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Plant a tree in Madagascar and see it grow on-line! - TH!NK ABOUT IT

July 20, 2010

 

Planet Action joins forces with the NGO Vakanala in its approach of reforestation and fighting against global warming in Madagascar. How? Through an annual provision of observation imagery and geographic information. This information will enable Vakanala to visualize the progress of their reforestation projects and to monitor the donors’ development efforts in a transparent way.
Planet Action is an initiative launched by Spot Image, a leader in the market for satellite imagery. Planet Actions goal is to encourage the Earth observation industry and geographic information professionals to support local projects searching for adaptive solutions to climate change problems. The products and materials available to these professionals – satellite images, geographic information systems, image processing and display software – are indispensable for studying the impact of global warming on our planet, on local and global scales.

Vakanala project called "Biosphere Reserve of  Manambolo: Reforestation as a tools of rural development in Madagascar" is visible in the website of Planet Action . This page will be documented, illustrated and updated under the responsibility of our scientific coordinator Jérôme Lebeau, expert in conservation, monitoring, restoration of biodiversity and rural crowd sourcing. Jérôme is the man behind the http://fire.vakanala.org/ which provide a Google 3D spatial and temporal representation of fires that occurs In Madagascar and Comorros Islands. Fires are detected from two satelittes by NASA and University of Maryland, throught The Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS). Data are collected for Madagascar and dispatch by Conservation International Fire Altert Project.

To be expected on the Vakanala Planet Action page: The monitoring of plants for reforestation; monitoring of biodiversity through géophotographie and GPS field survey. All carried out directly by the rural communities.


The population in the village of Manambolo, the pilot site in Madagascar, is already surprisingly sensitive to the interest of forest conservation as an essential asset to their development. Anxious to preserve their "forest capital" and aware of the massive increase in traffic of illegal wood and slash and burn activity in the country, they have appealed to the NGO Vakanala for the establishment of a sustainable management of their resources.

The project that Vakanala team has proposed to the community is in line with the program "Man and Biosphere (MAB) of the UNESCO. This form of protected area has the objective to integrate both conservation of natural resources (and hence biodiversity), and sustainable development of local populations into one single process. Launched in the early 1970s, it targets the ecological, social and economic dimensions of biodiversity loss and the reduction of this loss. It uses its World Network of Biosphere Reserves as vehicles for knowledge-sharing, research and monitoring, education and training, and participatory decision-making.


Vakanala project is funded entirely with online donations and crowd funding. Until July 30 2010 (10 days left), the project  is part of Global Giving Open Challenge to finance the reforestation of 3 fragments of forest in the south part of the Island  by the establishment of a community plant nursery. These fragments, the last remnants of natural forests which covered the Island before our era, are of paramount importance : it is first real sanctuary for the unique biodiversity of Madagascar, which it is a last refuge, but it is also a natural resource vital to the survival of rural communities to which they provide many services, natural raw materials, natural storage of rainwater, soil fertility, fight against desertification, and many others.

We hope to have a permanent place in the Global Giving green open challenge.
The principle of Global Giving competition: you make an online donation and if the total donations received by Vakanala  reached U.S. $ 4,000 from at least 50 donors, we will be able  to submit several projects permanently on  the Global Giving  web site, and we will receive additional funding of U.S.$10 000.
Some of our projects that will need their place on Global Giving to implement a Biosphere Reserve in the village of Manambolo are:

  • ecological studies (endangered species, soil erosion)
  • the socio-economic studies (development of a specific economic model)
  • the intercommunication between the communities, the region and the Ministry of Environment to obtain a classification of this area as a 'Biosphere Reserve' protected Area,  
  • the design of a plan for the sustainable management of the future protected area,
  • the establishment of long term funding mechanisms to continue the present and initiate future actions of Biodiversity Conservation and Rural Development.

Please Take part in this adventure of conservation of the unique biodiversity of Madagascar and create opportunities to increase resources revenue to the local community. A symbolic donation is within the reach of all. You can be sure that every penny that you donate is a penny that goes towards reforestation and tree planting projects. Off course for now we await the first rains (by september 2010)… If you give during the Global giving Competition, we will mark your tree on Google Earth and you will see it grow online. Donate by clicking this link http://goto.gg/5824 and pass the message to your friends.

