News

How can bicycles help save species from extinction? 

In collaboration with USAID Mikajy for World Ranger Day, our team in Madagascar is providing 50 bicycles to nine villages in the north of the Menabe Antimena Protected Area to improve patrols for conservation. 

Within the Protected Area is the largest dry forest in Madagascar, which covers 2,095 km2. It is home to many threatened endemic species, including the giant jumping rat, flat-tailed tortoise, and Madame Berthe's mouse lemur.

Increasing illegal activities have caused a deforestation rate in Menabe Antimena Protected Area of around 5% per year since 2019. As a result of this, an estimated 4,000 hectares of dry forest are lost per year.

To reduce the threats facing the forest and biodiversity, over the last 15 years, we have established and trained a group of community patrollers known as Komitin’ny Mpiaro sy Mpiaramaso ny Faritra Arovana (KMMFA).

These patrollers are from local villages and act as rangers, reporting threats they encounter, such as forest clearance, fires, illegal fishing and hunting, animal traps, and plantations. They also report any sightings of threatened species. 

Working on shifts in teams, patrollers will use the bicycles to get from their villages to a research camp we are building in the north of the Protected Area's dry forest. 

Patrollers will use the camp as a base to cycle deeper into the forest faster than if they travelled on foot, enhancing patrol coverage. The camp also helps to protect the forest by providing a permanent presence.

Patrols in Menabe Antimena are supported by Fanamby, Madagascar National Parks, Kirindy Centre, the Regional Direction of the Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development (DREDD), USAID, Biodiverse Landscapes Fund/UK Aid, Madagascar Protected Areas and Biodiversity Fund (FAPBM), and the Hempel Foundation.

A huge thank you to all of the patrollers and rangers we work with across the world for the vital work that they carry out!