Leading the change: Civil Society, Rights and Environment: Madagascar and Comoros <b>problem and context description</b>
	  <p>The Madagascar and Comoros sector of the Northern Mozambique Channel has the richest coral diversity outside of Asia’s Coral Triangle, diverse islands, and extensive seagrass and mangrove communities. Manambolo-Tsiribihina has some of the most extensive mangroves in the Western Indian Ocean and major coral formations. Both seascapes support highly productive fisheries areas in terms of shrimp, crab, and pelagic and coral reef fish. They are globally exceptional for the number of locally endemic and often rare and threatened species.
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	  <p>Madagascar’s population is currently just over 24 million and is increasing by 2.7 %, one of the highest rates in the African region. Its economy is based largely on agriculture, including cash crops as well as tourism, textiles and mining. Madagascar’s weak economy fosters increased poverty, particularly in rural/coastal areas. Some 80 % of the rural population live below the poverty line and are heavily dependent on natural resources. The economy of the Comoros is undiversified, and subsistence farming, cash crops and fishing are among the most important activities.</p>
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	  <p>Perhaps the most critical challenge in Madagascar is a persistent regime of open-access to natural resources that allows largely uncontrolled exploitation of fisheries and other valuable resources. Open access particularly impacts small-scale fishers or communities managing productive habitats such as mangroves as it leaves them no formal recourse to ensure the sustainability of these resources and their habitats as they are open to all. This has led to a grass roots movement to seek legitimate community management/ownership rights through legal and customary agreements, a process that is at the heart of this project.</p>
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	  <p>One major outcome of this process supported by earlier programme phases has been a partial reversal of a long standing perception among decision makers that natural resources management is the realm of national policy makers, with little or no role for civil society. Thus, there is growing recognition of the significant contribution of communities and CBOs to sustainable economic development. This has been brought about through development of innovative community – private sector agreements to improve natural resources value chains based on healthy, productive habitats. However, CBOs and CSOs are still relatively fragile and inexperienced, and consequently lack empowerment, opportunities and skills to fully consolidate their legitimate rights and roles regarding NRM. In addition, civil society remains vulnerable as its legal rights are still only weakly defined. The challenges in the Comoros are different where land/resource ownership is not problematic. The problem there is the lack of available agricultural and limited fishing grounds, leading to inter-community conflict and loss of biodiversity.</p>
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	  <b>Programme goals</b>
	  <p>The goal for the programme is that people and communities in the Manambolo-Tsiribihina and Northern Mozambique Channel priority seascapes will be strengthened and empowered to influence marine and coastal governance while also sustainably managing and receiving benefits from natural resources in healthy, productive ecosystems.</p>
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	  <b>Programme activities</b>
	  <p>There are four components in the programme implementation aimed at addressing the land/resource ownership challenge in Madagascar and the land/fisheries conflicts in the Comoros. Solutions will integrate equitable HRBA, gender and diversity approaches:</p>
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	  <li>Capacity building. Building upon prior capacity-building support, activities will be defined based on late 2017 baseline settings using the Capacity Assessment Tool. The results will provide a foundation for tailored training to strengthen institutional, operational and technical skills of each target association.</li>
	  <li>Empowering civil society. The activities will include, among others, strengthening of the existing political spaces and fora where CSOs have access to decision-making processes and strengthening of the social media coverage.</li>
	  <li>Influencing policies and laws through engagement. Activities to attain this result will include, among others, training to increase the specific knowledge that CSOs will require to effectively engage with the public sector and corporations.</li>
	  <li>Ensuring an equitable and a participatory NR management/use or access, and improved productivity. These activities will help to ensure improved ownership rights through policy/legislation reform, and better resource management practices to reduce conflict and productivity loss.</li>
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