[LUM#7] Back to Mada
Welcome to Nosy Lava: a biodiversity paradise in the Indian Ocean. But for how long? Faced with the threats to this small fishing island, six students from Montpellier are taking action.
Poaching, animal trading, destruction of mangroves, intensive fishing... On the island of Nosy Lava and in Ananalava, a coastal town in north-west Madagascar, animal species have already disappeared, like the emblematic dugong; turtles are massacred by poachers, the sea is overfished, and mangroves are burned to produce charcoal.
Marine protected area
In 2014, the island's inhabitants called for help from the Opti'Pousse Haie association, which specializes in local sustainable development. A solution was devised: the creation of an on-site marine protected area. In the summer of 2017, six biology-ecology students from Montpellier landed on Nosy Lava to lay the scientific foundations for the project, dubbed " Protect Mada '".
Among them is 22-year-old Florine Hadjadj. The young woman is discovering a new reality: " a very poor country, where the first priority is survival: having something to eat in the evening, feeding the children, not getting sick. There's a huge gap with our daily lives... and sometimes it's hard to get across what we're saying! Turtles, a protected species? Not easy to explain in a country where turtle exploitation can be a way of subsisting...
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The six vahazas1 know that the protected area will only be viable if it is supported by the local community. There's only one way: to convince them. " Raising awareness took a lot of time. We met everyone. Through meetings, discussions, film debates and awareness-raising games, links are patiently forged with the local population. One by one, the villages concerned signed up to the project. The preliminary file for the creation of the protected area is now complete: it will be submitted at the end of 2017.
For Florine, the adventure lasted four months. It changed her forever. " When I arrived, I was thirsty for virgin forests. But the real discovery was elsewhere. It was meeting these extraordinary people: their kindness, their benevolent curiosity, their joy in welcoming us...".
Today, the young woman is taking a year off from her studies. Her only thought is to return to Mada, where she has many fond memories. " I fell ill in the middle of a pulmonary plague epidemic , which gave me quite a fright! Over there, I was able to put my finger on a reality I'd never been able to grasp. It was enough to give life back its rightful weight. And to discover just how simple happiness can be...".
- European foreigners
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