing mainly ylang-ylang,
vetiver, cloves and lemongrass extracts, for
export. Another example is the Indian family
Goulamaly, who runs the company Parfumes
d’Ylang N. G exporting the product to France
in partnership with Société CHARABOT S.A.
The city of Nosy Be, Hell-Ville is practically
controlled by a family with an Indian or
Pakistani name, who enormously invested
in land and now controls a big portion of the
real estate market of the area, beside other
business activities linked to export of pepper
and coffee.
In this picture, we wanted to understand
what’s the impact of the expansion of the
tourism industry on the issue of access to
land for local people in Nosy Be. With this
Nosy Be photo © TerraProject
purpose, we approached the Regional Tour-
ism Office in Nosy Be.
Land for tourism
Before 2006 Nosy Be economy was strongly
dominated by two main companies: the above
mentioned SIRAMA, for the production of
sugar and its derivates, and the Pêcheries
de Nosy Be, belonging to the multinational
group Unima and dealing with large-scale
commercial harvesting of shrimps in Nosy
Be. Owned and founded by the French citizen
Aziz Hassam Ismail, the Unima group estab-
lished in 1964 the Pêcheries de Nosy Be with
licenses for 22 industrial boats. For years,
much of the jobs opportunities in the island
depended on these two companies.
In 2005, just before the bankrupcy of SIRA-
MA, out of a population of about 61000, SIR-
AMA alone was absorbing about 2,000 people
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 79
at working age. Upon its closure, and with through long-term leases, either by setting up
the suspension of activities of the Pêcheries de a company with Malagasy entities as major-
Nosy Be in 2011, the unemployment rate on ity shareholders. However, Collectif TANY
the island exceeded 90%80. questioned the Transition authorities about a
video spread worldwide showing testimonies
Under these conditions, the tourism sector re- of European people stating that they had
mained the sole backbone of Nosy Be econ- bought land in Nosy Be at 2 euros/square
omy, and the highest percentage of capital meter81.
flow in the island is today linked to tourism.
Local food and vegetable producers, small The enphiteusis is a special kind of lease
scale fishery, transport sector, artisanate and contract with large rights tributed to the ten-
every other productive and service activity of ant. It’s long term (more than 18 years), it’s
the island is meant to be feeding the tourism renewable, it allows the tenant to use land as
industry. In the meantime, tourism is grow- a collateral guarantee, and could, on the long
ing and attracting ever growing run, be transformed into effective
investments. In this picture, the At the moment, property.
commercial pressure on land almost all the
is on the rise, and despite the coast of Nosy Be In Nosy Be, the prices for land
2008-013 law, which sets the is controlled by negotiated with the State, despite
statute of seasides and shores being a lot higher than in other
(mostly Italian and
as public domain of the State, areas in Madagascar, are still very
French) touristic
making it oulaw to build within convenient for foreign investors.
25 metres from the sea, most operators They range from 1000 to 10000
beaches in front of the touristic ariary per square metre (0.30 to 3
resorts have been practically privatized, and euro) for purchasing land at touristic voca-
touristic infrastructures are often built di- tion, and from 100 to 1000 ariary per year per
rectly on the beaches (‘pieds dans l’eau’ – feet square metre for leasing it.
in the water, as they say locally).
However, the real impact of the foreign
At the moment, almost all the coast of Nosy investments on land access for local people
Be is controlled by (mostly Italian and is due to the fact that, under these condi-
French) touristic operators, which have tions, many inhabitants of the island are
created facts on the ground in terms of land willing to sell their land for what are locally
control, making virtually impossible for locals perceived as very high prices. We were given
and whoever else is not guested in the resort some examples: a recent transaction let a
to access the sea. In Nosy Be beaches are not Malagasy family to sell its 2 ha property
private, but hotels, b&b, resorts and touris- for 140.000.000 ariary (about 2,5 euro per
tic villages use them as if they were private, square metre). Probably a good deal for the
operating within an illegal framework which, local family, as it allowed them to build a new
however, is accepted “de facto” by the local house, to purchase several vehicles to enter
authorities. the transport sector etc.., but an even better
one for the foreign investor, who will make
As elsewhere in Madagascar, it’s illegal for millions out of it once their business plan will
foreigners to own Malagasy land, but this be implemented. Also the land of the formerly
rule is easily eluded either by renting the land glorious SIRAMA is slowly being chopped
and sold in pieces for about 25000 ariary per
80 http://bidpub.b2g.go.kr/2005/06/%5Bwww-wds.
worldbank.org%5D1118168750.27416759132.pdf 81 http://terresmalgaches.info/spip.php?article43

80 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

square metre (about 8 euro), making any
hypothesis of a reopening in the future, as an-
nounced in several occasions by the authori-
ties, an illusory possibility.

Considering the high prices that Europeans

are willing to pay to get their place in the sun,
prices are skyrocketing in the island, foreign-
owned estate agencies are making millions,
but it has become virtually impossible for
any average local to access a piece of land. At
the same time, also financial speculation on
land is on the rise, with foreign estate agen-
cies buying conveniently and then selling at
higher prices.

