Harifidy Rakoto Ratsimba

• Dr Eng
• University of Antananarivo

Forest-Savannah transition zones are increasingly vulnerable due to their position between the savannah and forest ecosystems, and their ecological and biophysical characteristics. This study evaluates the spatiotemporal dynamics of land use and land cover (LULC), degradation, and wildfire links. Random Forest (RF) classifier was used in Google Ear...

The urgency to restore landscapes to counteract deforestation, soil degradation, and biodiversity loss has resulted in a global commitment to landscape restoration. Many frameworks and tools have emerged for the design and implementation of restoration activities. The frameworks tend to focus on selected dimensions of sustainability, with the major...

Key messages and recommendations • Current FLR frameworks emphasize ecological restoration, overlooking in particular the social dimension of restoration and broad participation throughout FLR processes. • Understanding restoration as a multi-dimensional transformation process is key to facilitate long-term success of restoration initiatives. • A...

L’exploitation minière soutient des millions de moyens de subsistance, fournit des minéraux essentiels et peut contribuer au développement économique. Toutefois, ces contributions peuvent entraîner des compromis importants pour la biodiversité et les écosystèmes, à travers la perte d’habitats, la déforestation et la pollution. Ces impacts sont part...

Executive statement • Tenure and land governance models are decisive factors of FLR success. • Tenure arrangements and who benefits from FLR must be well-defined prior to implementation. Different approaches exist from individual land tenure to communal. • Significant gaps in communal land use policies still exist and need to be addressed. • There...

Borocera cajani Vinson, le fameux Landibe, un papillon séricigène sauvage de la forêt de Tapia est le plus exploité en matière de soie et possède la plus large distribution à Madagascar. Sa population ne cesse de régresser dans son habitat naturel suite à différentes pressions. Cependant, aucune étude n'a mentionné si les parasitoïdes contribuent a...

This review summarizes findings from 25 articles published together in Tropical Forest Issues 61 (Pasiecznik and Goldammer 2022), including contributions from 100 co-authors. Following a call for abstracts reviewed by a seven-strong panel of experts, case studies were selected from 16 countries in tropical America, Asia and Africa, along with artic...

The first 65 km of agricultural fuelbreaks in the country were established in Boeny Region, northwestern Madagascar in 2021 and 2022. Mostly in grassy savanna, these fuelbreaks limit the spread of fires, and have also create an additional 615 ha of farmland for crop production. This should reduce the cleating in the national park and so reduce futu...

Mapping the extent of fire-affected areas is very important for integrated fire management, especially for stakeholder communication and mobilization, rehabilitation of burned areas, and decision making. A prerequisite to planning fire response strategies requires accurate quantitative data on when and where fires occur. This article reports on a s...

The recognition of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification’s (UNCCD) failure to reduce the rate of desertification and its social and economic repercussions, and the attribution of this failure to lack of strong political will rather than to weak science and malpractice of land users, triggered the emergence of the land degradation...

In the Mananara-Nord Biosphere Reserve, the prices fluctuation of cash crops is a very important hazard for local populations whose local economy is heavily dependent on them. The objective of this study was to analyze where this price fluctuation comes from and how it affects landscape transformation and forest cover dynamics. Based on both quanti...

Anthropization of forest landscapes is a major threat to ecosystems and biodiversity. To gather comprehensive information on anthropization dynamics in forest landscapes, fine-scale surveys of deforestation are required, coupled with detailed analysis of both spatial transformation processes and forest patch geometry. We conducted such a comprehens...

Recent studies have underlined the importance of climatic variables in determining tree height and biomass in tropical forests. Nonetheless, the effects of climate on tropical forest carbon stocks remain uncertain. In particular, the application of process‐based dynamic global vegetation models has led to contrasting conclusions regarding the poten...

Madagascar contains Africa’s fourth largest extent of mangroves, representing approximately 2% of the global distribution. Since 1990, more than 20% of Madagascar’s mangrove ecosystems have been heavily degraded or deforested due primarily to increased harvest for charcoal and timber and the expansion of agriculture and aquaculture. Anthropogenic-d...

Mangrove ecosystems help mitigate climate change, are highly biodiverse, and provide critical goods and services to coastal communities. Despite their importance, anthropogenic activities are rapidly degrading and deforesting mangroves world-wide. Madagascar contains 2% of the world’s mangroves, many of which have undergone or are starting to exhib...

Mangroves are found throughout the tropics, providing critical ecosystem goods and services to coastal communities and supporting rich biodiversity. Globally, mangroves are being rapidly degraded and deforested at rates exceeding loss in many tropical inland forests. Madagascar contains around 2% of the global distribution, >20% of which has been d...

Mangroves are found throughout the tropics, providing critical ecosystem goods and services to coastal communities and supporting rich biodiversity. Despite their value, world-wide, mangroves are being rapidly degraded and deforested. Madagascar contains approximately 2% of the world’s mangroves, >20% of which has been deforested since 1990 from in...

Remote sensing digital image analysis is applied to monitor the behaviors of the southeastern forests of Madagascar where rainfall values have been decreasing for the last decades. This study investigates the vegetation reacts in relation with rainfall variability using vegetation indices as NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index). Six Landsa...

Madagascar is currently developing a policy and strategies to enhance the sustainable management of its natural resources, encouraged by United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and REDD. To set up a sustainable financing scheme methodologies have to be provided that estimate, prevent and mitigate leakage, develop national and...

Carbon accounting and deforestation monitoring constitute the most important instruments in implementing the Reducing Emission from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) mechanism in developing countries like Madagascar. Furthermore, most of the researches and calculations have been established at different scales. The present research develops a me...

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is encouraging specifically developing countries like Madagascar, to develop methodologies on carbon assessment. The present research shows above ground biomass assessment through a methodology combining satellite images analysis and biomass inventory in a lowland rainforest in the...

This paper presents an approach for combined biomass inventories in the scope of future REDD regimes. The focus is set on a sound and reliable method for measuring and monitoring the current state of carbon stocks and their changes over time. A reliable framework for measuring, reporting and verification is urgently needed to ensure the integrity a...

L’estimation du stock de carbone contenu dans les forêts peut être effectuée de plusieurs manières. Les méthodes les plus connues sont destructives et nécessitent l’abattage d’un grand nombre représentatif d’arbres. Cette représentativité est difficilement atteinte dans les forêts tropicales, présentant une diversité d’espèces exceptionnelles, comm...