PCU members attend conference in Madagascar
Last month, Estelle Razanatsoa, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Plant Conservation Unit (PCU), along with Glynis Humphrey (Postdoctoral Research Fellow) and Tsilavo Razafimanantsoa (PhD student), spent time in Madagascar to attend the 56th annual meeting of the Association of Tropical Biology and Conservation (ATBC) and to conduct fieldwork in the Northwest of the island.
The conference that took place in Antananarivo on 31 July - 03 August focused on “Tropical biology and sustainable development”. Environmental issues and practical conservation in Madagascar were discussed during the conference which helped Estelle in thinking more on her future research. Interested in exploring the effect of human and climate on the environment in Madagascar, Estelle presented her research on the impact of human land use and rainfall variability on the dry forest of the southwest Madagascar over the last 2000 years. Based on her results, she was able to suggest conservation strategies to conservationists and practitioners from her home country but also to interact with Malagasy researchers.
Following the ATBC, Estelle went on a fieldwork in Northwest Madagascar. This fieldwork aimed at gathering data that will ultimately serve in establishing a model to simulate changes in ecosystems on a scale of centuries to millennia. Estelle and her team (pictured below) conducted lake/wetland coring, vegetation surveys and soil profile analysis in and around protected areas.
Estelle would like to thank Rija Andriamialy and her wonderful #Matsabory team (matsabory means wetlands/lakes in the local dialect) for their great work and collaboration.
