The Ecology and Biodiversity Division

The Ecology and Biodiversity Division is in charge of the research and training activities in those fields, as well as on forest institutions. Thanks to the funding from various national and international partners, the Division provides also the material and the financial support for the activities in Tampolo (eastern coast of Madagascar) and in Bezà Mahafaly (Southwest) sites. The Division is composed of a pluridiciplinary team which is specialized namely in ecology and biodiversity, forestry, statistics, database management, geography and geographic information systems.

Various projects in partenarship with international insttutions are related to the Division, such as:

With Lemur Conservation Foundation (LCF) the University of Connecticut (USA), a research project for the conservation and the sustainable management of the forest resources in Tampolo. The funding of this project is supported by John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Baobab Foundation and the LCF.
In partenarship with ANGAP, the University of Yale (USA) and University of Cambridge (UK), a collaborative research project to monitor biodiversity, with participation of local villagers around Bezà Mahafaly Reserve continued. This project is financially supported by by the Liz Claiborne and Art Ortenberg Foundation, through Tany Meva Foundation.
With Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust in Madagascar, to follow up the setting up of the "Conservation Sites", following the declaration of the President in Durban in 2003, to extend the protected areas to cover 10% of the national territory. This project is financially supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Training activities

The Division is in charge of the following courses to the Forestry Department: Biodiversity Conservation (5th year students), Fauna and Flora of Madagascar (4th year), Statistics and Biometry and Multivariate statisitics (3rd, 4th and 5th year consecutively), Tropical and Forest Ecology (5th year), Phytogeography (5th year), among others.

Research activities

The Division undertakes an ecological monitoring of the Bezà and Tampolo floras. It is also carrying out a phenological monitoring program on some floristic species of Tampolo and Bezà (those species were chosen because of their economic and ecologic interests). Those research activities concerns also the restoration ecology of the Tampolo forest.
Within the framework of the research on biodiversity, the Ecology & Biodiversity Division performs biodiversity inventories, studies on vertebrate behavior and ecology studies as well as on flora and fauna interactions.

The Ecobio Division also carries out spatial ecology studies which are based on geographic information systems. Therefore, two programs on forest spatial dynamics in the Analanjirofo (Eastern Coast) and Highlands (Anjozorobe and Ambohitantely forests) are on-going.

Publications, products

The EcoBio Division periodically produces many publications, which includes papers in the Akon'ny Ala (the ESSA-Forêts journal), posters, leaflets on its intervention sites. The Division is also in charge of the ESSA-Forêts website mastering.