• 1 An estimated 70–80% of people in Madagascar rely on medicinal plants, called raokandro, for primary (...)
• 2 Officially known to botanists as Cinnamomum officinarum Nees, this Lauraceae tree has many synonyms (...)

1In March 2020, during the first weeks of the Covid-19 pandemic, many Malagasy people turned to ravintsara, using its leaves for infusion or steam inhalation (evoka). Widely used in everyday Malagasy therapeutic practices, ravintsara is considered on the island a familiar and trusted remedy1. Yet ravintsara is not endemic to Madagascar. Botanically classified as Cinnamomum camphora (L.) by J. Presl, the large evergreen tree was introduced in the nineteenth century as part of colonial botanical and industrial projects oriented toward camphor production2. Its status as a Malagasy medicinal plant thus raises a broader question about how introduced species come to be integrated into new contexts and therapeutic repertoires.

• 3 Andry Rajoelina, interview by France 24, May 11, 2020, YouTube video, 12:42 min mark, “Le problème (...)
• 4 Notably, neither plant is endemic to Madagascar. A. annua was introduced in the 1970s. See Chanelle (...)

2Trust in the therapeutic virtues of ravintsara became particularly visible when then-President Andry Rajoelina promoted Covid-Organics (CVO), a plant-based remedy produced by Pharmalagasy and distributed nationwide, containing Artemisia annua and a mix of “endemic” and “Malagasy” plants, including ravintsara, the name by which the Cinnamomum camphora tree is known in Madagascar3. Described as a symbol of medical autonomy and sovereignty, the plants used in CVO were presented as part of Madagascar’s therapeutic repertoire, despite their distinct and historically complex trajectories of integration into the Malagasy pharmacopeia4.

• 5 UNICEF. “Madagascar Country Office Humanitarian Situation Report No. 2: COVID-19 Situation Report,” (...)
• 6 Megan Vaughan, “Healing and Curing: Issues in the Social History and Anthropology of Medicine in Af (...)

3CVO’s scientific validity was hotly contested, particularly by critics of the political regime who viewed its timing as opportunistic and its efficacy as unproven, a controversy that unfolded amid a backdrop of worsening crises of hunger, malnutrition, climate stress, and unemployment5. In response to international criticism, President Rajoelina suggested that skepticism about CVO was less related to its scientific evidence and its efficacy than to its origin—namely Madagascar, Africa6. These debates brought to light a deeper set of historical resonances rooted in postcolonial and nationalist claims to medical sovereignty, dating back to the 1960s and rearticulated in 2020. CVO is thus not an isolated controversy, but a point of visibility for these long trajectories on the world stage, which foreground plant-based healing practices in a context of persistent skepticism toward medicines from the margins.

• 7 Despite the island’s high plant endemicism (around 90%), more than 1,300 introduced species are pre (...)

4At the same time, a central tension lay at the heart of this assertion. The botanical composition of CVO has a history which complicates such claims. Although the product was presented as typically Malagasy, one of its key ingredients, ravintsara, was itself the result of earlier colonial botanical introductions. The widespread assumption that ravintsara is endemic shows how well it had been naturalized as a Malagasy medicinal resource despite its foreign botanical origins, a process that was later taken up and stabilized by post-independence cultural and scientific projects that sought to articulate a distinct national pharmacopoeia7.

• 8 Gwyn Campbell, “Therapeutic Pluralism and Medical Change in Nineteenth-Century Madagascar,” Cahiers (...)
• 9 “Traditional medicine” is an analytically contested term, but widely used in Madagascar (in French, (...)

5Ravintsara is situated within a broader context of historical research on therapeutic pluralism and medical hybridity in Madagascar, where introduced substances were selectively integrated into local therapeutic repertoires rather than opposed to them. From the nineteenth century onward, Malagasy therapeutic practices routinely combined multiple forms of care, with practitioners selectively appropriating elements of European medicine alongside local practices8. Ravintsara’s integration into Malagasy health practices therefore does not reflect a simple opposition between “traditional” and “biomedical” systems, but rather shows a complex historical process in which introduced plants were selectively integrated, reworked, and naturalized into local therapeutic repertoires9.

• 10 More on essential oil extraction during the pandemic: Chanelle Adams, “Essential Work in Essential (...)

