The air on Madagascar’s East Coast is often described by one scent. But that is only half the story.
Most travelers arrive searching for vanilla. Its fragrance famously hangs in the air along the coastal road between Sambava and Antalaha. Yet there is another, deeper note that defines this part of the island: the warm, pungent scent of cloves. It’s a spice so intertwined with Madagascar’s identity that its story begins, almost apocryphally, with a shipwreck. In 1506, long before the plant was formally cultivated here, a Javanese junk ran aground, spilling its cargo of cloves across a northern beach and giving a Portuguese explorer the false impression of a land already rich in the spice.
The reality of clove cultivation arrived later, introduced to the island of Sainte-Marie around 1820. From there, it spread to the mainland coast near the turn of the 20th century, quickly becoming a cornerstone of the colonial and then national economy. By 1982, cloves accounted for over a quarter of the country’s foreign currency earnings, at times rivaling coffee and vanilla. Far from a mere flavoring, the clove has for two centuries reshaped both the land and the lives it sustains.
From Bud to Bottle
To understand the clove, you must see where it grows. This isn’t an abstract commodity. It’s a crimson flower bud, harvested before it opens. In places like Mananara and Fenoarivo-Atsinanana, functional market towns rather than polished destinations, the spice trade is the pulse of daily life. Here, the economy is built on cash crops, and smallholder farms are the standard. The work is tangible, visible in the drying cloves and the scent that permeates the air.
For a more structured look, we arrange visits to plantations like Domaine Aavyland, south of Manakara, or the Domaine d’Ambohimanitra, the ‘hill of perfumes.’ A walk through these grounds is a lesson in botany and economy. You see not only clove trees but also cinnamon, ylang-ylang, and ravintsara. You follow the journey of the crimson bud from the tree to the distillery, where its essential oil is extracted, a scent far more potent and complex than the dried spice in a kitchen jar. It’s an education in the patience and precision required to turn a flower bud into a globally traded product.
A Complicated Harvest
The story of the clove is not without its difficult chapters. Along the steep slopes of Ambanizana, the demand for land to grow cloves and coffee has led to the clearing of primary forest. It’s a stark reminder of the pressures facing Madagascar’s ecosystems. Yet, the clove also holds a key to conservation. In places like the Makira Natural Park, promoting clove cultivation is part of a strategy to provide alternative livelihoods, steering communities away from slash-and-burn agriculture and illegal logging. The plant is both a threat and a potential solution.
This complexity is the reality of Madagascar. It’s a place where an Aye-aye, one of the island’s most elusive lemurs, might find refuge in a cultivated clove plantation, and where the spice’s presence in a savory stew or a traditional Malagasy cake connects the dinner table directly to the island’s economic and ecological fabric. To travel the East Coast is to experience this firsthand, to smell that second scent in the air and begin to understand the intricate story it tells.
The Other Scent of Madagascar
Let us introduce you to the stories behind the spices that define the East Coast.
“The part of the clove we use is the flower bud, crimson when mature.”