Analyse des savoirs et savoir-faire paysans sur la gestion des systèmes de culture à base de girofle dans le district de Fénérive Est, Madagascar

The cloves are one of the most important cash crops in the eastern region of Madagascar being planted on the coast for more than a century. The income generation from the clove tree bases farming systems played an important role for the Bestimisaraka farmers since its introduction during colonial period. Based mostly on the subsistence agriculture, the family needs developed their livelihood strategies in concordance to the opportunities and in order to cope with the economical and ecological shocks and constraints. This study is part of a EuropAid EU project/ AFS4FOOD (Union African) that aim at the assessment of the cash crops systems and their income contribution to food security to African farmers. The specific objective of this paper is to assess the local traditional knowledge and management of practices in the clove based farming systems in the eastern coast of Madagascar. The Malagasy farmers are changing-on the farming practices in the clove crop production and diversifying the management techniques to improve their production system. Local knowledge and its transmission play a determinant role in identification of dynamics of clove tree cropping system. The assessment of different types of knowledge and practices can help to acknowledge the preferences for a certain type of cropping system. The decision making process is nevertheless influenced by the internal and external factors, like cyclones, price fluctuations. Knowing how local knowledge and practices determined for each choice of the farmers will allow analyzing the producers' livelihood strategies. The research took place in 2 villages from the Fenerive Est district. As regarding the study we employed multidisciplinary approach, using qualitative collection methods (33 in-depth semi-structured interviews) and focus group discussion (one in each village). Also PRA methods were applied (preference matrix), active participatory observation and transect, timeline and mapping. (Résumé d'auteur