Andriankoto Ratozamanana via development.thinkaboutit.eu

Related note on this blog:  We plant trees for you and for our world - TH!NK ABOUT IT

Filed under  //   Andriankoto   Environmental Concerns   Environmental Justice   Planet Action   TED 2009 Fellow   World Environment Action   World Environment Organization   climate Change   reforestation   vakan'ala  
Posted by Andriankoto Ratozamanana 

Comments [2]

 

We plant trees for you and for our world - TH!NK ABOUT IT

July 7, 2010

We are the first generation that has the knowledge and means to collaborate globally to solve poverty while ensuring respect for the environment and the dignity for the people. Web is the ideal tool to cooperate together and solve the crises that the world is facing today.

During eight weeks, supporters of NGO Vakanala have conffirmed the power of social networks and its effectiveness in the fight against climate change, proving the importance of individual action and how individual actions when multiplied can make a difference to the planet.

On behalf of the local community, my team (Vakanala)  would like to thank all its fans for their support during the tournament "Humanity Calls". Indeed, the local community of Manambolo through the NGO Vakanala received 1,098 votes at the friendly competition for the environment sponsored by Ebay Green Team. Thank you very much!

This result gives us the 10th place out of 145 participating non profit and has raised U.S. $ 2,351.73 equivalent to more than 5 million Malagasy Ariary.

That was possible with the great support of my fellow TED fellow, Tin Ho Chow and his team at Big New Ideas who worked on the design of Humanity Calls, a social giving platform that helps raise funds for nonprofits through an online tournament.

As we are pioneering the system of "Fundraising/voting" competition in Madagascar, we are also thankful for the advise and personal donation from my fellow TED fellows Darius Weems and Logan Smalley. Logan took time to share with me his experience and tips from DGW ( Darius Goes West). Their experience on "fundraising 2.0" helped us so much.

Photo: TED Fellow Darius Weems and Me at TED 2009

Thanks to all of you, more than 1,800 trees will be planted in the south part of Madagascar, for a total target of 10,000 trees for the year 2010. The use of these funds will be communicated transparently on Vakanala website. The first trees will be planted arround September, when the first rain drops.

Today I am thrilled to announce that Vakanala have been chosen to participate in the GlobalGiving  Green Open Challenge for July 2010.

 

Global Giving Green

Between July 5 to July 30, 2010, Vakanala will be working to raise a minimum of $4,000 from at least 50 donors to fund a plant nursery, which will guarantees the sustainability of our reforestation project in Manambolo. Check out our project design: http://goto.gg/5824

This amount will ensure a permanent spot on GlobalGiving’s website, which would allow us the opportunity to grow greatly and expand as an organization.

With all the economic sanctions that our country "Madagascar" is facing, especially from European Union, from African union and from US , plus the economic recession, we have planned to succeed our project with "crowd funding" approaches and mobilize resources outside institutions. We have also worked on the scales and will work from  small but sustainable developement project at the time.

How Can you help ?

We know that you can introduce us to a program or people that helps/ fund startup organisations or simply donate to us via our Global Giving web page.Your help is very much needed ... and will be appraeciated greatly. In addition the project that gets most support or from the most donors will win up to $ 10 000, so every donation counts! And I am counting on you all!

What is GlobalGiving?

The website Global Giving allows philanthropists to establish a direct contact with organizations in developing countries to effectively participate in their activities either through donations and / or expertise.

GlobalGiving is an organization that helps organizations like Vakanala to mobilize supports for their work in communities worldwide by offering a Web page and online tools to help them raise funds online.

About NGO VAKANALA

"Vakanala" means " Pearls of Forest" in Malagasy language.

Vakanala, is a nonprofit organization based in Antananarivo that has set a goal to preserve the many little fragments of primary forests of Madagascar with sustainable reforestation.

These fragments, the last remnants of natural forests which covered the Island before our era, are of paramount importance : it is first real sanctuary for the unique biodiversity of Madagascar, which is it last refuge, but it is also a natural resource vital to the survival of rural communities to which they provide many services, natural raw materials, natural storage of rainwater, soil fertility, fight against desertification, and many others.

