Nearly 40 years of commitment within the FOFIFA ...

Jacqueline is an agricultural engineer graduated from the University of Madagascar. She began her career in 1978 at the FOFIFA (National Center for Applied Research in Rural Development), the main Malagasy institution implementing the national research policy in rural development. Jacqueline has been working there for nearly 40 years, successively occupying various positions of responsibility. Jacqueline has held various responsible positions within the FOFIFA for more than 40 years. 

Since 2012, Jacqueline has been at the head of FOFIFA's scientific department, in charge of defining and implementing the institution's research strategy, coordinating research activities, seeking funding and evaluating projects. A key position in this institution that works through research for the development of local populations and farmers!

Jacqueline looks back on her career as a woman in this institution. Appointed to positions of responsibility at a young age, she has continually adapted her management and implemented collegial and participative approaches within her teams in order to establish her authority. These successive positions being very demanding, she would have liked to devote more time to her scientific career...A career that is nonetheless very rich! Jacqueline is also careful to promote women in her institution with respect for parity and a balance between family and professional life.

80% of Malagasy people working  in the agricultural sector...

Jacqueline mentions to the challenges facing Malagasy agriculture and the key role of agriculture on the Big Island, a sector that employs 80% of the Malagasy population. The food and nutritional security of the Malagasy population is at the core of national concerns; agricultural models that tend towards food self-sufficiency are sought after; given the demographic context it is a question of producing more and better. Jacqueline points out that 90% of Malagasy farmers produce rice, a staple food that is still largely imported. In 1989, the FOFIFA set up a dedicated department and in 2001, the Cirad, the FOFIFA and the University of Antananarivo joined forces to set up a research and training partnership, the dP SPAD (Altitude production systems and sustainability in Madagascar) , to develop production systems in tropical high-altitude areas in order to increase agricultural production on family farms in the Malagasy highlands, while preserving natural resources. This partnership continues today with the collaboration of the FIFAMANOR, the IRD and AfricaRice. The projects are numerous and cover all the rice-growing regions of the island: from Madagascar's rice granary to Lake Aloatra, via the southwest and western regions... FOFIFA is also working on leguminous plant, sources of protein and essential for the nutritional security of the Malagasy population, with a view to diversifying food rations. Cash crops for export are also being studied.

Jacqueline emphasises the role of women in Malagasy agriculture. Women are very present and active. Farms are generally not very mechanized, women participate in field work, plot maintenance, transplanting and weeding... And they are key players in the productivity and management of farms.

PRERAD-OI, a place for dialogue...

The FOFIFA has been collaborating with the Cirad for many years through the stakeholder networks and research projects supported by PRéRAD-OI, in various fields of livestock farming through the Eclipse project, food product quality with the Qualireg network and the Qualinnov project, and the conservation and enhancement of agro-biodiversity with the Germination project...

More broadly, the platform is a place for discussion and consultation with its counterparts on agricultural issues in the Indian Ocean and thus it offers the opportunity to exchange on the needs and supply of each, understanding the specificities and potentialities of each of the countries concerned. Without it, technical exchanges would probably be much more limited. 

In addition, the Indian Ocean  Agriculture Observatory is a tool to get to know each other better through the specificities and agricultural potentialities of each country... We all benefit from getting to know each other better !