SEED Madagascar

Despite producing less than 0.01% of the globe’s carbon dioxide emissions between 1933 and 2019, Madagascar is currently facing a food security crisis caused and exacerbated by climate change.¹ It is projected to place 49% of people in the Southern regions of Androy, Anosy and Atsimo Andrefana in acute food insecurity between October and December 2021.² SEED is currently implementing the second round of its Emergency Food Distribution project, supporting a total of over 900 affected families across 41 villages in the rural areas around Fort Dauphin. Yet, whilst this and other mitigation measures provide temporary relief, the medium and long term impacts of climate change on Madagascar's food systems remain a growing threat.

Food security was first defined during the 1996 World Food Summit as  when “all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.”³ Within this definition, food security can be categorised into four food systems: availability, access, utilisation, and stability. The maintenance of these four pillars is critical to the health and livelihoods of millions of people around the world, yet in recent years climate change has threatened all four.

The availability of food can be heavily influenced by the environment. Food availability, in terms of food security, is the ability to access sufficient quantities of good quality food supplied either domestically or from imports.⁴ Climate has the ability to harm crops and reduce yield, as well as contributing to pest outbreaks, disease, and even to changing pollination distribution.⁵ Evidence of this can be found in Madagascar, which is experiencing its most severe drought since 1981.⁶ In addition, the Malagasy migratory locust has infested more than 48,000 hectares of land in the south, combined with an armyworm outbreak that has caused up to 60 percent of crop losses in the region.⁷ These factors have contributed to changing agricultural conditions, for which farmers have been unable to prepare.

The changing availability of food has already had an impact on communities which SEED works alongside. Lomba Hasoavana, SEED’s head of construction, is originally from Manambaro, one of the five communes SEED is currently supporting through its Emergency Food Distribution Project. Traditionally the commune has grown rice and fruit, with the main fruiting times being October to April. Oranges usually fruit in the later part of this season from February to April. Lomba is uncertain of what the future holds “I went for a ride to Manamabaro, my hometown, the other day and saw something very unusual. The orange fruit is out now. My 86-year-old father told me that he has never seen something like this the entire of his life. Now the orange trees in Manambaro have changed their season, we do not know if these trees are part of the 2022 harvesting season or not.” The changing climate of Madagascar has already contributed towards a shift in seasonal agriculture, one which is increasingly difficult for farmers to predict and one which constantly depreciates local communities' food security. 

Food access, or the ability to obtain food and purchase it at affordable prices, can also be particularly susceptible to climate change. Climate change impacts productivity and yield, which in turn causes disruptions to markets and manufacturing, and increases prices.⁸ Since 2018, food prices in Madagascar have fluctuated significantly as a result of limited crop yield. Conditions in 2021 have barely improved, with significant seasonal rainfall deficits. This has a direct impact on food prices, with the price of rice currently eight percent higher than in 2020.⁹ Combined with limited access to planting resources such as seeds and cuttings, which are vital for the October planting season, many have been left in a vulnerable position. 

Edwine has been a part of SEED’s food distribution project since August 2021. She is the mother of Joeline, a child aged 14 months suffering from moderate acute malnutrition. Edwine and Joeline have witnessed the effects of climate change on agricultural production in her community in Ampasy Nahampoana. “Due to climate change, seeds are not germinating because of the prolonged drought. People have stopped cultivating because it is a waste of time as you aren’t going to harvest any production.” Her experiences provide valuable insight into the changing agricultural landscape of Madagascar and its impact on the individual level. As climate change devastates agricultural production, fewer Malagasy people will be able or inclined to farm, leading to increased food prices and destabilised food security. 

The third pillar of food security, also impacted by climate change, is food utilisation. Commonly, the utilisation of food is understood as how the body uses and makes the most of various nutrients in food. Changes in temperature, precipitation patterns, humidity, and increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events can change the nutritional makeup of food.¹⁰ Whilst it is predicted that increased CO₂ levels will directly reduce the micronutrient content of food crops in Madagascar, indirect consequences have already had an impact on food utilisation and consumption¹¹. Limited availability and access to food has led to emergency coping mechanisms amongst low-income families. As traditional foods have disappeared from markets due to limited availability, many Malagasy people have resorted to survival measures such as eating wild foods, including locusts, raw red cactus fruits, or wild leaves.¹² Despite the consumption of certain insects, such as Sakondry, known to be a sustainable source of nutrients, wild foods are considered to be less edible and more dangerous for children and pregnant and lactating mothers.¹³

Beatrice’s ten-month-old child, Frido, has been diagnosed with moderate acute malnutrition. They live in Soanierana and are currently supported by  SEED’s Food Distribution project. Beatrice spoke to SEED of her experience of food insecurity. “We eat wild foods when there is no food to eat. My family and I are not used to eating those so they affect our health but what can we do? We’ve got to eat. My children have stomach-aches due to these but we don’t have any choice to survive.” Beatrice’s is one of 114 families who currently receive unprepared food distributions in the commune of Soanierana, and will continue to receive rations until Frido is healthy again. Yet, with crops predicted to lose their micronutrient value, the future of food utilisation in Madagascar remains uncertain. 

