Abstract
In Madagascar, population growth has reduced the amount of available land and the rural population of the highlands is limited to an economy of self-sufficiency. The rural peasants of Madagascar hand down plots of land that shrink from generation to generation, often without legal deeds of ownership due to an administrative system poorly adapted to managing land. Thus the average surface area cultivated and available per household declined. Socio-demographic responses to the lack of arable land are the migration of children, increased selling of land, and late marriage. The cultural dimension is decisive for understanding the mechanisms governing access to land: intergenerational transmission is bound to comply with the duty to hand down ancestral land. Malagasy Highland peasants fulfil their traditional ancestral role, that of bequeathing their land to their children. The will, or at least the desire, exists to reduce the number of mouths to feed. But besides this economic argument, undoubtedly valid for all poor communities, there is a will to reduce the number of heirs, since parents consider their children as heirs who are entitled to receive the land left by their ancestors. This ancestral-spatial context is now threatened by the effect of the ever smaller size of the plots handed down.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
The term fokonolona evokes the community of descendants stemming from the same ancestor and living in a precise area (the people from here). The term foko means the descendants, and olona means the person.
- 2.
Their research was conducted in the towns of Tsarahoenana and Andranomangamanga, situated about twenty kilometres west of our research area of the 4D Programme.
- 3.
To which must be added 10.8% of land distributed by the village 1.3% of “miscellaneous”.
- 4.
The data was collected between 2003 and 2006.
- 5.
Unless mentioned otherwise, all the data are taken from the Survey Programme Demographic Dynamics and Sustainable Development in the Madagascan Highlands, carried out in 2003 on a sample of 1621 households in the commune of Ampitatafika. This programme associates six Malagasy institutions (Institut Catholique de Madagascar, INSTAT, Ministère de la Population, Centre National de Recherche sur l’Environnement, PACT Madagascar, Ecole Supérieure des Sciences Agronomiques) and three French institutions (LPED/ IRD-Université de Provence, Popinter/Université Paris V, Forum/Université Paris-X).
- 6.
In the spirit of traditional law, like that applicable to Malagasy individuals, the notion of heritage basically concerns land, a herd of cattle and a home.
- 7.
Article 83 of the official law of Madagascar stipulates that “joint heirs can agree that female heirs will receive their share of the succession in the form of an amount of money. In this case, the act of handing over the amount must be preceded by an estimative inventory of the goods to be shared, said inventory being officialised by a notarial or certified deed” (Republic of Madagascar 1968).
- 8.
When collecting data on surface areas, we asked the farmers how many women (transplanting) and men (labour) were needed to perform the work on their farms in one day. We then converted the number of wage earners into surface areas. To validate the conversion, we compared the surface areas measured of about sixty plots with the estimated surface areas.
- 9.
The information on the number of children desired concerns only the heads of households under fifty years old, living in a couple.
- 10.
It is the custom in Imerina that an individual is called by the name of one of his children (Bontems 2001).
- 11.
Only 5.0% of the population is sixty years old or older.
- 12.
The information is reliable as it concerns the great majority of surveys.
- 13.
Information was recorded on the children of the head of the household who had left their parents’ home for another commune, and on the migratory history of the head of the household.
- 14.
Cyclones are frequent in Madagascar.
- 15.
On the strength of qualitative surveys of 27 individuals, 14 transactions were identified by seeking the seller and purchaser for each transaction. We did not find archives from before this period.
- 16.
An informal and non-legally binding deed written on paper before the local authorities.
- 17.
In certain cases, the preference to sell within the family circle can be interpreted as a kind of disguised financial loan, with the vendor hoping to buy back the land if his financial situation improves.
References
Alter, G., Condran, G., & Easterlin, R. A. (1978). Farm and farm families in old age and new areas: the northern states in 1860. In T. K. Hareven & M. A. Vinovskis (Eds.), Family and population in Nineteenth Century America (pp. 22–84). Princeton University Press: Princeton.
Aubert, S. (1999). Gestion patrimoniale et viabilité des politiques forestières à Madagascar. Vers le droit à l’environnement ? Thèse de doctorat en droit de l’Université de Paris 1. 467 p.
Augustins, G. (1973). Parenté, résidence et régime foncier dans un village d’Imamo (Haut plateaux de Madagascar), Thèse de Doctorat d’Ethnologie. Nanterre: Université de Paris X-Nanterre
Blanc-Pamard, C., & Ramiarantsoa, H. R. (2000). Le terroir et son double. Tsrahonenana 1966–1992 Madagascar. Paris: IRD.