6This article examines how Cinnamomum camphora, an introduced species, became famous in traditional Malagasy medicine under the name ravintsara, a story that helps explain why this plant was particularly well positioned to regain new notoriety during the Covid-19 pandemic. It traces the evolution of the classifications, uses, and meanings of this tree from the nineteenth century to the present day, showing how colonial science and industry, botanical and cultural naturalization, post-independence medical and scientific projects, and global trade collectively shaped the growing importance of ravintsara—both as a staple household remedy in Madagascar and a commodity marketed beyond the island, notably in the form of refined essential oil and, later, as CVO, a pandemic product10.

• 11 On oral history, narrative, storywork and non-elite knowledge as historical evidence in the history (...)

7Drawing on archival sources, oral histories, interviews, and scientific literature, this study traces ravintsara’s historical and contemporary trajectories11. Archival materials include colonial periodicals, forestry records, and botanical codices, mainly preserved at the Arsivam-Pirenena Malagasy (Madagascar National Archives), as well as chemical and botanical studies from the 1990s and 2000s. These materials are complemented by oral testimonies and interviews conducted between 2020 and 2024 with healers, producers, exporters, and scientists in Madagascar’s Central Highlands and at national research institutes, including the University of Antananarivo, the Institut malgache de recherches appliquées (IMRA), and the Centre national d’application de recherche pharmaceutique (CNARP). Together, these sources allow us to trace how colonial science, cultural and botanical naturalization, post-independence medical and scientific projects, and local therapeutic practices collectively shaped the evolution of the classification, use, and significance of ravintsara over time.

• 12 Julia Frances Morton, Major Medicinal Plants: Botany, Culture, and Uses, Springfield: Charles Thoma (...)
• 13 Rakhi Mishra and Binit Dwivedi, “Cinnamomum Camphora: A Long History for Epidemics Control,” TMR In (...)

9Cinnamomum camphora refers to the camphor tree, a species native to East Asia. This robust tree can reach heights of 12 to 30 meters. Known for its aromatic leaves, small whitish-yellow flowers, purple berries, and large canopy, it thrives in tropical highlands between 1,200 and 1,800 meters12. Historically, camphor was extracted from its wood and bark to be used for medicinal purposes during epidemics, for example as a fumigant during the Black Death in fourteenth century Europe and as a cough reliever during cholera epidemics in eighteenth and nineteenth century India. It was also used in industrial materials such as celluloid and smokeless gunpowder in the 1870s13. By 1919, camphor production was monopolized by Taiwan (then Formosa), prompting competing empires to seek alternative sources and to introduce C. camphora to new territories.

• 14 Michael A. Osborne, “Acclimatizing the World: A History of the Paradigmatic Colonial Science,” Osir (...)
• 15 Robin A. Donkin, Dragon’s Brain Perfume: An Historical Geography of Camphor, Leiden: Brill, 1999.

10Rather than providing a comprehensive history of camphor production under empire, this section focuses on the introduction of C. camphora to Madagascar through imperial botanical exchanges and the conditions thus created for its later appropriation. British and French colonial expansion in the nineteenth century facilitated the global circulation of economically and medicinally promising plants, through acclimatization projects aimed at promoting imperial profits and colonial self-sufficiency14. By the 1930s, camphor trees had been planted across Australia, the southern United States, Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and South America15.

• 16 Henri Perrier de la Bathie, « Les Plantes introduites à Madagascar, » Journal d’agriculture traditi (...)
• 17 Pascal Danthu, Isabelle Michel, Stéphanie M. Carrière, Vanesse Labeyrie, Bakolimalala Rakouth, Juli (...)

11According to French colonial botanist Henri Perrier de la Bâthie, C. camphora reached Madagascar by the mid-nineteenth century16. Its introduction was likely plural rather than singular, occurring through multiple channels. Seafaring Malagasy settlers, European missionaries, and colonial administrators may all have transported seeds, and the precise timing remains debated17.

• 18 Archives nationales d’outre-mer, “Tananarive. Jardin d’essai de Nanisana, camphriers (Antananarivo, (...)

12What is certain is that Cinnamomum camphora trees were present in colonial experimental landscapes by the turn of the twentieth century. A photograph dated 1903 from the Jardin d’essai de cultures coloniales in Nanisana, founded in 1896 under General Joseph Simon Gallieni on land formerly belonging to Prime Minister Rainilaiarivony, shows a mature camphor tree prominently in the foreground18.

• 19 One possible reason for the interest in France may have been François-Vincent Raspail’s 1840s domes (...)
• 20 Louis Lavauden, “Les forêts coloniales de la France (suite),” Revue de botanique appliquée et d’agr (...)

