Five years on...

"It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.” J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

Over the past five years I’ve been up to my hips in peatland and mangrove mud; have tripped, stumbled, slipped and fallen flat on my face (literally and figuratively) in some of the most beautiful forests in the world and some back alleys in some pretty grimy cities. My ego has shrunk (I think) and my heart has expanded (I know ‘cause it’s stuffed with so many more friends). 

Nasri, my excellent colleague - I think I often prompted this look on his face 

Five years ago I headed out to find out if I had been lying to myself for most of my life. As a teenager, I determined that my life goal was to work overseas, probably one of the most nebulous goals out there, on par with “being famous”. Between that time and 2012 there were a few other things to do, and while it was a vague, half-formed idea, it was firmly lodged in the back of my mind. Meanwhile, I watched two kids grow into remarkable adults and kept the bills paid by taking any contract offered, and while some of those jobs weren’t the most fun I’ve had, each experience built on the next, and eventually became a decent compilation. So, with Alex finished college and slaving away at a job, Kirsten already through and slaving away at her own work, I started papering the globe (electronically) with my resume. No bites; no international experience. At the time, although I was pulling in a reasonable salary, every last cent was spent every month to pay the bills – and if you know me, you KNOW I’m not out clothes-shopping. Just that life is expensive in Canada, even in a small town. As a result, one quick calculation later I had decided to apply as a volunteer with CUSO working in Indonesia supporting community forest management. Travel, health insurance, visa fees and accommodation paid for plus a monthly stipend would let me work overseas (my teenage goal!) and if I wouldn’t save any money, I would still be no better or worse off than pulling in a middle-class salary in Canada.

Village in the middle of a lake, Sengkang, South Sulawesi

After a very jammy 3-week orientation in Bali, the first couple of weeks in my small town placement were awful – couldn’t speak more than a few simple sentences in Indonesia, didn’t know where to buy food or water, didn’t know what my job was or where I was going on an average day at work. Really? Was this what I imagined it would be like? I don’t even know if I had a preconceived idea of life in a completely unfamiliar country and culture, on my own, surrounded by endlessly friendly people with whom I could not communicate. It was miserable and I wanted to go home. 

But, there was lots of support – other volunteers (especially Margaret and Noelle) were a phone call or text away - and internet connections make it very easy to live in unfamiliar places; you can slip back into your culture and family just by clicking.

Pak Mahmud's family, Jeneponto, South Sulawesi

It got better - of course it did. I learned enough language to buy food and get directions, small essentials like that. Often I left the market without getting quite what I wanted. My coworkers were endless sources of help, and in that first volunteer contract I have no doubt that my value to them (regarding the work I was supposed to be supporting) was a fraction of their value to me, from helping with shopping to taking me along to family celebrations.

Ulysses, Sabangau forest

And I’ve fallen in love with the natural landscapes and have mind’s-eye pictures of beautiful places where the work has taken me…

In Maros province, South Sulawesi: the first trip up to Bengo-Bengo on winding roads through the Bantimurang Bulusurang National Park, an area of tall, straight up limestone hills, carpeted by huge trees and vines; the second largest karst ecosystem in the world. I took the trip almost weekly between the forest and Makassar on my motorbike, the best part of my job.

From Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo: Sitting on the narrow front porch of the field house in Sabangau Forest, with a morning cup of coffee watching Ulysses casually walk across the tops of trees less than 50 meters away. Great coffee, amazing view.

Comet moth, Ranomafana

Ranomafana National Park, eastern Madagascar: Back in hilly, forested terrain a 3-hour hike brings the opportunity to see four different species of lemur. Very cool, but what I found almost equally as fascinating was the ridiculous variety of insects - practically a new one everyday on my office door.

In South Sumatra, back in Indonesia: now the work starts to get serious - I had built up an appreciable amount of experience in tropical forests. While working this contract I saw a fair number of air-conditioned conference rooms in upscale hotels - surprisingly (ha!) all very similar. 

