Madagascar - Rice and water cultural landscape of Betafo

The proposed area is the countryside of the small town of Betato marked by an original rice and hydraulic landscape of great beauty. It is a landscape comprising a rice-growing valley (I), hillsides occupied by rice terraces (II) and a complex hydraulic network (III), fruit of a secular know-how transmitted from generation to production. generation, a delicate social balance and where the harmony between man and the environment is read. (I) The rice valley situated upstream and downstream of the town of Ambohiambo is inserted between two mountain ranges and exploits the topography of the land in great detail while benefiting from a well-designed irrigation system. (II) In certain sectors, and particularly on both sides of a river, there are numerous terraced rice terraces. (III) The complex hydraulic network serving the valley and the verants is a witness of the donation ~ estication of water on its regulation for a fair share to all the rice fields, first between the lineages, then between the families . The network includes, among other things, traditional catch with relatively dry dams of parallel and superimposed canals dug on the northern flanks of the deep canyon gorges, a good dozen parallel canals for lineages and small canals for families with distributors in volcanic stones. These last channels can be underground - passing under rice fields - when space is lacking.