Cities and Islands

Madagascar’s cities

With 18 million inhabitants for a surface reaching 587.041 km ², that is to say a little bigger than France, Madagascar has only one low demographic density of a little more than 30 inhabitants per km2. And as this population is urbanized only to approximately 15%, one will understand that great agglomerations are rare. Most important are Antananarivo, the national capital and the five chief towns of the old Provinces, that is to say alphabetically, Antsiranana, Fianarantsoa, Mahajanga, Toamasina and Toliara. During colonial times, well before the suppression of the six provinces and their replacement by the twenty-two current regions, the name of these six cities which the colonizers did not manage to pronounce had been changed into Tananarive, Diégo Suarez, Fianarantsoa, Majunga, Tamatave and Tuléar, of the names which were always rejected by the natives. These cities ended up finding their initial identity shortly after independence in 1960.

With the great political change of 2002 and the installation of decentralization, they almost all lost a good part of their administrative and political importance, but not their demographic and economic weight. It is besides the latter factor which leads us to add two ports to them: one in the extreme South-east which develops enormously because of the exploitation and the export of ilmenite, from which one extracts titanium and the second one is in the hollow from the West coast, with a promising back-country for coal plan (Sakoa) and fuel (Bemolanga). It is respectively around Taolagnaro, originally named Fort Dauphin, and Morondava. Of course, visitors who are not solely attracted by the economic outlooks will be able to also find in these cities various other centers of interest of human nature and historical, without forgetting the history, botany or zoological, ecological and the usual cultural in facets short the tourist attractions. That does not mean that we will neglect the other sites, but these eight places will initially hold our attention.

When we say large city, the adjective is quite relative: according to last official statistics, Antananarivo the largest among them counts less than two million inhabitants, which is well far from the tentacular figures of capitals such as Beijing, New York, Cairo or even Lagos. We must remember that, conceived at a time when pedestrian movements were the standard, these cities already start to know serious problems of cleansing, obstruction and air pollution, although the rate of the latter is definitely lower than that of Tokyo, Mexico City or Athens, cities between all dreaded by asthmatic people. But Antananarivo suffers from these evils because of lack of city planning and also for economic situation for the numbers of rural inhabitants fleeing the rural area while thinking of finding better life in the capital and come to enlarge the urban working class.

A last opinion: the political liberalism currently practiced in the country supported the birth of hundreds of lodging and restoration establishments of various levels. In the absence of a Michelin or Gault and Millau guide books, you can consult the Tourism Office Board booklets or get counsels from your appointed Tour Operator who knows the country well and who will be able to direct you in your choice.