13While initial interest in C. camphora in Madagascar was linked to its potential as a source of camphor, large-scale extraction never materialized. During World War II, French colonial botanists renewed calls for the broadscale cultivation of C. camphora, including in Madagascar19. However, as Louis Lavauden observed in the Revue de botanique appliquée et d’agriculture coloniale in 1941: “Madagascar cannot become an important source of camphor for us20.”

• 21 See Richard H. Grove, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical Island Edens and the Origins (...)

14Despite failed endeavors for camphor extraction, C. camphora persisted in Madagascar and gradually took on new functions. From the early twentieth century onward, the tree became increasingly integrated into colonial urban and highland landscapes as a shade and ornamental species, a use closely tied to colonial land-use practices that combined economic, aesthetic, and hygienic aims21. Camphor trees were incorporated into administrative, recreational, and symbolic spaces in Antananarivo, including the Soarano Train Station, Mahamasina Stadium, Tsimbazaza Zoo, and Anosy Lake. Two mature ravintsara trees still stand in front of the Ambohitsorohitra Palace, the former residence of the French governor and then the Malagasy presidency until 2009 (Figure 1). Longtime residents recall that camphor trees once lined the Avenue of Independence (previously called Avenue Fallières and later, Avenue de la Libération) alongside jacarandas, another introduced species strongly associated with colonial urban planning. In this context, ornamental planting was not simply decorative, but was part of a colonial practice of acclimatization, landscape management, and environmental governance.

• 22 European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organization (EPPO), Pest Risk Analysis for Cinnamomum (...)

15By the mid-twentieth century, C. camphora had transitioned from a speculative industrial resource to a familiar presence in Malagasy urban and highland environments. Although the species has been classified as invasive in other contexts, in Madagascar it acquired uses and meanings that exceeded the initial ambitions of nineteenth-century colonial botany22.

• 23 Banu Subramaniam, Botany of Empire…, op. cit.; Samir Boumediene, La colonisation du savoir: Une his (...)
• 24 Abena Dove Osseo-Asare, “Writing Medical Authority: The Rise of Literate Healers in Ghana, 1930–197 (...)
• 25 Haripriya Rangan, “The Movement of Plants and Creolisation of Landscapes in the Indian Ocean Region (...)

17Histories of botany and empire provided rich accounts of the circulation and classification of medicinal plants under colonial rule, foregrounding scientific institutions, imperial economies, and taxonomic regimes23. However, the processes by which introduced plants were recognized and considered therapeutic in local practice are less well documented, particularly when such practices unfolded outside formal medical or scientific institutions, and in non-European contexts24. As scholars specializing in historical botanical migrations have shown, introduced plants were often integrated locally through repeated use and everyday forms of appraisal embedded in lived landscapes, rather than by their origin alone25.

• 26 Laurence Monnais, “The Reinvention of an Appropriate Tradition or the Colonial Birth of Vietnamese (...)

18Rather than attempting a precise chronological reconstruction, this section examines how ravintsara’s therapeutic legitimacy was generated and recognized through narrative and evaluative practices. Such processes, unfolding outside formal medical or scientific institutions, often leave few archival traces, yet they confer lasting authority over time26. Drawing on contemporary accounts and oral histories, this section examines how efficacy and belonging are articulated and remembered in practice, and how ravintsara’s therapeutic value and Malagasy identity have come to be treated as self-evident.

• 27 Henitsoa Sandra Raonimanana, Recours à la médecine traditionnelle malgache avec le ravintsara : une (...)
• 28 Groundskeeper, interview, Sambaina Manjakandriana, Madagascar, 2022.
• 29 Godfroy Ralaindratsiry, interview, Antsirabe, Madagascar, 2022.

20Legends and narratives about the plant’s origins and properties are numerous and often contradictory. Some accounts suggest that ravintsara trees were planted as sacred trees around royal palaces in precolonial times27. In a contrasting narrative, a groundskeeper responsible for land where ravintsara trees grew in Sambaina Manjakandriana explained that Queen Ranavalona II’s strict policies regarding foreign influence extended beyond politics, also affecting forests and plants, making it unlikely that a foreign species would have been accepted on royal grounds28. It would not have made sense, therefore, for her to embrace ravintsara, a foreign plant, on her royal grounds. As a practitioner of traditional Malagasy medicine pointed out: “One must be wary of what is said about the past29.”