I’m seaside now, west coast of Madagascar, based in Toliara: If someone had given me the choice of the five contracts so far, I probably would have chosen to work in my current job over all the rest just because it’s centered around mangrove ecosystems which I’ve been interested in since a trip to Belize 10 years ago. But i’m really, really glad I didn’t get that option - seeing the diversity of the peat forest and karst forest in Indonesia and tall eastern rainforest in Madagascar just makes me want to go look at other parts of the world - see what else is out there. Although the mangroves are very cool, of course, and where there aren’t mangroves there are endless stretches of beach.

Colleagues from Universitas Hasanuddin, Makassar

Five years isn’t all that long – I’m amazed at the number of people you can meet and the different places you can see in just that relatively short span of time. Now I’ve got so many moments that I can carry with me; singing really bad karaoke with Raymond in Mada, and Nova in Indo; playing incompetent games of pool with Joyo in Indo and Tim in Mada; enjoying a cold beer with Leslie in Indo & - well, pretty much everyone – in Mada; hiking with Nasri, Lalao, Ritha…. I could go on & every one of those moments makes me smile (or blush, occasionally).

Office workmates in Toliara, SW Madagascar

So what have I learned? I mean, really, the different food and housing and figuring out how to find a level of comfort in a discomforted state are all the superficial trappings of working abroad. At the heart of these experiences are the relationships you build with people who are accomodating you in their home country. Well, it certainly helps to be able to laugh at yourself, because I can’t help but look ridiculous just trying to buy bread or negotiating the fare with a pousse driver. 

Kirsten with Indonesian kids in Flores, June 2014

Patti supporting the home team
Andavaoake, Madagascar

I’ve learned that culture plays a huge role in shaping behaviour and even though you get to know people and the country, it takes a lot longer to understand how or why people behave unless you know and understand the environment in which they grew up. Which is really hard, because to identify the elements that go into shaping our attitudes, we’d have to recognize these as they were affecting us - from when we’re born. Maybe children raised by parents with roots in two (or more) cultures move more seamlessly in the global environment. The rest of us just have to stumble through with our one-dimensional backgrounds, bringing as open a mind as possible to try to see the world through other people’s eyes.

And while culture deeply shapes us, at the heart, people everywhere are basically the same. We like to laugh, play games, work hard, love our families, enjoy good food and delight in something new or surprising. From my point of view, that’s pretty much it.

 My current excellent colleague, Lalao

So, bring on the next 5 years, I can't wait to see where the road takes me!

Villages, coffee and mangroves

Off to work!

Mangroves occur in bays dotted all along the west coast of Madagascar, protecting thousands of hectares of shoreline that border the Mozambique Channel. Last month, Lalao and I conducted a needs assessment at another site in and around the town of Belo sur Mer, located about midway along the long edge of Madagascar. There are about 12 communities in the area; Blue Ventures is working with these to promote sustainable fisheries, develop alternative livelihoods and manage the mangrove forests. We visited 6 of these communities, and met with the village associations as the first step in developing our Blue Forests planning for the site.

The mangroves are extensive, largely intact and beautiful. 

Coffee and menakely for breakfast. Menakely (called boko boko in other places) is a lot like a donut, but not as sweet.

Accommodation in Belo sur Mer

Left: Village meetings have to wait until the fishing day is done. And sometimes we get participation from the local chickens. This was our first meeting of the field tour, in Antananamibo.


Below: Eloi, the boat captain spotting a safe route for the pirogue in shallow water.

Below: Coming back into Belo sur Mer, temporary shelters of migratory fishermen on a sandspit are backlit.

Left: Fran, a Blue Ventures aquaculture technician, checking out the drying seaweed. Local residents can make a decent living from seaweed farming. This is in the village of Menaky.

Typical, square-sailed pirogue used by fishermen all along the coast

Women use a paste made from pounded bark as a sunscreen and beauty product.

Breakfast at the local cafe

 I had the feeling someone was sneaking up on me....

.....and then I was swarmed.

Meeting with the village association in Belalanda - the community members have a high level of interest in actively managing mangroves, well aware that the health of fisheries is heavily dependent on intact coastal mangrove forests.

At the end of this day we jumped into small pirogues to ferry out to our motorized boat.

Right: Lalanda, a dune-stabilizing plant with long runners.

Left: Men use handtools to carve wooden pirogues.

Two uses of mangrove wood.


Right: A woman is repairing her fence made of mangrove poles.




Above: Bags of charcoal, ready for transport and sale.






