Former (active) blogger,Andriankoto Ratozamanana, Founder of FOKO Madagascar decided he needed to do more than type to improve the standard of living and reforest in Madagascar. He cofounded MEGASEEDS Inc, which contributes to harnessing natural resources of the planet and ameliorating exploited habitats.
Sundance Channel Length : 01:33 Posted : 5/1/2009
Former blogger Andriankoto Ratozamanana decided he needed to do more than type to improve the standard of living and reforest in Madagascar. He cofounded MEGASEEDS Inc, which contributes to harnessing natural resources of the planet and ameliorating exploited habitats.
Free | www.sundancechannel.com">Sundance Channel Length : 01:33 Posted : 5/1/2009
Majora Carter is the host of Sundance Channel’s Eco-Heroes, she is an American environmental advocate and artist. She is president of The Majora Carter Group, LLC, a green collar economic consulting firm. She is a MacArthur "Genius" Fellow, one of Newsweek’s “25 To Watch,” and one of Essence Magazine’s “25 most Influential African Americans.” Majora serves on the boards of Ceres, SJF, and the Wilderness Society.
Majora Carter is also as good as Steve Jobs when she speaks. She gave this compelling talk at the TED 2006 Conference, aptly titled “Majora’s tale of urban renewal” - by greening the ghetto, one of my favorite TEDtalk. She detailed her fight for environmental justice in the South Bronx - and showed how minority neighborhood suffer most from flawed urban policy.
Since 2007 Majora Carter has appeared on The Green, a television segment dedicated to the environment, shown on the Sundance Channel.The first season consisted of a series of 90 second op-eds shot in studio. The second season consisted of a series of short interview pieces with people who are taking uncommon approaches to environmental problems.
I had chance to appear on Majora's TV show as guest . She is loads of inspiration for me to reach out and teach others about the value of our unique Environment.
I still have a long way to go before I can attain my dream but I am already thankful to TED for enlighten me and connecting me with wonderful people.
MEGASEEDS™ seeks to be one of the leaders in social enterprise in Madagascar. Composed by young Malagasy social entrepreneurs, MEGASEEDS™ wants to expand its new vision, based on how we have a unique way of adding value to our products. With MEGASEEDS™, we wish to develop a new agribusiness model that benefits all parties because it is aimed to be lucrative, sustainable and environmentally friendly.
One TEDx with Two TED fellows:
Our guest speaker For this first TEDx in Madagascar was Dr. Sheila Ochugboju. Dr. Sheila is a TED fellow like Andriankoto Ratozamanana, Co-founder and CEO of MEGASEEDS Inc. Both are passionate about changing Africa. She will be working soon for the African Technology and Policy Studies (ATPS) network and will coordinate research and communication in science and technology innovations across 23 countries. Her wish is that Madagascar through MEGASEEDS™ joins the network of ATPS as the first private sector business to open the 24th national chapter in Africa.
Her experience at the GWIIN helped identifying innovative ways of getting ideas to market.
Two films was projected as part of the event.
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED - like experience.
At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers
combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x=independently organized TED event.
The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events including this event, is self-organized.
From TEDAfrica (2007) to TED Long Beach (2009)
Two TED Fellows in Madagascar
>>> Getting the Dream to Market...
Madagascar has a robust and expanding domestic market and a modest share of the global market for aromatic and medicinal plants AMP. The domestic market is on a growth trend because of combined government and civil society efforts to mainstream traditional and herbal medicine.
With exports of $4 million, Madagascar is not among the top ten exporting nations, but it follows very closely. However, these exports are not insignificant at the national level.
Moreover, the global market is expanding by an estimated 10-15 percent per year, and Madagascar has potential competitive advantage for some specific (e.g., endemic, scarce) plant products.
Global markets in the aromatic, cosmetic and health care sectors demand steady supplies of new and innovative scents and medicinal products.
The perfume industry continually searches for “new” scents that can be introduced as new seasonal lines. Increasingly, these products must also be certified organic, fair trade or sustainably produced.