Food stability is the fourth and final pillar of food security. This is the ability to access food without intermittent periods of hunger. Climate change can influence food stability through increasing the frequency and extremity of weather events, which disrupt the full process of food production, including crop yield, transport, and pricing. Flooding can disrupt transport and markets whilst drought can reduce the availability and access of produce and reduce crop yield. Between 1996 and 2016 Madagascar was hit by 35 cyclones, eight floods and five periods of severe drought costing $1 billion in damages and causing food instability.¹⁴ The drought which lasted from 2015 to 2017 caused 1,144,000 people to become food insecure - over half experienced severe food insecurity.¹⁵ Today, it is estimated that 1.14 million people in the south are once again facing acute food insecurity.¹⁶ The economic repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic have only aggravated these environmental factors and further contributed to food insecurity. Tsaravavy and her 14-month-old child, Mary Rosni, live in the commune of Mandromondromotra. Tsaravavy spoke to SEED of her experience of the impact which continuous drought and instability have had on her community, saying, “Lack of water and the drought has meant that there is no crop production in some places, and this has caused poverty, migration, increasing insecurity and crime.” As the prevalence of extreme weather events grows worse so too will coping mechanisms - unfortunately crime is one method of survival in times of increasing food instability. 

SEED’s Emergency Food Distribution Project has taken steps to mitigate the growing food insecurity in south east Madagascar. This project has delivered packages of unprepared food containing rice, beans, and oil to 921 families with children suffering from moderate acute malnutrition and severe acute malnutrition. Ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) has been provided to 751 children diagnosed with moderate acute malnutrition whilst the remaining 170 children with severe acute malnutrition are referred to receive government-funded RUTF from community health centres. This treatment allows for recovery from nutritional deficiency and provides a solution to decreasing food utilisation. In addition, SEED provides nutritional education to the families to support them to keep their family safe during times of increasing instability. 

The first round of the food distribution project in an area north of Fort Dauphin led to an average recovery rate of 98% amongst children diagnosed with moderate and severe acute malnutrition. Yet the situation in Madagascar continues to grow worse. The number of people living in famine-like conditions is predicted to double from 14,000 to at least 28,000 this month, whilst emergency food insecurity will increase to over half a million people.¹⁷ Although the countries that have contributed the most in terms of carbon emissions may have the resources to combat changes in climate, those with the smallest carbon footprints do not, and consequently stand to suffer the most. The future of Madagascar's food systems remains uncertain, but what is certain is that without a cohesive international response to the threat of climate change, food systems across the world will continue to deteriorate at an exponential rate. 

References

1. Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser, “CO2 and Greenhouse Gas Emissions,” Our World in Data, May 11, 2020, https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/madagascar.
2. FAO, “FAO GIEWS Country Brief on Madagascar,” Fao.org, September 28, 2021, http://www.fao.org/giews/countrybrief/country.jsp?code=MDG.
3. FAO, “Policy Brief Food Security Changing Policy Concepts of Food Security,” FAO, 2006, http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/faoitaly/documents/pdf/pdf_Food_Security_Cocept_Note.pdf.
4. FAO, “Policy Brief Food Security Changing Policy Concepts of Food Security,” FAO, 2006, http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/faoitaly/documents/pdf/pdf_Food_Security_Cocept_Note.pdf.
5. IPCC, “Chapter 5 — Special Report on Climate Change and Land,” Ipcc.ch (Special Report on Climate Change and Land, 2019), https://www.ipcc.ch/srccl/chapter/chapter-5/.
6. Chris Funk, “How Climate Change Contributed to Madagascar’s Food Crisis,” The Conversation, September 9, 2021, https://theconversation.com/how-climate-change-contributed-to-madagascars-food-crisis-167370.
7. OCHA, “Madagascar: Grand Sud Humanitarian Snapshot (July 2021) - Madagascar,” ReliefWeb, August 27, 2021, https://reliefweb.int/report/madagascar/madagascar-grand-sud-humanitarian-snapshot-july-2021.
8. IPCC, “Chapter 5 — Special Report on Climate Change and Land,” Ipcc.ch (Special Report on Climate Change and Land, 2019), https://www.ipcc.ch/srccl/chapter/chapter-5/.
9. FAO, “FAO GIEWS Country Brief on Madagascar,” Fao.org, September 28, 2021, http://www.fao.org/giews/countrybrief/country.jsp?code=MDG.
10. IPCC, “Chapter 5 — Special Report on Climate Change and Land,” Ipcc.ch (Special Report on Climate Change and Land, 2019), https://www.ipcc.ch/srccl/chapter/chapter-5/.
11. Joy Guillemot et al., “Madagascar - Climate Change and Health Diagnostic : Risks and Opportunities for Climate-Smart Health and Nutrition Investment,” Research Gate (Washington DC: World Bank Group, February 2018), https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327155996_Madagascar_-_Climate_change_and_health_diagnostic_risks_and_opportunities_for_climate-smarthealth_and_nutrition_investment.
12. WFP, “Climate Change: An Assault on the Hungry Poor in Southern Africa,” WFP, August 2021, https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-0000131298/download/?_ga=2.246607620.1889736485.1629977673-1710738855.1629977673.
13. FEWS NET, “Madagascar - Food Security Outlook: Dim, 2021-02-28 | Famine Early Warning Systems Network,” fews.net, February 2021, https://fews.net/southern-africa/madagascar/food-security-outlook/march-2021.
14. US AID, “Climate Change Risk Profile: Madagascar,” Climate Links, June 2016, https://www.climatelinks.org/sites/default/files/asset/document/2016%20CRM%20Factsheet%20Madagascar_use%20this.pdf.
15. Norohasina Rakotoarison et al., “Assessment of Risk, Vulnerability and Adaptation to Climate Change by the Health Sector in Madagascar,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 15, no. 12 (November 26, 2018): 2643, https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122643.
16. FAO, “FAO GIEWS Country Brief on Madagascar,” Fao.org, September 28, 2021, http://www.fao.org/giews/countrybrief/country.jsp?code=MDG.
17. OCHA, “Madagascar: Grand Sud Humanitarian Snapshot (July 2021) - Madagascar,” ReliefWeb, August 27, 2021, https://reliefweb.int/report/madagascar/madagascar-grand-sud-humanitarian-snapshot-july-2021.