Another local coffee shop; the owner on the left is making menakely (basically fried cassava doughballs) on the right two of her children are pounding cassava into flour.

















Below: The mangrove forest outside of Lovobe; some of the damage is from harvesting, but some of the mortality may have resulted from the effects of a cyclone that occurred 5 years ago, which may have changed tide levels along this part of the coast.

 

Left: The cyclone also destroyed the school in one village; the teacher holds classes outdoors.


Right: A convenience store sells packaged goods.

Below: Village women in Lovobe, the last stop on our field tour.

The man on the right is coaching the boy in the pirogue - a boating lesson in relatively light waves.

My excellent co-worker Lalao - needless to say I would be completely lost without her.

Sweet work!

When Carbon Sequestration = Village Schools

Mangroves = carbon = schools

By registering the Bay of Assassins mangrove forests as a Plan Vivo project, Blue Ventures, as the project manager, will be able to channel money to communities through the sale of certificates for carbon credits on the open market. The certifier - in this case Plan Vivo, although there are other carbon standards - ensures that these certificates are backed up verifiable trees just standing around in the forest, sequestering carbon. And if they’re mangrove forests, the trees, soil and roots together add up to an ecosystem that can hold more carbon than many other forest types.

A few potential beneficiaries of the project

However, the preparation and planning that goes into validation of the project - that is, ensuring that carbon credits sold as certificates can be traced back to their origin from sustainably managed forests, supported by biomass volume calculations - has an enormous amount of work going on behind the scenes.

The primary consideration is that the people in the communities are full participants in, and leaders of, the process. The Blue Forests team working in the area; Lalao, our project coordinator, Cicelin, Dolce and Aina, have visited and re-visited each of ten villages; to first conduct information sessions to assess interest and commitment on the part of the communities, then to systematically guide them through the process. I’ve joined the project close to the end of the many consultations, as we expect to be able to finish this stage by July.

Village consultation

The villagers have discussed and agreed upon zonation of protected areas (no harvest of trees at all), sustainable use areas and planned reforestation areas. (The goal is to plant 10 hectares of mangrove each year until the degraded forest is completely covered in mangrove again.) To ensure that no harvest occurs from protected areas and that cut quotas are respected in the sustainable use areas, communities have also agreed on local rules (Dina) and as a result, have also planned a system to enforce the rules. One of the major issues throwing a wrench into control of mangrove forests by communities is that outsiders often come into the area, cut trees and transport them away for sale of the wood or to make charcoal. Everyone has agreed that monthly or bi-monthly patrols are necessary - which means that locals must be recruited and trained to monitor the forests and report infractions to the village and district associations.

Dolce, leading the consultation
in the Ankitambagna school, on the list to be replaced

Discussions have been had around what to do with the money earned through sale of carbon credits, with most villagers approving the construction of new schools, or meeting halls, or markets. Actual earnings, spread out over 20 years of the project, probably won’t be enough to completely fund the infrastructure, but will buy materials, and it is expected that communities will provide the labour for construction. However, some villages will have to wait for their share, and another consultation will be held to agree on the priority sites and to create a schedule for each villages’ needs.

One of our coastal villages

The latest meetings were held over the last two weeks to discuss benefit sharing and to explain division of the funds that will be earned. A percentage each year is set aside for monitoring and protection of the forest, some portion will be remitted to the larger area association and national government and at least 50%, possibly more, will be available for community projects. Generally, interest in these consultations varies between villages, but the presidents of the communities attended a workshop before this round and they all clearly explain the issues that are being brought before the residents for consideration, and consensus is reached through open, and sometimes vigorous, discussion.

In the next 3 months, we have at least 3 more village tours on the calendar; for benefit sharing with the discussion on infrastructure priorities, consultations to design a grievance mechanism and final validation of the whole project by each community. The process requires continuous, dedicated effort on behalf of the Blue Forests team in the Southwest and so far, they’re advancing the ball steadily and surely - we’ll get there.  

The best part for me about this round of consultations? The commute - a sweet hour in a sailing pirogue to get to Lomboara on the last day before wrapping up the tour. 

