(English) Savings and Loans, Improving Lives, Saving Forests

Miala tsiny fa tsy mbola misy amin’ny teny malagasy ity lahatsoratra ity.

Restore Forests, Renew Futures in Madagascar

Double Your Impact with Earth Raise 2026

Wednesday 22nd – Wednesday 29th April 2026

NOW OPEN

Money for Madagascar’s Earth Raise 2026 fundraising week is now open.

From now until 12pm on Wednesday 29th April, we are raising money to provide the platform – equipment, training and seed funding – upon which Malagasy men, women and children can improve their lives and livelihoods, and protect and expand the vital, vibrant wilderness upon which we all rely.

We can only achieve our target – £60,000 – with your help.

Every donation made through our Earth Raise 2026 web-page https://donate.biggive.org/campaign/a05WS00000Aun57YAB (also linked now from every Earth Raise 2026 post on Money for Madagascar’s website) will not only have double the impact, but will also be doubled in value: every £40 you donate will deliver £80 to Malagasy men, women and children, and the Malagasy wilderness.

Madagascar is one of the most beautiful, and remarkable, places on Earth, and a critical biodiversity hotspot. Ninety per cent of species here are found nowhere else on Earth.

We are also one of only four ‘carbon sinks’ – Madagascar absorbs more carbon from the atmosphere than we emit – on Earth. Madagascar is one of the world’s last remaining ‘brakes’ slowing the runaway climate catastrophe which is increasing temperatures, raising sea-levels and causing crop failure all over the world.

But we are losing our wilderness. If deforestation continues as it is, the Malagasy forests will be gone before 2065.

There is more than one reason, but poverty is certainly a driver. More than 90 per cent of Malagasy men, women and children live on or below the global poverty baseline, and most report missing at least one meal per day. Hunger and urgent need drive people to remove trees to create land to grow more food.

This vicious cycle can only be ended if we act to reduce poverty and protect Madagascar’s wild spaces. And that’s what our Earth Raise campaign is for.

We will use what you generously donate to:

• train Malagasy people in dynamic agro-forestry (DAF), so they can restore degraded land, increase crop yields, and reduce the need for forest clearance

• restore wild land and reforest, recreating spaces for Malagasy plants and animals to thrive

• strengthen community conservation leadership, improve environmental protection and stewardship, and improve livelihoods and incomes

We are already doing this. In Andasibe community, Madagascar, we, our partner Mitsinjo, and the local community have reduced forest degradation to 20 per cent.

One way we are doing this is through GECs – community savings and loans groups.

These are collectives run using seed funding from us, by Malagasy men and women to create opportunities for new initiatives, as well as helping people in moments of difficulty. All money generated by successes is used to provide loans for new projects and to maintain ongoing income-generation.

They help ensure Malagasy people not to have to fell trees to generate income, and deliver chances for innovation and initiative, improving lives and livelihoods.

Lucien Radrianarimanama is a farmer and member of the GEC Amparafara.

He explained: ‘I joined when I heard about it. It’s a good initiative because we help each other in a new way.

‘We always have helped each other, but in the past, people did not want to have to ask for help and only would do so when they were in great need. When one of us had a problem, we all came together to lend what we could to help them. But none of us had very much money, so we could help people stay the same, at best. We could never lend enough to help someone do something new, or improve their situation, and in any case, no-one wanted to ask for that.

‘But at the GEC, we are all members, and what we loan comes back to the group, so there is more money to lend. It is helping us all. We are all benefiting from each other’s work and ideas, and we are all thinking all the time of new ways we can improve and do more. We are still helping one another: now we are helping all of us to develop and have more than before, so people do not have to be hungry.

‘I was a pig farmer and borrowed 100,000 Ariary for feed. With the money I made I repaid my loan and now I have expanded. I have pigs, ducks, rabbits and many chickens. This is because of the group, and I know my success is helping my family and providing funds for others to follow their ideas.’

With your support and kindness, and the hard work and initiative of Malagasy people, what we are doing is working. But there is so much more which must be done.

Your donation will have double the impact by helping us continue our work uniting conservation and development, and will be doubled in value from now until 12pm on Wednesday 29th April.

The slogan marking our 40th anniversary this year, is ‘Hazo tokana tsy mba ala, Ny firaisakina no hery: One tree does not make a forest – Together we are stronger.’

With Earth Raise 2026, we will stand together, and build stronger forests.

Please share this message with friends, family and colleagues, and if you can, donate at https://donate.biggive.org/campaign/a05WS00000Aun57YAB.

Earth Raise 2026

Earth Raise 2026: what we will do

Reaping the fruits of the forest – DAF with MfM

Land, Lives and Livelihoods: DAF and MfM

Forests and Food

Earth Raise 2026: FAQs and how to donate

DAF and Defending the Environment