Follow Vakanala on twitter @vakanala, join Vakanala Facebook Group or contact us by email. Thank you all for your continued support.

via development.thinkaboutit.eu

Filed under  //   Andriankoto   Environmental Concerns   Environmental Justice   Humanitycalls   Madagascar   TED 2009 Fellow   World Environment Action   World Environment Organization   crowdfunding   environment   think3   vakan'ala  
Posted by Andriankoto Ratozamanana 

Comments [3]

 

The power of one vote can change Madagascar into a bread basket and medicine cabinet to the world - TH!NK ABOUT IT

May 10, 2010

I love my home country Madagascar more than any other place in earth. It is the fourth-largest island in the world, and is home to 5% of the world’s plant and animal species, of which more than 80% of which are found nowhere else on Earth.

Every year in this Island country, two hundred acre of forest is lost because of slash-and-burn agriculture, logging, and the production of fuelwood and charcoal for cooking fires… and the damage on the environment is irreparable.

Vakan'ala, a non-profit organization based in Madagascar take actions using ICT tools and social media to raise awareness on this issue. The organisation is part of an amazing tournament, the first online social giving tournament to support an environmental cause sponsored by ebay and named ebay tournament for the environement.

After reading this note, in few clicks  you can help grow trees in Madagascar and make difference. Individuals like you and me - via Himanitycall.org - have the possibility to drive-up the tournament cash pool through contributions, vote and help engage others through your Facebook and Twitter page and help the only malagasy organisation at the tournament to win.

There is a Controversial list about the importance of casting a vote. I simply believe on today amazing possibility for a solitary vote from every one of us  to change the world and improve lives of millions people in Madagascar by simply planting trees.

The UNEP (UNEP) in partnership with Treehugger ask bloggers to write a blog post about"'The importance of individual action to celebrate World Environment Day, and how individual actions when multiplied can make a difference to the planet" Please vote for Vakan'Ala in the eBay Tournament for the Environment, share this link --> http://bit.ly/cNFYnU #HumanityCalls, because that is something every one of us can do.

This year 2010, International year of Biodiversity, the online community from around the world can join force and help Vakan’ala  to preserve the remaining fragment of primary forest in Madagascar and what they contain. Vakan'Ala can restore missing forest and endemic tree species while taking into consideration the needs of Malagasy rural people leaving near primary forest with less than 1 dollar a day.

 

It's sounds like a dream but you have the power to make it real if you give your vote to Vakan'ala

Malagasy blogger Andriankoto Ratozamanana decided he needed to do more than type to improve the standard of living and reforest in Madagascar. He is part of http://www.vakanala.org team, an NGO which contributes to harnessing natural resources of the planet and ameliorating exploited habitats.

 

via development.thinkaboutit.eu

 

Filed under  //   Andriankoto   Environmental Concerns   Madagascar   TED 2009 Fellow   World Environment Action   World Environment Organization   vakan'ala  
Posted by Andriankoto Ratozamanana 

Comments [3]

 

A Second Puberty???

April 27, 2010

I have just submitted my first blog post for a show called This Emotional Life on PBS and would love to share it with you all. It can be read here or below. Thanks! Bristol

EAT, PRAY, LOVE COUCHSURFING ON A SHOESTRING! 

Last Wednesday I attended an open house to learn more about the University of Santa Monica Spiritual Psychology Master's Program (USM). "You did what?" Screams my ego or whatever it is that is constantly saying silly, useless things in my head. "Make sure you don't end up in a cult," my mother told me just before I walked in, gave them all my personal information and donned a nametag.  

If you had told me one year ago that I would be considering a master’s degree in anything, especially Spiritual Psychology, I would thought you were crazy and definitely didn’t know me very well. I would also mostly likely have been half listening to you while I was multi-tasking or text messaging someone else.

I feel like I have entered a second puberty where my mind, instead of my shins, is experiencing awkward growing pains. “Ahh yes, you are almost thirty. Brace yourself honey, these next few years are going to be a doozy AND mercury is in retrograde,” a friend once predicted.  I had no idea what she was talking about but now I know she was right. Between 28 and almost 30 years old, I have experienced seismic professional and personal shifts that have led me to sell everything I couldn’t fit into a backpack, give up my apartment, spend time reflecting on the past six years and pursue adventures that would radically shift my perspective.