• 30 Essential oil and plant vendor, interview, Ambositra, Madagascar, 2022.

21Interviewees offered various explanations for ravintsara’s adoption, drawing on historical, scientific, and allegorical sources. One plant seller remarked, “maybe one day a leaf fell into the cooking pot”, an explanation offered in an uncanny Newtonian apple kind of way that attributed agency to the plant itself in the moment of discovery30. While seemingly anecdotal, such narratives point to the interpretive work that establishes medicinal value. Here, efficacy emerges from collective witnessing and shared appraisal, rather than from biomedical conventions that prioritize documentation from a named and citable discoverer.

• 31 Mose Njo, interview, Antananarivo, Madagascar, 2023.
• 32 JCR Group Office, interview, Antananarivo, Madagascar, 2022.

22Author and scholar of Malagasy language Mose Njo describes the process of ravintsara becoming a medicinal plant as an act of appraisal, linking the root of tsara (good) to fitsarana, the Malagasy word for judgment, as a state of collective appreciation31. Similarly, Jean Claude Ratsimivony, founder of the JCR Group and former owner of HomeoPharma, a Ministry of Health–approved Malagasy company for phytotherapy and aromatherapy, described ravintsara’s adoption in terms that defy botanical logic but convey cultural belonging: “Ravintsara modified its DNA to become endemic32.” Such statements articulate a scientific paradox of belonging. Although botanically introduced, ravintsara is nonetheless perceived as having become Malagasy through its appraisal and use, even if the precise moment of this transformation remains undetermined.

• 33 Later, in 1993, it would gain “foundation” status under a government decree.
• 34 Notably, C. camphora is not mentioned in Albert Rakoto Ratsimamanga, Pierre Boiteau and Marcel Mout (...)
• 35 During this period, several companies did export essential oils such as geranium and ylang-ylang, b (...)
• 36 Gabrielle Robbins, “‘May Madagascar Live Long and Never Kneel’: Autonomous Medical Industries in Ma (...)

26Central to these efforts was the Institut malgache de recherches appliquées (IMRA), founded as an NGO in 1957 by Suzanne and Albert Rakoto Ratsimamanga33. From its inception, IMRA presented plant remedies as both culturally grounded and scientifically rigorous, advocating for their inclusion in national strategies for medical self-sufficiency34. These initiatives persisted during Madagascar’s socialist period (1975–1992), when state projects emphasized independence, autonomy, and the development of domestic medical and pharmaceutical capacities capable of reducing reliance on drug imports35. This era was marked by the political and symbolic elevation of locally produced state-run therapies as expressions of sovereignty and national dignity, leaving durable institutional and epistemic legacies that extended beyond the socialist state36.

• 37 Richard R. Marcus, “Political Change in Madagascar: Populist Democracy or Neopatrimonialism by Anot (...)
• 38 André Descheemaeker, Plantes médicinales malgaches : traduction française de Ravi-Maitso, Fianarant (...)

27By the early 1990s, these projects of medical sovereignty encountered a changing political and economic landscape. Structural adjustment and economic liberalization redefined the role of the state, while opening new possibilities for botanical therapies to circulate beyond the island-nation’s borders through structures not directly related to the state37. In this context, aromatic plants were increasingly perceived as potentially lucrative national resources, and Madagascar turned to the essential oil industry as a promising avenue for economic growth. Ravintsara’s rising prominence was reflected in its inclusion in works such as those of botanist Boiteau and in Descheemaeker’s Ravi-maitso, which cataloged Malagasy medicinal plants and contributed to its scientific visibility and legitimacy at a time when local therapeutic knowledge was being repositioned between Malagasy scientific institutions and emerging market logics38.

• 39 Ratismamanga’s speech notes. IMRA archives [Fondation Albert et Suzanne Rakoto Ratsimamanga], boxes (...)

28These shifts were accompanied by intensified efforts to establish Madagascar’s scientific credibility in the essential oil sector. In September 1999, the Institut malgache de recherches appliquées hosted an international conference called “L’analyse chimique au service de qualité des huiles essentielles” (Chemical analysis in the service of essential oil quality) in Antananarivo. There, Albert Rakoto Ratsimamanga, a founding figure of Malagasy plant medicine, emphasized IMRA’s capacity for phytochemical research and quality control, particularly through partnerships with institutions such as the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium (Figure 3)39. Such collaborations helped establish confidence in Malagasy scientific expertise among foreign buyers and industry stakeholders, and positioned IMRA as a credible intermediary for the analysis and certification of essential oils.

