Due to their lower population densities, Madagascar's dry deciduous forests have been better preserved than the eastern rain forests or the original woodlands of the central plateau.

Recent U. S. assistance has contributed to a population census and family planning programs ; conservation of Madagascar's remarkable biodiversity, private sector development, agriculture, democracy and governance initiatives ; and media training.

Madagascar's lowland rainforests have been preserved generally better than the high central plateau, presumably due to historically less population density and longer distance to the capital city via marginal highway.

Madagascar's high plateau forests have been altered more than the eastern rainforests or the western dry forests, presumably due to historically greater population density and proximity to the capital city of Antananarivo ; moreover, there has been extensive slash-and-burn activity by native peoples in the central highlands, eliminating most forest habitat and applying pressure to some endangered species.

The Betsileo are of Malayo-Indonesian origin, whereas Madagascar's population is largely mixed of Bantu African and East Asian descent.

Madagascar's highest peaks rise from three prominent highland massifs: Maromokotro on the Tsaratanana Massif is the island's highest point, followed by Boby Peak on the Andringitra Massif and Tsiafajavona on the Ankaratra Massif.

Like its flora, Madagascar's fauna is diverse and exhibits a high rate of endemism.

Gemstone mining is also an important part of Madagascar's economy.

He is the son of Albert Sylla, who served as Foreign Minister under Madagascar's first president, Philibert Tsiranana, until being killed in a plane crash in July 1967.

Although threatened by deforestation, habitat degradation, and live capture for the pet trade, it is considered one of Madagascar's most abundant small native mammals.

The gray mouse lemur is considered one of Madagascar's most abundant small native mammals, found in seven national parks, five special reserves, the Berenty Private Reserve, and other privately protected forests within the Mandena Conservation Zone.

The Royal Poinciana is found in Madagascar's Madagascar dry deciduous forests.

The fertile plain surrounding lake Lake Alaotra is Madagascar's most important rice-producing region.

The city is home to the University of Toamasina, which is part of Madagascar's public university system.

Nosy Be is Madagascar's largest and busiest tourist resort.

The Lokobe Reserve is one of Madagascar's five Strict Nature Reserves ( Réserves Naturelles Intégrales ).

For example, Madagascar's central highland plateau has become virtually totally barren ( about ten percent of the country ), as a result of slash-and-burn deforestation, an element of shifting cultivation practiced by many natives.

Ecotourism and agriculture, paired with greater investments in education, health and private enterprise, are key elements of Madagascar's development strategy.

More than 80 percent of Madagascar's 14, 883 plant species are found nowhere else in the world, including five plant families.

Three-fourths of Madagascar's 860 orchid species are found here alone, as are six of the world's eight baobab species.

Lemurs have been characterized as " Madagascar's flagship mammal species " by Conservation International.

Madagascar's varied fauna and flora are endangered by human activity.

Habitat destruction and hunting have threatened many of Madagascar's endemic species or driven them to extinction.

In 2003 Ravalomanana announced the Durban Vision, an initiative to more than triple the island's protected natural areas to over or 10 percent of Madagascar's land surface.

The first settlers encountered Madagascar's abundance of megafauna, including giant lemurs, elephant birds, giant fossa and the Malagasy hippopotamus, which have since become extinct due to hunting and habitat destruction.

These policies, coupled with economic pressures stemming from the 1973 oil crisis, resulted in the rapid collapse of Madagascar's economy and a sharp decline in living standards, and the country had become completely bankrupt by 1979.

As part of an effort to decentralize administration, Madagascar's six administrative provinces ( faritany mizakatena ), established under the French colonial authority in 1946, were subdivided into 22 regions ( faritra ) in 2004.

In 2003, the World Bank released more than $ 100 million dollars in poverty reduction aid in response to Madagascar's efforts to stop corruption.

Then, in October 2004, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank said they would write off $ 2 billion in debt — almost half Madagascar's total debt.

Even while Madagascar's conservation crisis remains high, its economic crisis remains still higher.

Under the leadership of President Philibert Tsiranana, Madagascar's First Republic ( 1960 – 1972 ) was established as a democratic system modeled on that of France.

As Madagascar's economy quickly unraveled, standards of living declined dramatically and growing social unrest was increasingly met with violent repression on the part of the Ratsiraka government.

The first settlers encountered Madagascar's wealth of megafauna, including giant lemurs, elephant birds, giant fossa and the Malagasy hippopotamus, which have since become extinct due to hunting and habitat destruction.

On November 18, 2006, his plane was forced to divert from Madagascar's capital during a return trip from Europe following reports of a coup underway in Antananarivo and shooting near the airport ; however, this alleged coup attempt was unsuccessful.

The novel, which is not merely dystopian but also brilliantly satiric, describes a future America where one-sixteenth of the population, the men who run advertising agencies and big corporations, control the rest of the people, the submerged fifteen-sixteenths who are the workers and consumers, with the government being no more than `` a clearing house for pressures ''.

`` It's a whole lot easier '', he said, `` to increase the population of Nevada, than it is to increase the population of New York city ''.

It has already been reported in your newspapers that the East Greenwich School Committee is considering additions to at least one elementary school and to the high school to insure future accommodations for a school population that we know will increase.

The lack of scientific unanimity on the effects of radiation is due in part to insufficient data covering large population groups, from which agreed-on generalizations could be drawn.

If the raw population figures are crucially relevant, then it is idle to think of liberation, as idle as to suppose that Poland might liberate Russia.

The number of countries thus favorably situated is small, but their peoples constitute over half of the population of the underdeveloped world.

Mr. Speaker, for several years now the commuter railroads serving our large metropolitan areas have found it increasingly difficult to render the kind of service our expanding population wants and is entitled to have.

The basic market for textiles is growing with the expansion of the population that began 20 years ago.

It would seem necessary that members of this population provide support for one another since it is not provided by the larger society.

There is some indication from a limited number of interviews with members of the population that the element of power, primarily the voluntary influence of non-authoritative power, has been exerted on actors in the system, particularly in regard to mate selection.

It is hypothesized that fertility is a function of the social system when the population as a whole is considered and a function of the subsystems when the two-fold division of core families and marginal families is considered.

To maintain their intermediate position in the larger society, it is not only necessary that members of this population be `` visible '', but that their numbers be great enough to be recognized as a separate, distinct grouping or system in society.

Intense interaction is easier where segregated living and occupational segregation mark off a group from the rest of the community, as in the case of this population.

Although the Brandywine population is still predominantly rural, `` there are indications of a consistent and a statistically significant trend away from the older and relatively isolated rural communities.

There is an oral tradition among the members of the population in regard to the origin and subsequent separate status of the group in the larger society.

but the subsequent analysis of characteristics is reported only for the de jure population ( or, in some districts, only the de facto population ).

It is still used in making current population estimates in post-census years, though the value of these estimates is open to question.

That reference in the Report is `` continuation of the trend toward an all-Negro school system '', a remark apparently occasioned by the increase of Negro school population from 74.1 per cent to 76.7 per cent.

Only a radical change in the nature of the population in the central city would be likely to destroy this preference -- and we must now turn our attention to the question of whether such a change, gloomily foreseen by so many urban diagnosticians, is actually upon us.