It officially started in May of 2009, after much struggle and heartbreak, when I ended a six-year relationship with my first start-up love, a socially conscious film production company.  I don’t know if you have ever had a job that felt more like a baby or husband than a profession but this was that. It was the kind of love that lifts you up on a wave of enthusiasm*, whirls up time and kidnaps your perspective.  It was also the kind of love that you don’t realize is no longer working until reality punches you swiftly in the gut and you recognize you feel more lonely in the relationship than out. We had been incredibly fortunate to be able to produce movies we truly loved and experience the incredible highs of the film business but the reality was we couldn’t sustain it as a business and our shared vision had started to diverge. It was no longer “we” but “I” and that was going to take some getting used to. So now what? It can’t be a coincidence that I am going through adult puberty and now questioning who I am and what my purpose is right?

“Life is an X and a Y axis, where you shift your focus back and forth between the Goal Line (X) and the Learning (Y) line.” A former professor/Sufi mystic tried to explain. So I drew that out.

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Ok. Hmm, considering my attention has been 100% focused on X it might make sense that Y has come aknockin. But what is Y? How does one go about climbing that axis?

It is amazing how wise your friends are if you start asking them this question. A Joseph Campbell Companion was one of the first books recommended to me that truly rocked my world.

“We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”  Joseph Campbell

Whoa.

The themes of surrender and letting go were hammered from every angle and much to my dismay it started to make the most sense. The more guilt and pressure I put on myself to figure it out and get my act together, the further away clarity felt. I was soon to be homeless and unemployed so I decided to embrace this window of precious time. The first thing I did was save money like crazy. I set up an auto-withdrawal to put money into my savings account with every paycheck. I read biographies of people like Joseph Campbell and Nelson Mandela that gave the middle finger to convention and followed their heart. I plotted out places on a map where I had friends to crash with and joined couchsurfing.com for the places I didn’t. I applied for a fellowship at TEDIndia (www.ted.com) and asked adventurous friends for recommendations of cheap places to live and learn anywhere in the world. 

What was supposed to have been a six month sabbatical has become a year of extremes from falling in and out of love in Berlin, surfing and walking throughout Spain, a pilgrimage with Tibetan monks in Nepal, the TED conference in India, studying Yoga and Tantra in Thailand and releasing a documentary around the world. “How very Elizabeth Gilbert,” some have said with a sneer and some with love. Actually, it is quite similar indeed but imagine Eat, Prey, Love couch surfing on a shoestring! (oh, but I am still single.)

I feel like I just graduated college, moved to Los Angeles and am in line at a Souplantation of possibility. I am taste testing a bunch of stuff before I commit and pretty much figuring out what I don’t want as a way of knowing what I do.

But I digress: the latest sampler is USM. I happened to meet two impressive USM graduates in Bali who actually, in all seriousness, radiate love ALL the time.  Fully sober these women dance their asses off in the morning and tend to laugh in the face of fear. Um, I'll have what they’re having. Hence, the USM open house. According to the USM website Spiritual Psychology is the "study and practice of the art and science of human evolution in consciousness."

What in the world does that mean?

They continue, "We must begin by distinguishing the essence of human evolution—what does it mean to evolve? In short, it means surrendering anything in consciousness that disturbs one’s peace…Essentially, this ‘surrendering’ and ‘sacrificing’ is work that can be called ‘healing,’ which includes healing on the physical, mental, and emotional levels in service to the deeper revelation of who we truly are as Loving, Peaceful, Compassionate and Joyful beings.”

So we get a master’s in being better people? Random but I kind of dig it. Do they have loans for this?! I sat among a wildly diverse group of people, all ages and races and one woman who flew in from Sweden. I spied the cups on the snack table for any suspicious cool-aid and watched the speakers carefully for any culty-like behavior. We listened to testimonials from alums that had written novels, volunteered in Haiti, and pursued personal and professional goals while dealing with any emotional baggage that would pop up through the supportive environment of USM. 

