Protecting Threatened Lemur Habitat in Madagascar

Between January and July 2026, the final months of Phase III, the Ala Programme carried out its largest planting season to date in the Sainte Luce Littoral Forest. This progress was built on close partnerships with the Sainte Luce community, local forest management groups and regional organisations.

From January to April 2026, the Ala team planted 18,500 seedlings of 24 native species in four new open-ground planting areas next to the existing corridors. By July 2026, overall survival was above 70%, and in some areas the plants had doubled in size.

Much of this work depends on the corridor landowners. In December 2025, SEED and the landowners signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) outlining land rights and how the two sides would work together. After the MOU was signed, the landowners, now ten local community leaders, were formally organised into a local reforestation cooperative.

In June and July 2026, SEED and the local forest management organisation FIMPIA planned together months in advance and jointly cleared a 20-metre firebreak around the full 14-kilometre perimeter of the S8 protected area. In earlier years, each organisation had cleared its own sections. Before the dry season, the Ala team also held fire prevention sessions in each of the seven communities bordering the forest.

SEED brought together more than 50 representatives from eight communities, including two new communities, Belavenoky and Itapera. SEED has shared its Community Forest Resource Usage Report with QMM, the mining company operating near Sainte Luce, and has met with them every other month since March 2026. In February 2026, SEED also joined a two-day workshop with conservation organisations from across the Anosy region to share lessons on reforestation.

Together with SEED's Conservation Research Programme, the team is tracking the growth and survival of 900 seedlings of nine species in the field and 520 seedlings of 13 species in the nursery. The results will inform a scientific paper planned for 2027, the first to measure how different species perform in restoring southeastern Madagascar's littoral forests.

The next phase was designed with the community through consultations with FIMPIA and the locally elected forest management committees (COBAs), and through focus groups with residents of different ages and genders. Phase IV begins in October 2026 and will focus on strengthening the COBAs' capacity to enforce forest rules. The aim is locally led forest management that can continue without ongoing outside facilitation.

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