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Geography, agriculture and the economy Geography, the agricultural sector and the Malagasy economy The island of Madagascar has a total area of 587,841 km2 and is situated in eastern Africa between 12° and 25° south. Its population rose from 6.7 million in 1970 to 18 million in 2006, thus growing by about 3.0 per cent a year, or doubling every 25 years. Population density varies greatly from region to region, with half the population living in a third of the country’s land area in the central and eastern regions, where the density exceeds 50 inhabitants per square kilometre, while the density is less than 50 in the south and north, and less than 10 in the rest of the country. The agricultural sector and the economy With a view to halving poverty by 2015, the Government set itself the goal of an annual growth of 6 per cent in gross domestic product (GDP). Although lower than the Government’s expectations, growth was 4.6 per cent in 2005 and 4.8 per cent in 2006, which is quite acceptable, given the high cost of petroleum, the droughts of the past two years and the damage inflicted on infrastructure, public services and economic activity by the cyclones that have repeatedly struck the island right up to 2007. Agriculture is the basis of the Malagasy economy, contributing 26.0 per cent of gross national product (GNP) in 2005. On the other hand, the mining of such elements as ilmenite, nickel and cobalt, and precious and semi-precious stones, is expanding fast, as are the tourist industry and textile free-trade zones. Rice is the Malagasy staple food and accounts for nearly half the country’s agricultural production. Although it is cultivated throughout the country under both rainfed and irrigated systems, the recent shortage (2005) highlighted the recurrent shortfall in the country’s production and the complexity of the rice market. However, the rise in prices resulting from this shortage on the local market immediately led to an increase in the areas sown, indicating farmers’ ability to react quickly. At the end of 2006, the Government announced that it was importing 50,000 tonnes of rice to cover the country’s needs because of the recent years’ drought in the far south and the flooding of harvests in the north, both factors that aggravated the crisis. Madagascar also produces several export crops, particularly vanilla, coffee, pepper, tobacco, groundnut, sisal, clove and ylang-ylang. Source: IFAD |
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