The World Bank’s Atiala Atsinanana REDD project in Madagascar: “5% of the revenues from carbon credits are allocated to local communities.” And even that isn’t getting through

An excellent investigative report by Lynda Andriatsitonta of the Malina network.

PHOTO Credit: A community tree nursery in Andasihanaka, Malina.

In February 2021, Madagascar signed an agreement with the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF). Under the agreement, FCPF would buy US$50 million worth of carbon credits generated by forests covered by the Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme.

The money was to be paid in three installments for carbon credits generated between 2000 and 2024.

The first payment (US$8.8 million) came in December 2023, for emissions reductions in 2000. Since then, nothing. The remaining payments are pending, subject to verification.

Payments are supposed to pay for conservation, including payments to local community groups, that play a key role in forest protection in Madagascar.

But in a recent report, Lynda Andriatsitonta, an investigative journalist with the Malina network, found that in practice, “implementation remains hampered by payment delays, a lack of consultation, and opaque decision-making processes”.

Andriatsitonta told Radio France International that,

“In terms of sharing the benefits of the program, 5% of the revenues from carbon credits are allocated to local communities, as a reward for their efforts to protect forests. We found that, despite the payment of a first tranche of World Bank funding, many local communities have still not received the benefits for them. Some even did not know that these rewards existed.”

The Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme

The FCPF’s Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme consists of 15 REDD projects in Madagascar which in total cover 10% of the country.

In total, 119 communes in and around these projects are supposed to benefit from the money from the sales of carbon credits.

80% of the money is supposed to go to the local area of the 15 REDD projects. The vast majority of the money, 60%, is allocated for “REDD initiatives”. 5% goes to communes, 2% is for monitoring activities by communes, and 8% is for social services and security in the communes. Only 5% goes to local communities.

The Malina team carried out a survey in the Alaotra-Mangoro region between June and November 2025, to find out whether the World Bank’s carbon credit money is actually reaching local communities.

They found that in Fierenena, Didy, and Andasibe local community groups “often do not know the exact amount of their share, or have not received it”.

Andriatsitonta reported bureaucratic delays and commune activities taking precedent over local communities. “Two years after the first payment, local beneficiaries are still waiting,” she writes.

Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor

One of the protected areas included in the Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme is the Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor, which is managed by Conservation International.

There are 11 community-based organisations in the commune of Fierenena. These organisations, called Vondron’olona Ifotony in Malagasy, are responsible for environmental protection at the local level.

Part of the Fierenena commune overlaps the Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor. Of the 11 community-based organisations, six were supposed to receive carbon payments. But the local communities still do not know the exact amount of their share.

According to the benefit sharing plan for the Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme, each community-based organisation should participate in the development of a land-use plan. But Andriatsitonta reports that the “consultation seems to have been ignored”.

During discussions with the authorities, the Indigenous Peoples highlighted that they needed access to agricultural equipment, irrigation infrastructure, and the supply of seeds to improve production.

Andriatsitonta reports that Conservation International asked the mayor to develop a land-use plan — without consulting local communities. The money was to be spent on corrugated iron sheets, cement, and paint to renovate schools.

“The money intended for local communities was determined based on the requests of the communities and the municipality,” Conservation International’s Rameson Hariniaina told Malina.

The communities disagree with this version of events.

Ranaivoson Dieu Donné, president of the Fierenena local community group told Malina that,

“The idea regarding the use of the money did not come from the local communities. It was the mayor who was tasked by Conservation International with drawing up the budget.”

Conservation International only told the local communities that the carbon credit money existed after the mayor had presented his land-use plan. Nevertheless local communities agreed to request materials to renovate schools, even though this was not their idea.

Some villagers remain confused and upset. “Why aren’t our views taken into account?” one villager asked. “And why does the amount allocated to us remain unclear?”

Haingomanantsoa Rija Tahiana is head of REDD in Madagascar’s Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development. He told Malina that the mayor is not involved in deciding how the money is spent, although his opinion could be sought. Conservation International is responsible for allocating the money to local communities and develops the land-use plan together with the communities.

Malina reports Haingomanantsoa Rija Tahiana as saying that the process was fast-tracked for the first payment and the consultations “may not have been entirely exhaustive”.

By November 2025, the Fierenena and Didy local community groups had still not received their money — two years after the first World Bank payment for carbon credits. A payment planned for December 2025 was delayed.

The sapphire rush

Back in 2016, research published in Global Environmental Change raised the alarm that REDD could exacerbate poverty. The authors note the “growing concerns that REDD+ could exacerbate poverty in forest-edge communities by restricting access to land and forest resources, especially for those with insecure tenure”.

Speaking to the BBC, one of the authors Julia Jones of Bangor University, explained that the people receiving benefits from the REDD project “tended to be more socially connected; members of local forestry management committees, and they were – on average – richer or, at least, less poor”.

Things took a serious turn for the worse later in 2016 when somewhere around 45,000 people moved into the area to mine for sapphires. Miners cut down large areas of forest. Conservation International asked the government to call in the army.

REDD-Monitor sent some questions to Conservation International about the situation in the Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor, but did not receive a response.

In 2020, Hayley Dixon, a journalist with The Telegraph, reported from the Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor. By then, the REDD project was part of the World Bank’s Atiala Atsinanana Emissions Reductions Programme. Dixon found that “significant areas” of forest had been cleared.

Julia Jones told The Telegraph that the money from sales of carbon credits had to reach the people who were destroying the forest. But this has not happened. The money isn’t even reaching the communities in Madagascar that are trying to save the forests.