**1. Introduction**

Water is the most important element for the preservation of life. Water resources underlie the production of agricultural and industrial goods and services; their careful development and management are essential to generating wealth, mitigating risks, and alleviating poverty. Water, energy, and food resources are essential for human sustainable development [1]. Global water demand will increase substantially over the next two decades in the industrial, domestic, and agricultural sectors [2]. Previous studies have demonstrated that water is becoming limited, and more careful consumption is needed. This is partially caused by increasing population coupled with changes in the consumption pattern and climate change. Recently, considerable attention has been focused on the implementation of integrated water resources management (IWRM) in global river basins, including basins in Africa. Addressing the development challenge is an increasingly important issue in African countries. By 2050, the African population growth is projected to increase by 108% of the current value [3], while industrial and domestic water demand will increase by 300% and 800%, respectively [4].

Madagascar is an island country located in southeastern Africa. The country is sufficiently endowed with water resources both in terms of surface water and groundwater, but water resources are distributed irregularly in terms of seasons and geographical location. Previous studies have demonstrated that the pressures on water resources in Madagascar vary between regions [5,6]. In addition to the lack of infrastructure, various pressures on such resources threaten their existence. Water resources must cope with natural pollution because of soil erosion due to deforestation, pollution due to wastewater discharge from

**Citation:** Harifidy, R.Z.; Hiroshi, I. Analysis of River Basin Management in Madagascar and Lessons Learned from Japan. *Water* **2022**, *14*, 449. https://doi.org/10.3390/ w14030449

Academic Editors: Rafael J. Bergillos and Nikolaos Skoulikidis

Received: 29 November 2021 Accepted: 25 January 2022 Published: 2 February 2022

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**Copyright:** © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

human activities, and practices such as agricultural fires (Tavy). IWRM was incorporated into Madagascar's Water Code in 1998 [7]. A policy is needed to ensure adequacy between the quantities used and the need for water resources to enable socioeconomic development within the country. Madagascar does not currently experience tensions or wars related to water resources. However, the island is exposed to various weather and climate phenomena because of its diverse landscape [8] and climate change. In 2018, the country ranked fourth among the 10 countries most vulnerable to extreme weather events [9]. Climate change has impacted virtually every river basin in Madagascar, often degrading the quality and availability of water and water-related [10,11]. In this paper, we explored the possibility of managing the major river basins to achieve sustainable development. For that purpose, we evaluated the existing IWRM policy, legal and strategic frameworks in Madagascar. The integrated river basin management (IRBM) in Madagascar was compared with Japan to assess the progress of both countries in the implementation of IWRM/IRBM and possible strategies for Madagascar to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) target 6.5. Japan is one of the largest and most developed economies in the world, whereas Madagascar is one of the poorest. There are important differences between Japan and Madagascar, such as the level of economic development, population density, climate, geography, culture, etc. Not all Japan's experience of river basin management can be applied to Madagascar, but some lessons can be drawn and adapted in Madagascar's context. We also used Aqueduct data to analyze the projected effects of climate change on the 12 major river basins to provide information regarding future water availability and water demand. Further, we proposed a solution to manage the basins based on the results of the precedent analysis.