Madagascar presently exports five key products in this area. Three are relatively scarce essential oils: ylang ylang, niaouli, and ravintsara.
The other two are spices: cinnamon (some bark is also distilled into essential oil) and clove (used
mostly in Indonesia in cigarettes). The potential for growth lies in organic aromatic essential oils—not only ylang
ylang, niaouli, ravintsara and cinnamon, but also from new, endemic or “exotic” plants.
THE DREAM OF PARFUM TED CAN ONLY HAPPEN IF WE CONTINUE TO DREAM TOGETHER...
Thursday Night, 5th Feb – Pine Avenue TED Block Party 8: 38pm
Sitting at the table for dinner at the Block Party, Adriankoto could hardly eat, he was really nervous, change is comming in his home country Madagascar, a big presentation to partners at Megaseeds his Japanese TEDsters friends.
Sheila’s thinking about the book at bedtime, a gift from Adriankoto “A Guide to The Health Benefits of the Essential Oils of Madagascar: The Healing Trail: Essential oils of Madagascar” by Georges Halpern, MD, Ph.D, a Professor of University of California at Davis.
So many omens.......science, Japanese (she speaks Japanese) and Africa...what is the Universe saying?....
Some Facts
• Madagascar is one of the world’s poorest countries economically and one of its richest in biodiversity.
• Madagascar is the world’s fourth largest island, covering an area of 592,000 km2.
• It contains at least 13,000 plant species, of which more than 80 percent are endemic and 3,500 are reported to have medicinal properties.
• With a per capita GDP of U.S. $809, Madagascar ranks 146 of 177 countries on the Human Development Index.
• Seventy-four percent of its population lives in rural areas, and 78 percent of the rural population lives in poverty.
• Agriculture accounts for the largest share of GDP (35 percent); economic growth has accelerated over past four years (5.2 percent in 2004), as the government shifted from socialist to private sector- led growth policies.
• Political strife associated with this transition set back the country, as key road infrastructure was destroyed.
• Madagascar’s rural economy is based upon subsistence-oriented agriculture. Much of this agriculture is slash-and-burn (tavy), which has been a principal cause of forest cover and biodiversity loss.
• The challenges of improving standards of living among the rural poor and conserving biodiversity are interlinked in Madagascar, and a key issue is how to increase rural incomes and reduce the need for tavy.
• This proposed enterprise will highlight the interlinked challenges of biodiversity conservation and rural poverty reduction by promoting alternatives to tavy along two of the country’s forest corridors: Zahamena-Mantadia and Ranamofana-Andringitra- Ivohibe.
Thursday, Feb 5th – Long Beach
2:15pm. Overheard at TED. The Renaissance Hotel
....So Adriankoto says to Sheila......”How was your table?” They were talking about the wierd kind of match-making at the TED Fellows Debut lunch.
Sheila: “Umm.....I sat next to a cool software guy and we talked about social networking sites etc, etc.....” her voice trailed off.
Adriankoto: “No one spoke to me actually.......in fact, our table was........mostly us.....”
Both: “Umm...”
Sheila: You know I want to come to Madagascar and help you with your project. I miss working as a plant scientist...I miss the concentration.......doing really hard heady stuff....”
Adriankoto: You should come then....we could do some great work....
Sheila: Yes....I love plants.....Ylang, Ylang.....
Adriankoto: Yeah...You know that’s what they use for Chanel No.5 ? There’s an island in Madagascar which smell Chanel No.5
Sheila: For real?.......... We should create our own perfume you know.....Essence of Madagascar......something like.....being a TEDster.....wierd?
Adrian: Ummm.....Parfum TED.....WOW! Let’s do it. Someone like Forrest Whittaker....he’s the essence of a TEDster....
Sheila: Absolutely! Cool, kind, clever.......just a little sexy too.
Adrian: Did you see the film Perfume?
Sheila: Yeah....but that story was just gross....we’re living on the light side my Malagasy Brother
Agri investments must help, not hurt
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, managing director at the World Bank, former finance minister for Nigeria and Fellow TEDster, Speaking at the Reuters Food and Agriculture Summit.
