Landison Andrianina Randimbison (ELP 2019) | Nosy Tanikely National Park Director, Madagascar National Parks, Madagascar
Once upon a time, at the ages of 10 to 12, I dreamed of being a doctor. My grandfather is a doctor and I wanted to be like him. But when I got my bachelor's degree, life didn’t allow me to continue in that direction, so I chose the science of nature.
I did my studies in the natural sciences until I graduated from Mahajanga University, where I lived and continued my postgraduate degree until obtaining a Master II degree in Ecology Environment from Antananarivo University, in the capital of Madagascar.
In 2002, six months after the promotion release, I got my first post as an environmental specialist in the Rural Development Support Project (PSDR) in the Executive Directorate of Mahajanga Province. It is a national project funded by the World Bank that financially and technically supports the development activities of farmers' associations communities in the agricultural, fishing and livestock sectors. Support has also been provided through improvements to agricultural infrastructure such as hydro-agricultural dams and protecting watersheds for irrigation.
After that, I was recruited into a National Association for the Management of Protected Areas, which is now Madagascar National Parks. I worked in the interregional branch in Antsiranana Province as Head of Science. Madagascar National Parks's mission is to conserve and manage Madagascar's National Parks and Reserves in a sustainable manner.
In this position, I also found that working directly in the management of a protected area was more important because my responsibilities and my commitment in protection and conservation could be complete. It also completes my ambition to make a challenge to show that the protection of natural resources is a life and can save life.
Finally, it was while pursuing this path that I entered into the management of the Marine Protected and Coastal Area of Nosy Tanikely National Park, Nosy Be in September 2011 as the Executive Director of the Park.
In this management, with all the peculiarities of the Park, already there is joint decision-making at a round table for each strategic decision for protection/conservation, valuation, and development, and the ideas of each and every stakeholder is considered in the decision-making process.
Eight years have passed since its creation, and Nosy Tanikely is now among the most visited parks in Madagascar because of its beauty and biodiversity.
However, the Park is facing threats such as the inability to adapt to and mitigate climate change, invasive species that proliferate, and coral bleaching. We know that efforts still need to be developed with adequate strategies, capacity building, and training.
Our ambition and challenge for the team is that Nosy Tanikely will be labelled and entered on the IUCN Green list one day.
I strongly believe that my time at Berkeley was a boost to enable me to achieve our environmental goals.