• 40 S. Rakotoarison, L. Ranarivelo, and A. Randriamanantena, “Promotion et développement de la filière (...)
• 41 IMRA archives, folders 3D1, 3D3, 3D4, 3D5, 3D6, “Huiles essentielles produites à l’IMRA” (bilan au (...)

29That same year, the Syndicat des producteurs d’extraits aromatiques, alimentaires et médicinaux de Madagascar (SYPEAM) began exporting ravintsara, while IMRA initiated a small-scale production of approximately sixty kilograms per month, used for its antiseptic and antibacterial properties40. In the absence of dedicated ravintsara production sites at the time, the leaves were initially harvested from ornamental trees in and around Antananarivo, including public spaces such as Mahamasina41. Ravintsara’s early entry into export markets thus relied on infrastructures and landscapes not originally designed for commercial production, drawing on remnants of colonial aspirations related to camphor and urban ornamentation rather than on purposely established plantations.

• 42 Vahinala Raharinirina, “La valorisation économique des plantes aromatiques : pratique viable ou ‘my (...)
• 43 S. Rakotoarison, L. Ranarivelo, and A. Randriamanantena, “Promotion et développement de la filière… (...)
• 44 Marcello Nicoletti, Mauro Serafini, Filippo Maggi, and Giovanni Benelli, “Professor Philippe Rasoan (...)

30By the late 1990s, medicinal and aromatic plants in Madagascar were increasingly viewed as valuable resources, with biodiversity considered both a public good and a potential economic resource42. Interest in essential oils rapidly expanded. By 1999, exports had reached a value of 44 billion Malagasy Francs (FMG) (roughly $6.45 million USD) and an annual volume of 1,297 tons: long-standing ambiguities surrounding ravintsara’s botanical and chemical identity became newly consequential43. A stable classification system was necessary to facilitate its export, but it also became a means of asserting control over the definition, value, and representation of the plant among several newly valorized Malagasy resources44. In this sense, commodity classification was not merely a technical step, but a site of Malagasy scientific appropriation.

• 45 Variations in spelling and usage further compounded this ambiguity. Raymond Decary notes that homon (...)
• 46 Étienne De Flacourt, Histoire de la grande île Madagascar, Paris: Karthala, 2007. Ravensara aromati (...)

31The interpretive problem created by homonymous vernacular names was the most immediate scientific concern. Two distinct species circulated internationally under the name ravintsara: Cinnamomum camphora (ravintsara) and Ravensara aromatica (ravensare)45. On international markets, products labeled as ravintsara circulated without clear distinction between the endemic species R. aromatica and the introduced C. camphora, thus calling into question ravintsara’s identity as a commodity altogether. While R. aromatica had been described as early as the seventeenth century by de Flacourt and distilled in the eighteenth century46, C. camphora had arrived in Madagascar through colonial botanical transfers and was known elsewhere under names such as camphor laurel or Laurus camphora. Resolving this ambiguity was essential for producers, exporters and scientists wishing to claim ravintsara as distinct from both ravensare and other C. camphora trees.

• 47 Chemotypes are single species subsets that exhibit distinct chemical compositions due to minor gene (...)
• 48 Globally, five distinct chemotypes of Cinnamomum camphora have been identified. Michaël Mansard, Do (...)

32Chemical analysis offered a means of differentiation. Unlike camphor-rich varieties found elsewhere, C. camphora from Madagascar typically contains negligible camphor. Instead, the island’s chemotype47, designated C. camphora ct 1-8-cineole, is rich in eucalyptol (1,8-cineole)48. In aromatherapy and phytotherapy, cineole-dominant profiles are associated with antiviral, anti-inflammatory, and antimicrobial properties, aligning closely with traditional uses of ravintsara in Malagasy medicine.

• 49 Marta Andriantsiferana, “Rôle fondamental des laboratoires de recherche et d’analyse dans la mise e (...)
• 50 Lalasoa Ranarivelo, Panja Ramanoelina, H. Rodolfo Juliani, and James E. Simon, “Characterization of (...)
• 51 A technique that separates and identifies chemical compounds by vaporizing a sample and measuring t (...)
• 52 In partnership with the LDI and BAMEX projects (USAID) and NGOs such as Label CBD.

