Project Overview
The WWF Conservation Tourism Scorecard Project aimed to identify how tourism can strengthen coastal and marine conservation while improving livelihood opportunities for local communities in Madagascar. Madagascar’s coastal and marine ecosystems are among the most biodiverse in the world, supporting globally significant mangroves, coral reefs, seagrass beds, sea turtles, lemurs, waterbirds, fisheries, and coastal livelihoods. However, these ecosystems face mounting pressures from overfishing, deforestation, climate change, weak enforcement, and poorly managed tourism.
To help address these challenges, WWF Madagascar and the Western Indian Ocean Programme Office partnered with Solimar International to assess conservation tourism readiness across priority coastal and marine sites. The project applied WWF’s Conservation Tourism Readiness Scorecard to evaluate ecological value, community stewardship, tourism readiness, market demand, and enabling conditions for responsible investment.
The assessment focused on five priority conservation tourism sites: Ankazomborona Mangrove Area, Ampasindava / Nosy Hara National Park, Kivalo Mangrove Area, Nosy Sakatia Sea Turtle Snorkeling Area, and Lokobe Nature Special Reserve. Through this process, Solimar developed a practical roadmap to help WWF advance community-based conservation tourism, improve visitor experiences, strengthen market linkages, and position tourism as a tool for biodiversity protection and community resilience.
Project Activities
Solimar used a combination of scorecard analysis, site assessment, stakeholder engagement, and tourism market research to evaluate opportunities for conservation tourism development. Key activities included:
Conservation Tourism Scorecard Assessment: Applied WWF’s scorecard across three core pillars: Conservation Status, Tourism Readiness, and Conservation Tourism Potential. Each site was assessed based on ecological significance, community rights, natural resource management, tourism infrastructure, market access, safety, seasonality, and investment potential.
Site Visits and Fieldwork: Conducted field missions in August 2025 to priority conservation sites in Madagascar’s Diana Region, including Ankazomborona Mangrove Area, Ampasindava / Nosy Hara, and Nosy Sakatia, along with a desk-based review of Kivalo Mangrove Area in Menabe.
Stakeholder Consultations: Engaged local communities, community-based tourism associations, women’s groups, lodges, tour operators, government representatives, conservation NGOs, and private-sector stakeholders to understand local priorities, tourism constraints, and partnership opportunities.
Community Tourism Enterprise Analysis: Evaluated the capacity of local associations to manage tourism services such as guiding, cultural experiences, boat tours, meals, handicrafts, visitor facilities, and conservation-linked activities.
Market Linkage and Investment Recommendations: Identified opportunities to connect community tourism sites with existing visitor flows from Nosy Be, Diego Suarez, Baobab Alley, and other established tourism circuits. Recommendations included familiarization trips, tour operator partnerships, joint ventures, conservation fees, improved digital presence, and stronger product packaging.
National Enabling Environment Review: Assessed broader policy, branding, certification, concession, and investment conditions that influence conservation tourism development in Madagascar. The project produced national-level recommendations to help scale community-based conservation tourism across the country.
Project Results
The project produced a comprehensive Conservation Tourism Scorecard Assessment and Recommendations Report for WWF Madagascar, offering both site-specific and national-level guidance for strengthening conservation tourism.
5 priority conservation tourism sites assessed across Madagascar’s coastal and marine ecosystems, including mangroves, marine protected areas, sea turtle habitats, coral reefs, seagrass systems, and forest reserves.
3 scorecard pillars evaluated at each site: Conservation Status, Tourism Readiness, and Conservation Tourism Potential.
5 national-level recommendations developed to improve Madagascar’s enabling environment for conservation tourism, including a national community conservancy brand, stronger concession management systems, a sustainable tourism investment conference, voluntary sustainable tourism certification, and a global conservation tourism marketing campaign.