Beside the direct impacts of a reduced access

to land and of the impossibility to access
beaches, also land conflicts are on the rise in
the island. Like elsewhere in Madagascar, the
right of usufruct/right of occupancy on the
land is recognised by the Malagasy law. But in
order for this right to be effectively guaran-
teed, people should regularise their situation
with the Land Administration, proceding with
the process of land titling and registration.
However, for financial and bureaucratic rea-
sons, this procedure is rarely implemented by
the majority of the inhabitants of the island,
and it often happens that land which seems to
be available according to the land registry, it’s
actually physically occupied.
When an investor decides to expand on such
lots, the troubles start.
Unfortunately, the commercial pressure on
land has reached the point for which Mala-
gasy inhabitants have started to sell also their
rights of occupancy to the foreign investors.
Meanwhile, foreign tourist operators man-
aging the resorts are starting ‘de facto’ to
privatize and appropriate also trails and roads
leading to the beaches, provoking tensions
and social unrest in the surrounding areas.
Moreover, local people are trying to get them-
selves organised to set up small business to
sell excursion packages and artisanate to the
tourists. However, most touristic resorts are
Nosy Be photo © TerraProject
preventing locals from accessing the beaches
to negotiate with the tourists, contributing to
a serious growth of rage and frustration.
According to some, local authorities are aware
of how the touristic industry is affecting the
local population, but they seem to be leaving
things until it’s too late.
But who invests?
The majority of the requests, according to
the Land Administration and the Topography
Department, come from Europeans, mostly
Italians and French. It’s both private individ-
uals and companies, and, in both cases, they
often set up a local company, associating with
Malagasy partners, in order to be allowed to
purchase the land, thus securing the actual
property.
The formal procedure to follow is not dissimi-
lar from what we’ve seen elsewhere: the law
currently foresee the lease as provisional title,
conditionned by the clause of developing it.

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 81

After the implemetation of the business plan,
if things haven’t been done as foreseen, the
State should intervene and get the property
back. According to the procedure set by the
Land Administration at the Central Level, the
Local Office should instruct the dossier of
lease request, which is then sent to Antanana-
rivo, where the Minister in charge of Devel-
opment and Country Planning, currently the
Vice Prime Minister, grants or rejects the
authorisation. No possibilities for the local
office to oppose a decision taken from Anta-
nanarivo.
In the past few years several authorisations
have been granted to Italian companies on
the coasts of Nosy Be: the biggest one is An-
dilana Group, the largest hotel in Madagascar,
with 208 rooms, built on 15 hectares of land,
right on the beach.
Owned by the Italian family Aiolfi, the Andi-
lana Beach resort opened in December 2003
under VentaClub (belonging to the group I
Viaggi del Ventaglio). In May 2004 the fam-
ily, with what they define “a great financial
strain”, managed to obtain the permits and
the construction of the extension of Nosy
Be airport needed for the landing of the first
direct flight Milan-Nosy Be.
With the bankrupcy of the historical Ital-
ian tour operator I Viaggi del Ventaglio, due
to a hole in the balance of 200 million euro,
and accumulated losses of over 100 millions,
without a single euro of net equity, the resort
had to change its Tour Operator. Since 2007
it is commercialized in exclusive by I Villaggi
Bravo of the Alpitour Group. The resort’s
facebook page describes it today as being “set
in 15 hectares of lush tropical gardens with
superb private (private?) beaches of white sand
and crystalline sea, in the exclusive bay of Nosy
Be (…).The infrastructure include restaurants,
bars, amphitheater, swimming pool, massage
area, disco, technical area, staff, sports area and
warehouses for a total of 35.000 square metres”.
82 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
Andilana Beach Resort – Nosy Be
photo ©TerraProject
According to some testimonies of local ad-
ministration, the resort belongs for the 50%
to the Aiolfi Family, with a 50% share of the
Malagasy Government.
The legacy of colonization is a reality in Nosy
Be more than anywhere else in Madagascar.
Very little control over the economy is held in
the hands of Malagasy people. Businesses are
owned by the French or by the Italians and
the island’s Indo-Pakistani population. Mala-
gasy work every-day jobs, such as in a hotel or
as a taxi driver, but the cost of life on such a
touristic island is high for local inhabitants.
Beside the increased cost of living and a
sharply reduced access to resources for local
people, we could verify other even uglier
“collateral damages” linked to this kind of
development.
In fact, such a cheap, beautiful and easy-to-
deal-with island is a hot-spot for many others,
including retired European men, which have
trasformed the southern beach of Ambato-
laoka in the Island’s ‘red-light district’, where
the impact of sex tourism and prostitution
shows the most its ugly face.
“The Vazaha (the white men) are the owners of
the island, they not only occupy our land, but
they take the women as well” told us with dis-
may a young taxi driver during the trip back
from Ambatolaoka.
A special case:
“The best investment Region: ANOSY
Capital: Fort-Dauphin
project in Madagascar”? Area: 30 198 km2
Population: 510 000
inhabitants

3.8 RIO TINTO – UK/Australia/Canada

“QMM, by Rio Tinto, is the best example

of investment project that we have in Madagascar.”

(Abstract of conversation with the

Director of Land Administration, Ministry
of Management and Country Planning
Antananarivo, 4th of April 2013)

