I paused my PhD for 11 years to help save Madagascar’s seas
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Ando Rabearisoa worked with local fishers to establish locally managed marine conservation areas that protect fisheries and local incomes in Madagascar. Credit: Johnson Rakotoniaina
Three years into an ecological economics PhD in France, Ando Rabearisoa made a decision that would change both her life and Madagascar’s coastal ecosystems. In 2009, she abandoned her PhD studies to move back to her home nation of Madagascar. There, inspired by some of her early research on community-based management of natural resources, she worked with fishing communities to create locally managed marine areas (LMMAs), a type of coastal conservation zone that is overseen by the communities that rely on the area’s natural resources. LMMAs offer an alternative to conventional, government-managed marine protected areas, the implementation of which, in low-income countries, can lead to friction with anglers and lack proper enforcement.
From 2009 to 2019, Rabearisoa led the Madagascar marine programme at Conservation International, a non-profit organization headquartered in Crystal City, Virginia, focused on environmental protection. During that time, the number of LMMAs in Madagascar swelled from 33 to 177. Now, scientists are studying how these conservation areas affect people and nature. For example, in Madagascar’s first LMMA, researchers observed a 189% increase in fish biomass over a six-year period1.
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