Aina, one of the Blue Forests team members, 
at home on the pirogue

Obligatory (for me) baobab picture (expect more)

Blue Ventures / Blue Forests

Baobab in the southwest forest

Note: For those of you who read my blog (because I shamelessly email the link, maybe?), I know, it's been a while (15 months). Update: I spent 7 months of 2016 in Bogor, Indonesia but wasn't inspired to write a lot - I worked as deputy director for a landscape management project, about 3 steps of the ladder away from the actual landscape (i.e. in an air-conditioned at a desk behind a computer - highly reminiscent of my last Canadian job).
Casting around for the next job, I made the conscious decision to choose one that offered a technical field work aspect and have been incredibly lucky to land a position with Blue Ventures in Madagascar as their Blue Forests programme lead, advancing work to ensure sustainability in coastal mangroves. So here's how things are going.... 

Dry forest in southwest

Hotel in Befandefa, a village in Baie des Assassins

Village in southwest - note the fence; constructed from mangrove species

Village outreach, consulting on mangrove reforestation areas

Another source of income - seaweed cultivation

Village of Andavadoaka

So far, the first two months of my new job has involved a lot of traveling - Antananarivo, Toliara, Ambanja, Andavadoaka and surrounding villages, with possibly Mahajamba and Belo sur Mer lined up in the next month. All with the aim of familiarising myself with the several sites at which Blue Ventures operates. BV has been in Madagascar for over 10 years, primarily focused on improving fisheries sustainability in coastal communities. But, as with any environmental issue, it’s all connected, and for the last four years additional resources have been targeted towards management of bordering mangrove forests which have been depleted for building supplies and charcoal production. Mangroves, for my non-forestry readers, are multi-functional ecosystems, fringing ocean and riverine systems in the tropics and sub-tropics. They provide nurseries for small fish, crabs and shrimp, and protect coasts from wave-action erosion and more severe events like cyclones. There are 8 species of trees found in Malagasy mangrove forests; comparatively few compared to Indonesia, with about 35 different species; all fascinating plants which are able to grow with their roots in salty water. 

Shoreline in Andavadoaka, village where BV has an office

Tree nursery in southwest, Cordylla madagascarensis seedlings

Outplanted seedling, southwest

The Blue Forests program is centered around communities close to the coast, primarily dependent on fishing for their livelihoods, which either have tenure over the mangroves or have a path to tenure, and depend on them to provide building materials for houses, fences and boats. Tenure is key, because it allows communities to continue sustainable harvest from mangroves; in an attempt to stop people from outside the area cutting trees in the mangrove forests the Malagasy government has made harvesting mangrove trees illegal. 



Our role is to facilitate communities to build management plans that include provisions to set aside protected zones and areas for sustainable harvesting, to monitor natural regeneration and to hold planting events to reforest the most seriously degraded areas.  And, to relieve demand for wood, we’re also helping to establish alternative wood plantations outside the mangrove zone, planting species that can be used for charcoal production; another environmental issue that demands a broader solution. Most Malagasy use charcoal to cook, other forms of energy being unavailable, unreliable or too expensive for the average family. If there were significant investment in affordable green energy sources, the threat to mangroves would decrease accordingly. 

Tree nursery in northwest, Acacia seedlings

However, charcoal production is also an important source of income for many villagers, who are living close to the poverty line, many earning less than $2 USD a day.

Heading out to plant seedlings

Options? Northwest Madagascar is humid, warm and leafy, which offers the potential to grow fruit crops, cinnamon, and other plants to replace cash earned by charcoal, as well as to develop beekeeping, producing mangrove honey. In the extremely dry southwest, options are more limited, but BV is supporting a trial beekeeping operation and alternative fuel wood plantations, expanding the paths to increased income for families whose primary source of food and money is fishing.

Beehive

Village consultation for health programme

Along the trail to a village in the northwest

My brain is swimming with all sorts of new information after these first 2 months - I’m hoping to go back to my base in Toliara and process a lot of this before sorting out how I can be effective in the job. Not to mention several other items on the to-do list; improving my French, picking up more Malagasy, finding a place to live and figuring out how to shop the markets. If learning keeps you young, I’m quite the baby now.

Weekend trip to Nosy Be with Tim, Danny (in front), Nick (behind Danny) & Kate

More baobab (expect lots of these in photos - I love them!)