Exceptionally, the report on this case is

not the result of a visit of our team on the
field, but it aims at quoting the document
“Voices of Change” by the NGO Andrews Lees
Trust which, in 2009, collected testimonies
of the farmers impacted by the project82.
We also include here some excerpts from
the video documentary “Je veux ma part
de terre – Madagascar”, which the authors
Lambolez Fred and Jean Marie Pernelle have
kindly allowed us to publish before the film
is launched83, and some data collected by
Friends of the Earth - France, and reported in
“Madagascar: the new eldorado for mining and
oil companies”84.
The reason for doing so, is that the project of
ilmenite-extraction in Fort-Dauphin is the
oldest in Madagascar, whose impacts have
been largely investigated and can be of great
learning for all of us.
82 www.andrewsleestrust.org/hepa.htm, Madagascar
Voices of Change, NGO Andrews Lees Trust & Panos,
London, 2009.
83 “Je veux ma part de terre – Madagascar”, documen-
tary of Lambolez Fred and Jean Marie Pernelle (to be
launched) 2013.
84 “Madagascar : nouvel eldorado des compagnies minières
et pétrolières”, Friends of the Earth (2012).
Data from www.cites-unies-france.org/img/pdf/
Fiches_des_22_Regions_malgaches.pdf
But most of all, we included this case as it
has been defined by the Land Administration
Office in Antananarivo “the best example of
ongoing investment project in Madagascar.”85
Let’s see why.
The Project
The ilmenite – extraction project of QIT
Minerals Madagascar SA - QMM - which is
80% owned by a subsidiary of the Anglo-
Australian multinational Rio Tinto and 20%
by the Malagasy state, is located in Fort-
Dauphin, Tolagnaro in the Anosy region in the
far South-East of Madagascar. The company
plans to extract and export every year
about 750,000 tons of ilmenite to Canada or
85 Abstract of the conversation held with the Director of
Land Administration at the Ministry of Development and
Country Planning on the 4th of April 2013.

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 83

processing in the 60 next years [See footnote
82].
Talks around this operation began in
the 1980s. The agreement Convention
d’établissement on the project was ratified in
1998, the work agreement has been endorsed
by the Government of Madagascar in 2002
and the beginning of the implementation of
the infrastructure necessary for the operation
was signed in 2005. [See footnote 83].
Anosy region covers an area of 30,198
km2, with over half a million inhabitants
and it is estimated that at least 75% of the
rural population live below the poverty
line, (INSTAT 2005) about almost the same
number are illiterate and do not have access
to clean water. The intended operation area
covers 6000 ha [See footnote 82]. 6,000
people living on the perimeter extraction or
nearby have been identified [See footnote 84].
As in most parts of Madagascar, subsistence
farming is the main activity of the population
in Anosy, and the land is people’s main
source of income and food. The coastal areas
of Anosy are largely populated by fishermen
and their families. Lobster and prawns
are harvested for local and international
markets, and local people also fish in rivers
and lakes for domestic consumption. In
addition, the forest is doomed to be exploited
by QMM who took control of 1320 hectares
of land, including 120 hectars that have
been designated as a conservation area since
2008 by QMM and the Forest Service. The
construction of Ehoala port, but also the
pollution of rivers and the ecosystem changes
caused by the mining activities have caused
great harm and significantly reduced fishing
and the products of this activity even for the
domestic consumption. [See footnote 82].
Ehoala Park
Ehoala Park, an area of 440 ha where
the Ehoala port is located, was given in
84 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
concession by the State to QIT, the Canadian
subsidiary of Rio Tinto. It is an “area reserved
to industrial development and provision
of investors”86. Ehoala Park and Ehoala
Village are currently managed by QMM
with different partners such as EDBM [See
footnote 82].
The Port is the result of a public/private
partnership between Rio Tinto and the
Government of Madagascar. Rio Tinto
financed its construction with 110 million
U.S. dollars, while the Government disbursed
35 million dollars through the “Integrated
Growth Poles” Project of Anosy, using funds
from the World Bank. Rio Tinto funded the
construction of the project at 100%, until the
first production, performed in 2009. At this
point, OMNIS, representing the State, should
fund its share of the project costs or agree to
dilute its shares87.
Land issues
When the procedures of displacement to
grant space to the project’s operation began,
only the 8% of the population could count
on an official document of ownership of
the land, as the majority of people lived on
land inherited from their ancestors under
customary law.
For the extractive industry needs, the State
evicted or expropriated innumerable families,
in the framework of a “public utility purpose”,
in order to assign the land to QMM Rio Tinto
through a long lease 60 years contract [See
footnote 82]. Neither the clauses nor the
dates of signature of the contract about this
concession and the whole mining area have
been made available by the State and QMM
Rio Tinto.
86 http://www.riotintomadagascar.com/french/about-
Carateristiques.asp
87 http://www.riotintomadagascar.com/french/about-
Government.asp
 As in most parts
of Madagascar,
subsistence farming
is the main activity of
the population and the
land is people’s main
source of income and
food

photo ©TerraProject

Currently, the exploitation site is located in
Mandena, an area of 2,000 hectares north of
Fort Dauphin. Displacement and loss of land
affected communities living in Ilafitsignana
and Ambinanibe. Although currently mining
does not directly impact these communities,
they are affected by the loss of access to
the forest and firewood and fresh water for
fishing [See footnote 82].
Ilafitsignana is located 6 kilometers south-
west of Fort Dauphin, near the QMM site
that provides stones for the construction
of the port and roads. The local mountain
on the west of Fort Dauphin is the source
for rocks, and its rapid disappearance
changed the landscape to the point that it
is unrecognizable. Of the 1,500 people who
live there, at least 124 households in the
community have been displaced because of
the quarry and road construction (statistics
PIC) and many others have also lost their
land [See footnote 82].

