Madagascar Food Crisis: How A Woman Helped Save Her Village From Starvation
According to the BBC, a prolonged drought in the deep south of the island has left 1.3 million people struggling to find food and 28,000 facing starvation. Some have called it the world's first famine caused by climate change, though this has been disputed. But Loharano's village, Tsimanananda, where she is a community leader, has been spared the worst.
"We suffered a lot from hunger. We planted but it failed every time," the 43-year-old says, reflecting on a previous drought that started in 2013. But with the help of a local charity, the Agro-ecological Centre of the South (CTAS), this time things are very different.
Armed with a poster illustrating farming techniques, she talks to her neighbours, and her husband Mandilimana, about drought-resistant crops and techniques to revitalise the soil.
