Sarah Tojo Mandaharisoa

Socio-economist, Madagascar

About me

I recently joined WWT Madagascar as a socio-economist. I have a Master's degree in agronomy with a specialisation in tropical agriculture from the University of Antananarivo. I have always worked in rural areas of Madagascar and in community based development projects. I have worked mainly on rice varieties improvement facing climate change, strengthening farmers' livelihoods and nutritional status.

My previous experience allowed me to develop an interest in social research, transdisciplinary approach, and to have a broader vision of the link between research and rural community activity, environment and resilience. The field of wetland conservation is a new and exciting adventure where I am confident that with our team we can make changes in community livelihoods and resilience and be effective in wetland conservation and management.

My role

As Socio-economist, my work is mainly to undertake social scientific research in project sites. A key focus of the role will be to advance research on social dimensions about wetland conservation and wetland management.

I develop and facilitate on site qualitative study such as interviews, focus group discussion or participatory workshops that assess villagers’ perceptions and actions toward wetland management. I also help in developing and handling quantitative research such as baseline survey. I am in charge of socio-economic data collection and analysis, reporting, and providing help in paper writing. I can therefore support in any other task that is judged relevant to my duties.

Experience and interests

• Field research methodology development and socio-economic data collection
• Qualitative research analysis : content analysis, thematic analysis, etc
• Quantitative analysis
• Reporting and paper writing
• Rice breeding and participatory varietal selection

Publications

• Tojo-Mandaharisoa, Sarah & Steinke, Jonathan & Randrianarison, Narilala & Kubitza, Christoph & Konzack, Alexandra & Rafanomezantsoa, Arielle & Randriamampionona, Denis & Sieber, Stefan & Andriamaniraka, Harilala. (2022). Assessing Farmers’ Diverse Preferences and Expectations for Tailoring Food and Nutrition Security Interventions in Southeastern Madagascar. Current Developments in Nutrition. 6. 10.1093/cdn/nzac142.
• Rafanomezantsoa, Arielle & Coral, Claudia & Randrianarison, Narilala & Kubitza, Christoph & Randriamampionona, Denis & Andriamaniraka, Harilala & Sieber, Stefan & Tojo-Mandaharisoa, Sarah & Steinke, Jonathan. (2022). Identifying nutrition-sensitive development options in Madagascar through a positive deviance approach. Food Security. 15. 1-16. 10.1007/s12571-022-01339-z.
• Pariasca-Tanaka J, Rakotondramanana MF, Tojo Mangaharisoa S, Ranaivo HN, Tanaka R, Wissuwa M. (2022). Phenotyping of a rice (Oryza sativa L.) association panel identifies loci associated with tolerance to low soil fertility on smallholder farm conditions in Madagascar. PLoS ONE 17(5): e0262707. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0262707.
• Tanaka, Ryokei & Tojo-Mandaharisoa, Sarah & Rakotondramanana, Mbolatantely & Ranaivo, Harisoa & Pariasca-Tanaka, Juan & Kajiya-Kanegae, Hiromi & Iwata, Hiroyoshi & Wissuwa, Matthias. (2021). From gene banks to farmer’s fields: using genomic selection to identify donors for a breeding program in rice to close the yield gap on smallholder farms. Theoretical and Applied Genetics. 134. 10.1007/s00122-021-03909-9.