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 85

 Ambinanibe is a fokontany (the main amount of trees fruit). No information was
administrative organization of the community available in the Regional Office to clarify
- a group of villages) on the coast 7 kilometers or further establish the exact amount of
south of Fort Dauphin. It is composed of compensation. The compensation process is
seven hamlets where about 3,000 people being reviewed because the guidelines of the
reside. To the west there is a cove protected World Bank indicate figures that are closer
by the sea coastal landscape, which allows to 2 000 Ariary / square meter for untitled
villagers to catch shrimp. In addition to the usable land [See footnote 82].
land compensation, the villagers received new
housing. The first round of new housing was Job impacts: reality and expectations
built by QMM, and the conditions related to
the new constructions were According to local people, the
widely accepted. However, According to local cost of living in the region has
later on, for the following people, the cost of tripled since the start-up phase
construction were contracted living in the region of the mine [See footnote 82] and
local companies, who built has tripled since the tourism has declined [See footnote
houses of inferior quality, with start-up phase of the 82]. If around 3 000 jobs were
leaking walls during rainy mine and tourism available during the construction
season [See footnote 82]. phase, the recruitment processes
has declined
included hundreds of skilled
Petriky is an area of coastal workers from abroad – Philippines,
forest which is located 32 Sri-Lanka, South Africa and Africa
kilometers south of Fort Dauphin, with –and workers from other regions. In 2013 only
about 900 inhabitants. The forest is rather 600 jobs were provided.
deteriorated, especially around Loharano
where villagers grow cassava and tomatoes on In Ilafitsignana, the construction phase
the western edge. Much of the forest has been of the mine, which provided employment
cut from east to west, to build a road access to about 36 people in the quarry is now
for QMM vehicles [See footnote 82]. over. Ten people from Ilafitsignana are
currently employed as forest guards in QMM
In 2005-6 QMM began a compensation eucalyptus plantation [See footnote 82]. In
program for people affected, by the loss of Petriky, approximately 324 people were
land. They were offered the choice of land employed by QMM for road construction
or, in alternative, money. Since the villagers (each of them earning about 2 000 Ariary per
realized that the land made available to day – about 0,80 euro) but the job only lasted
them was too sandy, and therefore not good for a few days [See footnote 82].
for cultivation, they chose the money [See
footnote 82]. In 2005, Fort Dauphin received increasing
financial investment in the framework of the
QMM documentation claims that the World Bank ‘integrated growth pole’ program,
company has invested about 4 million which placed the mining operations at the
dollars for 492 local residents affected by heart of its strategy for regional development.
the construction of the port. However, the However the World Bank declared in 2013
villagers reported amounts of compensation that for various reasons, one should not
ranging from only 100 Ariary / square expect job growth in Madagascar, due to
meter to 400 Ariary / square meter (about mining88.
21 cents per square meter), depending on
the condition of the land (fallow crop, the 88 http://lanation.mg/archive.php?id=351 and http://

