Hi everyone! Before I begin this second post of the week, I’d like to mention that out of all the countries I have searched on, Madagascar seems to be the least studied country. There are not many scholarly articles on pollution in Madagascar. It took me relatively much longer to find relevant papers to review. Nonetheless, these papers caught my interest.
In my previous post, I specifically mentioned how water-borne diseases can cause children to be malnourished. I found a paper that examined levels of nutrition in children in a unique way. Zielinska-Dawidziak et al. (2021) studied the nutritional status of Madagascar girls, by studying the concentration of various elements in their hair. I did not know you could do that! They compared hair samples from girls who lived in both rural and urban areas, and found these following elements: Al, As, Cd, Cr, Hg, Ni, Pb, Sn and Sb (refer to your periodic table for better visualization!). Below is their study design. Doesn’t it look fascinating?
They concluded many different things, but to generalize, they argued that the place of residence (rural vs urban area) influenced the level of pollutants in the girls’ hair. This was also mainly because of where their food came from. Nevertheless, they summed up that there were high contents of Al, followed by Cd and Cr in all the hair of these girls. They also found that younger girls were more exposed to Al, Cr, and Ni.
Meanwhile, Dasgupta et al.’s (2015) paper examined indoor air pollution, and ways to better improve current conditions. Unfortunately, they argued that current measures in Madagascar to improve air quality indoors are ineffective – “Ethanol is significantly cleaner than biomass fuels, and a larger kitchen significantly improves the quality of household air. Although improved wood stoves with a chimney were effective in reducing concentrations of carbon monoxide in the kitchen, improved charcoal stoves were found to have no significant impact on air quality compared with traditional charcoal stoves” (p. 345). If you read the paper, you will also wonder why these measures were even suggested in the first place. Were the consultants who implemented this solution aware of its inadequacies? Is this the reason why many of the initiatives that aim to manage pollution fail? Why are professionals not involved in the decision-making process?
Finally, Qin et al.’s (2021) paper discusses whether waste to biomass energy conversion is possible in Madagascar. Currently, biomass energy accounts for 80% of Madagascar’s energy source. Most of the biomass is sourced from wood and solid charcoal. Hence, Qin et al. tried to find out if advanced technologies could be developed, so that there could be a better utilization of other forms of waste, such as farming residuals, animal wastes, and forest waste. These technologies include fermentation, gasification, and torrefaction – “Gasification converted biomass wastes to combustible gas; torrefaction can increase the energy density in solid biomass energy and be used to produce biocoal briquette; fermentation can transfer these biomass wastes to biogas or ethanol fuel. Advanced conversion technologies can not only improve the efficiency of energy utilization but also reduce the cost of power generation” (p. 8). All of these are promising avenues for the government to look into.
But can Madagascar really achieve an efficient circular economy?
Up next, Mongolia. See you in the next one! ✿
References
Dasgupta, S., Martin, P. & Samad, H. A. (2015) Lessons from Rural Madagascar on Improving Air Quality in the Kitchen. The Journal of Environment & Development. 24(3), 345-369. Available from: https://journals-sagepub-com.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/doi/full/10.1177/1070496515588590?utm_source=summon&utm_medium=discovery-provider [Accessed: 4 March 2022].
Qin, L., Wang, M., Zhu, J., Wei, Y., Zhou, X. & He, Z. (2021) Towards Circular Economy through Waste to Biomass Energy in Madagascar. Complexity. 1-10. Available from: https://www.hindawi.com/journals/complexity/2021/5822568/ [Accessed: 4 March 2022].
Zielinska-Dawidziak, M., Czlapka-Matyasik, M., Wojciechowska, Z., Proch, J. & Niedzielski, P. (2021) Concentration of Selected Elements in the Hair of Madagascar Girls in Relation to Nutritional Status and Place of Residence. British Journal of Nutrition. 1-11. Available from: https://www-cambridge-org.libproxy1.nus.edu.sg/core/journals/british-journal-of-nutrition/article/concentration-of-selected-elements-in-the-hair-of-madagascar-girls-in-relation-to-nutritional-status-and-place-of-residence/C4F9F1268EA957D286284F9853B99C54 [Accessed: 4 March 2022].