In Madagascar, she said, demonstrations against President Marc Ravalomanana involved unhappiness over a deal to lease half of the Indian Ocean island's arable land to grow food.
"What we need to do is look at the political and social consequences of this," said Okonjo-Iweala.
"As far as I'm concerned it is a good thing ... but you must make sure that you do it transparently and everyone in the country understands why is it being done, who is benefiting and how will ordinary people benefit," she added.
Okonjo-Iweala said such large commercial farming investments by foreigners could benefit local farmers by giving them access to new technology, irrigation and marketing.
Over the past few years a growing number of people in the TED community have become passionate about Africa, a continent that appears to be at an important tipping point. Its problems and challenges are well known. Less well known is that across the continent, change is afoot. Instead of relying on yet more aid bailouts, Africans are starting to take matters into their own hands. Ingenious solutions are being applied to tackle some of the toughest health and infrastructure problems. Businesses are being launched that are capable of transforming the lives of millions. New communication technologies are allowing ideas and information to spread, enabling markets — and governments — to be more efficient. And the numbers suggest that incomes are starting to nudge up and real growth is on the way. Africa: the Next Chapter.
As TED Global Africa fellow , and TED 2009 fellow I want to take my responsibility and want to be part of the solution for the announced Next Chapter.
With the project MEGASEEDS, Asian TEDsters and Africans get together to cristalise the discussion from TED Arusha and concreat it as real project since TEDsters are not only a thinkers but also Doers. We have planned a win win partenarship that will be a model to intiate something meaningful to the world.
Crisis in Madagascar shows that the way of partenarship with africa must change. One of the tipping point of this deception is the recent much-publicised plan of conglomerate Daewoo Logistics to lease a reported 1.9 million hectares of prime land in Madagascar to cultivate maize for export has fallen through.
Given the size and audacity of the the proposed deal, its astonishingly generous-to-Daewoo terms and the charges of 'neo-colonialism' from many quarters, it was probably doomed from the beginning.
Now that the heat has died down somewhat, perhaps it is time to examine it more calmly for the lessons that can be gleaned from it. It is one thing to criticise this particular attempted deal but African countries need foreign investment, and agriculture will for a long time offer the most realistic development options for Africa.
What we need in Madagascar is :
Madasgascar is a testimony of the very old ages, We want to keep it safe for common heritage - for the humanity . 80% of our population are farmers ... It is an opportunity for doing sustainable Agribusiness but please ask us what products to grow, and how to grow it properly.
Not imposing us Maize crops ...
May be we have more valuable plants wich are profitable for the business, human right respectfull and Environmental friendly? Madagascar in particularly have thousands more valuable plants than maize crops, including Food's and Medecine's plants.
At MEGASEEDS: With our Ravintsara tree, we are fighting deforestation, controlling erosion, we don't have to cut the tree but we are using the leaf to make essential oil. On top of that, ravintsara tree is an evergreen tree. In terme of profit the Ravintsara essential oil is arround $240 USD per liter on the global Market. $240 USD is nearly the average salary ANNUALLY in the country.
Let's plant ... every malagasy can have his TREE BANK in his piece of land and it is only $1 USD investment per tree. Good for the pocket and good for the environment.
The Ravintsara is an Endemic tree who has specific carracteristic when it's grow in Madagascar - Madagascar only monopoly by Nature and hurts noboby - our ravintsara raw material today is only 2% of the Global Market need... it's valuable essetial oil is used for Making Medicine ... but Ravintsara is only one tree among thousands existing in Madagascar.
Why Maize ? Maize pump loads of water scientists says. Our stapple food in Madagascar is Rice and it is what we eat daily and what we need, one malagasy eat 180 kg of Rice per year, some of our country mate eat rice three time a day. Untill today, Madagascar still import 25% of it rice consuption annually... It's not impossible, and we can do it ... agriculture sound like something very odd, but trust me, it's fit Technology, Entertainment, and Design.. and we are working daily to make it NEW.
To be continued ...
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