86 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

TESTIMONIES of 2009
Land
“[QMM] took the land of Fanja and Papango
[because they are too close to the quarry]. They
did not buy it. They said that the land [here]
remain for us, but I am surprised to see the
extent to which their land keeps moving towards
our areas. We went to talk to them and they told
us they would be back soon to work on this issue.
So far they have not come. We are sad because
we have not received any money in return for
that land [near the quarry] being acquired by
QMM but [only money for crop loss] (...). QMM
also moved us to a more crowded location (...) In
addition the population has increased ...” [See
footnote 82].
“There are positive changes [such] improvements
in the houses (...) The roads were repaired
and expanded. The movement is not our main
concern. There is even a project to build a new
road to Ankarefo [that] will improve our village
and create an influx of people and goods. In
terms of distribution of money in exchange for
our land, some people in my village might say
that it was positive, but I would not say that
(...) When my family got the money, as the land
was our ancestral land, each family member
should receive its share (...) Our land was also
undervalued because the government said it
was not cultivated when they took it. They said
that our land was not fertile and therefore not
worth much. But our land was huge and fertile
(...) We harvested a lot of products such as rice,
sweet potatoes and cassava, and these products
fed the family throughout the year. There was
also an unequal distribution of money (...)
People who had fruit trees on their land have
received much more money. How can I say that
I enjoyed receiving this money, which also did
not last for years, but a few months? (...) With
this money, I had to buy food, pay the medical
www.lagazette-dgi.com/index.php?option=com_conte
nt&view=article&id=26887:croissance-2013-le-fmi-est-
moins-optimiste&catid=45:newsflash&Itemid=58
photo ©TerraProject
expenses of my children meet daily needs such as
salt, oil, firewood - and now that the wood is no
longer available, I ‘I had to buy charcoal in Fort
Dauphin” [See footnote 82].
“Some of us were skeptical and did not want to
share their farmland for money (...) some were
convinced that once the foreigners were involved
in the acquisition of our land, there would be
no way to resist, so it was better to accept their
offers [money] (...). I do not accept the idea of
their ownership of Ehoala. I asked my fellow
farmers where would they take their vegetables
if their farmland disappear? Despite opposition
from some of us, they took our land and the
project progressed. People were asked to sign
agreements. Shortly after that, they came to
measure the land. Surprisingly, they measured
our land using their own steps [step], it seemed
inappropriate given the size of our land (...).
Finally, the estimate was made. They announced
on television Tana Tulear and Fort Dauphin
that the payment was about 40 million Ariary.
So when we heard that, people they say, OK, 40
million Ariary - but they had not yet in hand,
just heard on TV (...) [We] have received much
less than that (...). Some people were satisfied
with money, and others immediately regretted
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 87
it, realizing that the amount they received would
not last long enough to feed their grandchildren
in the same way as their agricultural land would
have done” [See footnote 82].
When calculations of our land were terminated,
the people in our village have complained.
People went to see the Prefect of the Region and
the Mayor of Fort Dauphin and QMM. They
changed the price of our land to 100 Ariary
per square meter. Their excuse was that the
wastelands were much cheaper. But I did not
know Ehoala wasteland because people grew
enormously there. (...)I think it was a way to
reduce the value of our land” [See footnote 82].
“This land is the land of our tanindrazana
(ancestors) and QMM will also take our crops
(...) Even if they give us money for our land,
it will not be enough for the rest of our lives
because we still have to raise grandchildren, who
also need to survive - and the land and the earth
is theirs, more than ours. It is for this reason
that I say that they will kill us by taking our
land. This has not occurred in our village, but it
was seen in Ambinanibe and Ilafitsignana” [See
footnote 82].
Forest
“I still expect the forest to meet my needs,
especially to pick up the mahampy for my
work ... In [the past], so I could not pick up
the mahampy, I changed and I was picking up
firewood and for revendais earn some money”
(...) “When foreign tourists come here to see
animals like lemurs, they pay a sum of money
to the local community, an admission (...) Our
forest contains many species of biodiversity that
attracts many tourists, but unfortunately their
visits are prohibited by QMM. QMM does not
accept that tourists pay a fee directly to the local
community (...) All we want is that the forest can
be used to generate income for our community,
because the forest grows in our community. The
forest is still alive thanks to our maintenance
(...) We love the forest, which is why we took care
of it so far (...). For me it would be better to bury
88 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
us - because taking these resources is killing us.
Biodiversity is unique here, both in the sea and
the forest [See footnote 82].
“[QMM] built wells for the local community
(...) and a hospital. I am grateful that we have
a hospital now (...) [But] I’m having trouble
when my children are sick. I do not have enough
money to buy drugs. Before I went into the forest
to gather medicinal plants to treat my children.
Now I have to go to the hospital. QMM has
forgotten that it is not free to go to the hospital
and the drugs are expensive.” [See footnote 82]
“the forest is fundamental for peoples’ lives. First,
since communities are poor here, they need the
forest (...) Instead of building brick houses, people
use forest resources ... Second, woodlands are
fertile and provide good crops of cassava, sweet
potatoes and rice. And thirdly, the forest provides
many good things such as medicinal plants (...).
The one thing that people always had the right to
do is to pick up the firewood, but the guardians of
the forest QMM now supervise anyone who wants
to do so (...) [See footnote 82].
Water
“It is not surprising that our cows die” I hear
that QMM will limit access to the river (...)
I do not know what will happen to us (...) If
such a restriction is put in place. Net fishing
will be prohibited. What will be left for us to
do? What is happening is that QMM and local
communities use the same river (...)
You can see how the dust of their construction
work is covering our environment. Dust is
everywhere, the grass and the river are all
covered by it. Unfortunately our livestock graze
these grasses (...) [And] drink from the polluted
river. Therefore it is not surprising when
our cows die one after the other (...). Here in
Ilafitsignana, in total there use to be 200 cows,
but now I think there are only about 60 left (...)
[See footnote 82].
Since there is no other source of water here
beside the river, we are forced to drink it. This Other aspects
has caused illnesses among the villagers as well”.
[See footnote 82]. “Anyway, everyone in the village has improved
his home, which is why the appearance of the
“Somatraha is not only our traditional area of town is so different today. I must say that the
agricultural land but it is also crucual for our village seems to shine. During the construction
fishing. During a meeting at the Mayor’s Office phase, you could see the happy faces of the
of Fort Dauphin, which was broadcasted on people. They were willing to improve their lives.”
television, they said they would build a small “Now, almost everyone lives in a house made of
harbor for our fishermen in Somatraha, when corrugated iron (...). In fact, the euphoria was
they began to restrict access short-lived because after the
to Somatraha. But this is not construction of houses people
the case - because acess was
“Before I could say that my
not restored [See footnote life was good. Agriculture and had to face the reality: what
does one eat tomorrow? It is
82]. fishing were my business...
strange to think that one lives
I cultivated my land three
in a beautiful home, but he
It was hard to believe they times a year and I collected dies of hunger. Sometimes I see
would build this port for us, a lot of products, but it is no people in their beautiful houses,
because they had already longer possible because the yawning all the time because
limited [our] collecting government took our land” they are malnourished” [See
firewood to Somatraha footnote 82].
(...) In addition, they have
increased their ownership of land to the rest If I have enough money, I hope my children will
of our farmland, and they are approaching succeed in education so that they can secure
the graves of our ancestors (...) I think our their livelihoods. But if I cannot find the money
government underestimates us as villagers” [See to send them to school, (..) If our children are
footnote 82]. illiterate, their future will certainly be dark
because they cannot find a job and they are left
“Before I could say that my life was good with nothing because our ancestral lands were
Agriculture and fishing were my business... I appropriated by QMM. Future generations
cultivated my land three times a year and I will have fewer opportunities in their lives [See
collected a lot of products, but it is no longer footnote 82].
possible because the government took our land.
Thus, people are deprived of their farmland, “(..) The villagers were sad when they learned
providing food insecurity (...) More (...) that a newspaper has published information on
Somatraha, an important source of fish for us how people spent their money at Ambinanibe
villagers, is closed to fishing (...)” QMM (...) It has been written that people
[See footnote 82]. have spent their money on beer. No, it was not.
People have spent their money on things that
“Even though I have received money in exchange could alleviate their hardships (...) In addition
for my land, I thought it was not enough. The [to build houses], many people have legalized
money were spent to build a house and buy some marriage, and others have recorded the birth of
things I needed for my daily life. Worse, the their children (...) [See footnote 82].
money did not last [long] (...) While we were
working for foreign firms, it would not be a Moreover, people should also rebuild their boats
sustainable business and help us forever. You because almost none were available anymore. In
can be fired at any time, if your boss wants.” my case, I wanted to buy two new boats. I had
[See footnote 82].

