Key Trends from the 2003 country brief

• Funding for agricultural research decreased severely in the 1990s in real prices (adjusted for inflation) resulting from the high inflation rates of the mid-1990s and the completion of the National Agricultural Research Project (NARP) in 1999.
• The National Center of Applied Research and Rural Development (FOFIFA) is the main agricultural research agency in Madagascar and accounted for more than half of the country’s total agricultural research spending and staff in 2000.
• FOFIFA made considerable advances in its infrastructure through NARP, which included establishing a network of regional centers and training its staff. In addition, research staff numbers—mainly affecting nontechnical staff—were more than halved.
• In 2000, agricultural research conducted by the nonprofit sector amounted to nearly 10 percent of total investments in Madagascar, which is high compared with most African countries.

Madagascar