As I enter my 30s with a seriously arresting transformational vengeance I am trying to let go of my need TO DO and just, as Joseph Campbell so simply puts it, follow my bliss. It may lead to prostitution and bankruptcy (or just moving in with my parents) but I will follow it for now and against every “rational” bone in my body give this surrendering thing a shot. Let me know if you have any tasty additions you would like to add to the salad bar. I am open to try just about anything! At this moment I am seeking a semi-structured school/community/colony of artists and thinkers who get excited about filmmaking, fractals, political art, photography, mythology, neuroscience, science fiction, writing, yoga and social justice. Any ideas??? 

*”Enthusiasm”, according to Eckardt Tolle, is the deep enjoyment of what you do toward a goal, an enormous intensity that resonates with the energy of the universe and gives out of its’ own abundance.

Filed under  //   Spiritual   TED 2009 Fellow   psychology   travelling  
Posted by Bristol Baughan 

Comments [12]

 

It's Christmas, offer a tree to our Planet

December 15, 2009

Media_httpfarm3staticflickrcom21232314785962ea4655eab1jpg_cgofppxxlcvivjq
via flickr.com

It’s been almost a year since Madagascar was turned upside down by political turmoil. Please, forget the kids' movies  with crazy penguins and lions for a minute, the situation is particularly worrying in here.

Presently Madagascar is  sitting without any legitimate government and on the verge of anargie !!! This is the Africa that we are trying to change.Criminal politicians and Criminal gangs are stripping our poorly-protected country and it's peoples.

According to a Mail & Guardian Online report, 'Timber traders in Madagascar have effectively bought the right to pillage the country's protected forest area with impunity. They are extracting up to $800 000 a day worth of timber,' said Reiner Tegtmeyer of Global Witness. Some reports announce a figure of $460 000 a day.

In the other side, farmers reaction is immediate: loggin but also Slash and burn agriculture ...

To get an idea of the phenomenon, my friends and I developed a system based on Google Earth 3D map plug-in, which lets you see the fire overnight. Fires are detected by NASA satellite, so it's fairly accurate.

What we can do is to replant the trees and restart again and again ... with more attention on the human need (reforestation for food, reforestation for energy ...)

I want to share a small organisation that we have started named VAKANALA (NPO). Vakanala aim to act for nature and contribute on the reforestation and the conservation of the planet .

Earth's Christmas is one of the vakanala project.

Earth's Christmas

The idea is simple: When you buy your Christmas tree, please consider Madagascar. with a small contribution of $1,  we plant a tree for you and you are offering a tree to the world.

May be a "classic idea" for you but IMPORTANT for the planet.

The tree (for this project) will be planted in the south-west Madagascar; to restore the cleared space between forest fragments of virgin forest still exists.

Halting forest degradation and forest restoration are on the agenda in Copenhagen. We also need to protect our intact ecosystems, which is by far the least expensive of all the solutions  for climate change.

Bellow is the design of the project (fr)

Our ultimate goal is to preserve the most valuable ecosystem in the world and what they contain, restore missing forest tree species endemic to the region, and also restore ecologically (through the trees that produce organic fertilizer ) specific areas included in the future complex forest for agriculture.

We have created earthschristmas.org  to receive the beautiful gift you will give to our planet. Please also look at our Earth's Christmas Facebook Application to Get trees planted in honors of your Facebook friends. On this application, a Google Maps can show you where the trees will be planted and we will us this technology to monitor your gift as the trees grow.

We have a few hands and we can plant trees for all "flying" TED conferences Attendees and all Technology Entertainment and Design lovers who mind their CO2 footprint.

Contact us through our email: contact@vakanala.org

Visit our web sites (fr) www.vakanala.org | www.earthschristmas.org | http://apps.facebook.com/earthschristmas/ |www.fire.vakanala.org

Follow us on twitter at http://twitter.com/vakanala

 

We wish you Merry Christmas and Happy New Year :)

Photo courtesy: TED 2009 Fellow Andriankoto Ratozamanana - Reforestation Activist | anti-deforestation crusader | Madagascar

Filed under  //   Africa   Andriankoto   Madagascar   TED 2009 Fellow   cop15   environment   green   reforesation  
Posted by Andriankoto Ratozamanana 

Comments [4]