Land grabbing in Madagascar | 89

already built a house and also another for one
of my children, I bought clothes for my children,
food and furniture for the home ...
I wish that people can see the problems we face
and the work we do to support our lives. Now I
am like a child abandoned by his mother, alone
in the forest.” [See footnote 82]

TESTIMONIES of 2013
“In places like Ilafitsignana and Ambinanibe they
proposed money to people who then agreed to
sell their land. But right now, a few years later,
people are left with nothing. They do not know
where to go, they have nothing. So the money
story, they don’t want it. […] Then one man
said that he worked for some time in the port
there, where he earned 3 millions Ariary (about
1000 euro). But “what is left now. I have nothing
left”? In fact, they [QMM] think that they are
poor, but in in fact they are richer than them.
And they say that the wealth that they have now,
they don’t give it up. Some of them are saying
“We are not afraid as when they are not pleased
they call policemen and nobody sees them
[QMM], they put the policemen and soldiers
ahead. So from now, they will take initiatives to
not be afraid any longer” “We are not going to be
afraid any longer.” [See footnote 83]
An economic operator in Fort-Dauphin:
“There is no money circulating today. There is
nothing. […] Indeed, when there is no money,
poverty is taking hold.” [See footnote 83].
The private management of Ehoala port, as
a concession to QIT, a subsidiary of Rio
Tinto, is being translated by an impossible
access to the port without a special permit.
A Parliament member from Fort-Dauphin:
«They [QMM] think they are the heads of these
places (maîtres des lieux).[..] I am the deputy
of Fort-Dauphin. For me, this port is as it was
located in Montreal and not in Fort-Dauphin. I
am not able to ask for an authorisation to move
inside my circonscritption». [See footnote 83].
photo ©TerraProject
Local communities struggle
Farmers and citizens affected by this mining
are organized around the association
FAGNOMBA and its president Perle
Zafinandro-Fourquet. Since 2010 they are
fighting with courage and determination to
defend their land and their heritage, claiming
fairer compensation for their land despite
threats and challenges as well as more jobs
for local people, more training for local
workers to fit with the company competences
needs. Faced with the silence and lack of
response by the managers of the company
and regional authorities, demonstrations and
activities were strengthened at the beginning
of 2013. They have been in custody for more
than six weeks, were sentenced to suspended
sentences and prepare to face other trials due
to lawsuits filed by the QMM company or by
Malagasy authorities. Many citizens, lawyers
and organizations have been following their
path for years, spreading information about it
in Madagascar and worldwide, and supporting
their legitimate struggle for true development
and a better future.