33Malagasy scientists played a crucial role in translating ravintsara’s distinctive chemical profile into standards that could guarantee both domestic legitimacy and future circulation49. Researchers, including Rasoanaivo at IMRA and Ranarivelo at CNARP, advocated defining ravintsara using specific chemical norms, rather than relying solely on its contested botanical nomenclature50. Using gas chromatography, they established parameters specifying cineole concentrations between 50 and 63 percent and minimal camphor content51. These standards, created in 2002, were developed in collaboration with Malagasy organic certification organizations such as NATIORA, and professional export organizations like SYPEAM and PRONABIO52.

• 53 Panja Ramanoelina, “Normes: outil au service des entreprises, extraits aromatiques – huiles essenti (...)
• 54 Decree No. 2339/2002, Ministry of Health, Madagascar, August 28, 2002, mentioned in “Traditional Me (...)

34What constituted ravintsara was therefore actively negotiated among Malagasy scientists, producers, and export-oriented actors53. Unlike previous colonial aromatic crops such as clove, vanilla, or ylang-ylang—whose standards were largely imposed from outside—ravintsara’s chemical identity was stabilized in Madagascar. Through this process, Malagasy institutions asserted their authority over the plant’s definition and value, positioning ravintsara as a national commodity grounded in the island’s specific ecological and scientific conditions. This general orientation was reinforced in 2002 by a decree from Malagasy government officially supporting traditional medicine and recognizing knowledge of the national pharmacopeia as a resource worth recognition and legal protection54.

• 55 World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), “Achat de plants de ravintsara pour appuyer des COBAs à Divohibe, (...)

37From the early 2000s, ravintsara’s economic boom also drew the attention of conservation and rural development actors. As its chemical identity was stabilized for export, government agencies and NGOs, including WWF, promoted ravintsara as a dual-purpose tree, capable of supporting rural livelihoods through distillation while also contributing to reforestation55. Regional environmental offices (DREDD) and the national seed bank distributed seedlings for reforestation, thus extending ravintsara cultivation across the Central Highlands as if it were a native species, despite its status as an introduced species.

• 56 Henitsoa Sandra Raonimanana, Recours à la médecine traditionnelle malgache…, op. cit.

39It was in this context—where ravintsara occupied an ambivalent position as therapeutic remedy, development resource, conservation object, and volatile commodity—that the Covid-19 pandemic unfolded. Between 2020 and 2023, ravintsara was mobilized simultaneously at different levels: as a common family treatment, as a nationally promoted curative product, and as a standardized essential oil distributed on global markets. Each of these uses relied on infrastructures and forms of legitimacy established during previous phases of ravintsara’s transformation into a therapeutic and commercial substance56.

• 57 Maminirina Rado, “Médecine traditionnelle : Edmond Alfred Rakotomalala, géant de la ‘multinationale (...)

41At the national level, plant-based therapeutics became a political issue. In collaboration with IMRA, the state promoted COVID-Organics (CVO), a beverage containing ravintsara. Though initially presented as an assertion of medical sovereignty, the program faced regulatory criticism and practical constraints that limited its long-term supply, and was discontinued in 2021. Meanwhile, private initiatives emerged. Entrepreneur Edmond Alfred Rakotomalala developed ED1, an essential-oil blend containing ravintsara and other ingredients, which circulated widely within Madagascar and among the Malagasy diaspora57. Alongside these local and national mobilizations, ravintsara also circulated as an essential oil for international aromatherapy and alternative medicine markets.

• 58 Estimates based on aggregated private-sector data provided by the Groupement des exportateurs d’hui (...)

43At the same time, it is the essential oil, rather than the leaves, that lends itself to standardization, certification, packaging, and long-distance trade. The exportation of roughly 35 tons of ravintsara oil between 2020 and 2021 relied on classificatory and regulatory frameworks established in the late 1990s and early 2000s, through which ravintsara had previously been defined, stabilized, and made exportable as a commodity58.

• 59 Chanelle Adams, “Essential Work in Essential Oil Production…,” op. cit.

44This expansion relied, and still relies, on labor-intensive production methods. Madagascar’s Central Highlands constitute the primary region for ravintsara cultivation, and oil extraction typically requires between 100 and 125 kilograms of dried leaves per liter of oil, with harvest possible up to three times per year. While distillation generated pandemic income opportunities, producers often captured only a limited share of the value created. As demand declined, many distillers and harvesters faced renewed economic precarity, highlighting the uneven and unstable conditions under which these livelihoods were secured59.