Bonnemaison, J. (1967). Le terroir de Tsarahonenana. Introduction à la région d’Ambohibary (Vakinakaratra), Orstom, Tananarive, 247 p.
Bonnemaison, J. (2000). Tsarahonenana ou la route circulaire. In C. Blanc-Pamard & H. R. Ramiarantsoa (Eds.), Le terroir et son double. Tsrahonenana 1966–1992 Madagascar (pp. 194–206). Paris: IRD.
Bontems, C., (dir). (2001). Les caractéristiques du mariage malgache traditionnel, in Mariage-Mariages : actes du 2ème colloque international, 9-10 mai 1997, Association française d’anthropologie du droit, Université Paris- Sud 11-Paris-Sceaux. PUF, Paris, pp. 267–293.
Boserup, E. (1970). Évolution agraire et pression démographique. Paris: Flammarion.
Boserup, E. (1985). Economic and demographic interrelationships in sub-saharan Africa. Population and Development review., 11(3), 383–397.
Cain, M. (1978). The household life cycle and economic mobility in rural Bangladesh. Popul Dev Rev, 4(3), 421–428.
Cain, M. (1985). On the relationship between landholding and fertility. Popul Stud, 39(1), 5–15.
Caldwell, J-C., Reddy, P. H. and Caldwell, P. (1982) December. The causes of demographic change in rural South India: A micro approach, Population and Development Review, Vol. 8, No. 4, pp. 689–727.
Chauveau, J. P. (1995). Pression foncière, cycle domestique et crise économique : étude de cas en Côte d’Ivoire forestière. Bulletin du GIDIS-CI (CIV), 10, 12–32.
Chauveau, J.-P. (1998). La logique des systèmes coutumiers , in Lavigne Delville Ph. (dir). Quelles politiques foncières en Afrique rurale ? Réconcilier pratiques, légitimité et légalité, Ministère de la coopération/Karthala, Paris, pp. 66–75.
Clay, D. C., & Johnson, N. E. (1992). Size of farm or size of family: which comes first? Popul Stud, 46(3), 491–505.
Deschamps, H. (1959). Les migrations intérieures, passées et présentes à Madagascar. Paris: Berger-Levrault.
Lucas et Stark. (1985). Motivations to remit : Evidence from Botswana. Journal of Political Economy, 93(5), 901–918.
Omrane, M., & Ramasinjatovo, N. (2005). Inégalités spatiales en matière d’accès à la terre en milieu rural malgache: impact sur les comportements démographiques et socio-économiques. In J. M. Jauze & J.-L. Guébourg (Eds.), Inégalités et spatialité dans l’océan Indien (pp. 219–231). Paris: l’Harmattan.
Ottino, P. (1998). Les champs de l’ancestralité à Madagascar : parenté, alliance et patrimoine. Paris: Karthala/ORSTOM.
République de Madagascar. (1968). Loi 68-012 du 04 juillet 1968 relative aux successions, testaments et donations. Tananarive.
République de Madagascar (1999) Enquête prioritaire auprès des ménages, Rapport principal. Antananarivo: Ministère des finances et de l’économie, secrétariat général, direction générale de l’institut national de la statistique (INSTAT).
Roca Z (1991) Case study on population, status of women in rural development in Phamong District, Lesotho. In FAO/FNUAP, Women in Agricultural Development, Women and Population in Agricultural and Rural Development in Sub-Saharan Africa, Paper n°5
Schlager et Ostrom. (1992). Poverty Rights. Regimes and natural ressources: A conceptual analysis, land economics, 68(3), 249–262.
Schutjer, W.-A., Stokes, C.-S., & Poindexter, J.-R. (1983). Farm size, land ownership and fertility in rural Egypt. Land Economics, 59(4), 393–403.
Sharif, M., & Saha, R. K. (1993). The observed Landholding-Fertility Relationship. Is it Monotonic? J Dev Stud, 29(2), 319–341.
Stokes, C. S., & Schutjer, W. A. (1984). Access to land and fertility in developing countries. In W.-A. Schutjer & C. S. Stokes (Eds.), Rural development and human fertility (pp. 195–215). New York: Macmillan.
Tabutin, D., & Mathieu, P. (1996). Démographie, crise et environnement dans le monde rural africain. In J. Vallin & R. Coussy (Eds.), Crise et population en Afrique (pp. 123–160). Paris: CEPED.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Omrane, M. (2018). Sociodemographic Pressure on Land in Madagascar. In: Petit, V. (eds) Population Studies and Development from Theory to Fieldwork. Demographic Transformation and Socio-Economic Development, vol 7. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-61774-9_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-61774-9_7
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-61773-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-61774-9
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)