90 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

4 CONCLUSIONS
This report is the result of a joint mission to Madagascar carried
out in March-April 2013 in cooperation between the Collectif
pour la Défense des Terres Malgaches – TANY, the Civil Society
Organisations Platform Solidarité des Intervenants sur le Foncier
– SIF and the Italian association Re:Common.
The data collected during the field visits
allowed us to reach a direct understanding
of the impacts of very diverse projects, but
all implying the shift of access, control
and management of land to others than
the communities which rely on it for their
survival.
We crossed five Regions (Itasy, Sofia, Alaotra
Mangoro, Analanjirofo, Ihorombe), and
directly visited six projects implemented by
the following actors: i) Tozzi Green (Italy); ii)
Delta Petroli (Italy); iii) Ambatovy (Canada/
South Korea/Japan); iv) Mainland Mining
(China); v) Mada Woodlands (Norway);
vi) LAICO - Bionexx (Lybia/Madagascar/
France). Moreover, we spent some time in the
island of Nosy Be, in the Diana region - to
assess the impact of the tourism industry
on land access for local people. Finally, we
included testimonies on the case of QMM-
Rio Tinto (UK/Australia/Canada), in the
Region of Anosy, exceptionally relying on
information gathered through the document
“Voices of Change” by the NGO Andrews
Lees Trust, that we sincerely thank for their
agreement, and on some excerpts from the
video documentary “Je veux ma part de
terre – Madagascar”, which the authors
Lambolez Fred and Jean Marie Pernelle
have kindly allowed us to publish before the
documentary is launched. All the projects
included in this report are being implemented
by foreign investors. Despite this, we had the
opportunity to verify, directly from the field,
that domestic investors are also very active
actors in the rush for land in Madagascar, and
the negative impacts on local communities’s
access and control of land and natural
resources do not differ much from those
produced by foreign investors.
Summing up the whole amount of inputs
and information gathered during our visit
on the field, thanks to the testimonies of the
many people that accepted to share their
experiences with us, is a rather difficult task.
However, what was not difficult to
understand is that, whether the projects
we visited implied putting the land under
production or not, developing the companies’
business plan accordingly or not, the basic
fact of shifting land’s access and control to
actors other than the peasants and herders
who were living and working there, makes
these projects clear cases of land grabbing.
In this framework, some provisional
considerations can be drawn from the
meetings that we had and from the actors
statements recorded on the field:
• Madagascar is one of the richest
countries in the world in terms of natural
resources and potentials to self-sustain
its own development, but it hosts one of
the poorest population in the world. This
unsolved contraddiction is at the core of
the appetites of most investors. Whether
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 91
 they come to Madagascar to produce
food or medical plants for export, to grow
energetic crops to meet Western clean
energy targets, to plant forests to obtain
carbon credits, to exploit the rich subsoil
to meet the global growing need of row
materials, or to exploit the country’s
touristic potential, they can count on a
strong “colonial” legacy that do not take
in account that “customary” land rights
are still alive in Madagascar; they count
on cheap labor and on the possibility,
granted by very fragile material
conditions, to make people endorse the
principle that they can offset the loss
of land with money compensations and
with the access to few jobs under dubious
conditions.
• Despite some public claims of the
opposite, land and resource grabbing
in Madagascar is far from experiencing
a downward spiral. The much-vaunted
cancellation of the Daewoo project in
2009 was just a bait and switch. On one
side, in fact, Daewoo Logistics has not left
Madagascar but, as it is often the case, it
simply went on or relocated its activities
in other areas, implementing more
projects of lesser scope; on the other
side, the loud mediatic echo granted to
the Daewoo scandal managed to hide
the development of several other smaller
projects, setting the base for a more
silent, but no less impacting, wave of land
grabbing. Most of the new deals are based
on long-term, or renewable short-term
leasings, which shift the right to access,
manage, control and decide over land and
its resources from the local communities
to investors, which can dispose of it
for many years to come. Whether this
happens through lease or sale contracts,
the actual results for local communities
is the same: their land is being grabbed
and they loose any possibility to sustain
themselves.
92 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
• Grabbing land and other resources
in Madagascar would not be possible
without the facilitation, the support and
the acquiescence of the State authorities.
Over the last ten years all the Malagasy
governments seem to have largely
absorbed the World Bank’s approach to
development. In 2010, in line with the
global trend of promoting the “win-win”
discourse linked to “land acquisition” (as
they called it), the current government
started focusing on how to improve the
internal procedures in order to avoid
delays thus loosing precious investment
opportunities, to reduce confusion for
the investors and to facilitate the relevant
authorities in taking well-informed
decisions. In the name of the promotion
of foreign investments to boost economic
growth, and with the expectation of
high financial returns through taxes and
royalties, the Malagasy authorities play
today a central role in marketing their
country abroad89 and in guaranteeing the
maximum possible effort to improve the
country’s investment climate.
• Linked to the above, nowadays, the
acquisition of land by foreign investors is
not put under discussion by the Malagasy
authorities. Even the long process of
land reform, that saw the light starting
from 2005, despite some attempts to
introduce norms and regulations aimed at
improving the recognition of customary
land rights, is not without omissions.
The legislative vacuum consecutive to
this, in addition to the set up of the new
investment law 2007-036, opened up
large room to maneuver for investors,
leaving affected communities with weak
legal tools to appeal to, in order to defend
their rights.
89 http://www.lexpress.mu/story/24381-madagascar-
economie--promotion-des-atouts-malgaches-en-chine.
html
• One of the most pernicious aspects of
the on-going land transactions lies in the
asymmetry of the means for negotiation
between local communities and investors.
If Malagasy communities are sometimes
consulted, a lack of information of the
real impacts inherent to these deals has
led to acceptance before, and regret
later. However, the acceptance, or
rather the weak opposition, is due to
different factors: in some cases, fear of
authorities’ sanctions played a strong
role in preventing people to speak out;
some peasants and herders had to face
court procedures, and even days of
imprisonment following their declared
opposition to a project. Moreover, in most
cases, local communities have no real
choice: in the framework of an enduring
and worsening social and economic
crisis, with the 92% of the population
living, in 2013, under $2 a day, short–
term benefits such as compensations
and temporary jobs have been, in some
cases, understandably perceived as
opportunities to improve very fragile
living conditions. However, confronted
with the real consequences of these
projects, and despite some preliminary
expectations which remained mostly
unmet, the concerned communities
are well aware that the loss of land and
resources, in exchange for few short
term benefits, has not improved their
life conditions, nor set up the bases for
improvements in the future.
These provisional considerations lead us to
raise some more general concerns, and few
questions:
• From the World Bank to pension
funds, from the Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO) to the UN
Conference on Trade and Development
(UNCTAD), diverse efforts have been
put in place to “regulate” land grabs
(or “large scale land acquisitions”, as
they prefer to define them), through the
creation of codes and standards, sets
of voluntary rules that governments or
companies can use to discipline and guide
the land deals. In all cases, the net result
is voluntary self-regulations – which, as
many cases from the ground can testify,
are ineffective, unreliable and no remedy
for the fundamental wrongness of these
deals90.
Focusing on the way land is acquired
rather than on the consequences
and risks, allows to avoid calling
things by their name: land grabbing
has become synonymous with
agricultural investment, evictions and
expropriations are called acquisitions,
privatisation is named development.
This is a catch 22 we all need to guard
against, in order to keep pushing
all involved actors in front of their
reponsibilities, from the very local to
the national and global level.
• Linked to the above, many believe that
the participation and consultation of
local communities in the definition of
land leasing agreements is the panacea
for all evils, as if it was not so blatantly
obvious that one of the key elements
in favour of land grabbers is that
often peasants and local communities,
especially in contexts of deep political,
economical and social crisis, have no
real choice and, at times, are obliged to
pursue short-term benefit at the expense
of a more long-term vision. For these
reasons, increasing transparency in land
acquisition contracts, and achieving
accountability are, almost everywhere,
regarded as crucial objectives. An
increased transparency is certainly
desirable and necessary: investors and
90 “Responsible Farmland Investing? Current efforts
to regulate land grabs will make things worse”, GRAIN,
August 2012
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 93
 decision makers have to reveal their
plans to the concerned populations and
to all citizens, in order to allow them
to understand what is really happening
on their territories and take immediate
action. However transparency alone
is not enough, as it cannot protect the
communities from the arrogance and the
impunity of those who take their land,
and the improvement of accountability
measures are not a solution, if a serious
discussion on the full decision making
process is not put in place.
• Expecting development to come by
granting the control (through selling
or leasing) over land and resources to
others seems like a non sense, but it
often responds to logics which have
little to do with the real interests and
needs of the local communities. But no
“national development” can, in fact, be
considered as such, if it impoverishes
the majority of the population that,
in Madagascar, is made for the 80%
by rural inhabitants, which include
peasants, breeders and fishermen mainly.
Despite their size, the productive drive
behind them, the involved actors and
sponsors, the adequacy or inadequacy
of the compensation measures, all these
projects pose some crucial questions:
who really decides over the
management of the territories, and
what development model do these
projects perpetrate and respond to?
Hasn’t time come, for Madagascar,
to break a disruptive neo-liberal
development cycle, based on intensive
foreign exploitation of the country’s
natural resources, implemented
at the expenses of the majority of
Malagasy citizens, for the profit of
few representatives of the global and
national elite?
• At the national level, Malagasy
authorities along the years have
94 | Land grabbing in Madagascar
implemented new laws and land reform
and, further on, additional policy tools
with the declared intention, on one
side, to strenghten the protection of
customary land tenure rights and, on the
other, to improve the conditions of local
people by boosting economic foreign
investments. These double objectives
resulted in serious failures, omissions
and contraddictions within the various
legislations, and have become a powerful
tool in the hands of investors to proceed
with their plans, meeting little obstacles
on their way.
Given the ongoing discussions aimed
at amending existing laws to increase
mining royalties and improve the system
of revenues’ distribution between the
State and the municipalities, wouldn’t
it be the right time too for the State
to respond to the urgent and unsolved
issues related to the existing land
policy, which have a grave impact on
small scale peasants, breeders and
rural communities survival?
Couldn’t it be the right time to find
new tools to prevent the economic,
social and environmental disasters
inherent in “selling off” natural
resources to foreign investors and in
promoting a development model which
dismantles agroecologic small scale
farming, channeling disproportionate
resources towards large-scale export-
oriented agribusiness?
Moreover, wouldn’t it be better for
Malagasy authorities to start adopting
public policies aimed at guaranteeing
that the benefits coming from
Malagasy resources really reach and
stay within Malagasy people, granting
the majority of them enough jobs with
an acceptable income to provide a
decent life for the future generations?
• With the food crisis hitting hard
in Madagascar, land grabbing, as
elsewhere, is increasingly preventing
local communities from accessing the
land and its resources; it eradicates
local production for local consumption,
turning traditional sustainable social
and economic systems into large-
scale agricultural production which
are cut off from their context; it ties
food production with export instead of
diverting it back to the domestic market,
following the same pattern that has
made many food crises so devastating
for smallholder peasants; it promotes
a development model which keeps
creating more poverty and environmental
destruction; it pretends to offset the
loss of land with the creation of a few
jobs under dubious conditions; finally,
it makes the implementation of a more
just land tenure system, which takes
seriously into account customary land
rights and rights of use, an increasingly
remote prospect91. Confronted with this
huge challenge, and with the global
dimension of the phenomenon, Malagasy
peasants, impacted groups, civil society
members and concerned citizen may
feel helpless and think that it cannot be
escaped. However, a global solidarity
against landgrabbing is already in place.
Worldwide peasants’ organizations, social
movements, civil society organisations,
with groups coming from investors’
countries as their allies92, started
organising themselves to firmly oppose
these attacks to the sovereignty of the
91 For further information: Seized! The 2008 land grab
for food and financial security, GRAIN, October 2008.
92 Nyeleni Conference Declaration “Stop Land Grab-
bing Now!” available at: http://viacampesina.org/en/
index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/agrarian-reform-
mainmenu-36/1127-stop-land-grabbing-now; Declaration
“Land Grabbing by Pension Funds and other Financial
Institutions must be stopped!” available at: http://www.
grain.org/bulletin_board/entries/4534-land-grabbing-by-
pension-funds-and-other-financial-institutions-must-be-
stopped
local communities on their territories.
In this framework, concerned and
affected people in Madagscar can find
solid support to break the silence and
this disruptive cycle, and to strenghten
alliances between competent and
committed lawyers, peasants, activists
and civil society groups to raise early
warnnings and jointly define tools to
confront the phenomenon at the local
level.
• 2014 will be the International Year of
Family Farming, an initiative launched
by the General Assembly of the United
Nations, aimed to call for the promotion
of active policies to support family
farming, indigenous, peasant, cooperative
and artisanal fisheries systems.
Isn’t this a precious occasion for
Madagascar to foster agricultural
policies to enhance smallholders’
productive capacities for local market
consumption? Isn’t, finally, a crucial
issue that of granting real protection
to occupation rights and rights of
use, in a country where the 80% of
the people is represented by rural
inhabitants, peasants, breeders and
fishermen?
Land grabbing in Madagascar | 95
 photo ©TerraProject

96 | Land grabbing in Madagascar

Land grabbing in Madagascar
Echoes and testimonies from the field

This report is the result of a field mission to Madagascar carried out in March-April
2013 by some organizations from the local and international civil society. Through the
testimonies of the communities concerned by the projects visited during the mission,
the report intends to demonstrate that the pressure excercited on Madagascar’s land and
other natural resources is growing, causing a proliferation of land conflicts throughout
the territory, at the expense of local people. To do so, the report is structured in two
parts. The first aims to framing the issue, highlighting the specific cultural and juridical
context in which land grabbing is taking place. The second is an overview of some
ongoing projects that entail moving the control of land and natural resources from local
communities to multiple transnational actors, with the related consequences.