title: Preliminary surveys: ecological, demographic and socio- economic, and their Implications as regards the sustainability of the Lefini Game Reserve, Republic of Congo
title: A Series of preliminary surveys: ecological, demographic and socio- economic, and their Implications as regards the sustainability of the Lefini Game Reserve, Republic of Congo
titleType: AlternativeTitle
Creators: name: Downer, Ahab
Publisher: name: The University of Edinburgh
Year: 1998
Subjects: subject: Annexe MSc Digitisation Project 2022 Block 51
subject: Sustainability
subject: Ecological surveys
subject: Bushmeat hunting
subject: Human impact
subject: Conservation initiatives

description: A series of preliminary ecological and socio-economic surveys were carried out in areas within and adjacent to the Lefini game reserve in central Republic of Congo over a period of two years. The aim of this study was to: provide preliminary data concerning the distribution and relative density of large mammals existing in both the gallery forests and savanna habitats characteristic of the Plateau Bateke. To provide relative density estimates for human activity within the same area as an indicator of hunting pressure. To census the local village populations and assess their degree of dependence and influence upon the natural resources characteristic of the region. To determine the impacts, in terms of immigration to the region, of the war which recently gripped the nation’s capital for five months in 1997. To discuss the causes and effects of these results as they pertain to the conservation initiatives currently focused on the Lefini reserve. The 35 day ecological survey consisted of a series of parallel modified line transects radiating north and south from the axis of the Lefini river. The resulting data enabled the determination of the relative density of large mammals, as well as that of human activity, throughout a vast portion of the Lefini river valley. Large mammal densities were found to be consistently low regardless of distance from a major town where hunting is a prime commercial activity. A network of well maintained hunting trails and camps was recorded throughout the entirety of the forest and savanna habitat surveyed. Evidence suggests that there is no sizable area within the existing reserve, or the adjacent river valley, where hunting for bushmeat does not occur. Lion, hyena and leopard as well as elephant, hippo, and buffalo, seem to have all but disappeared while red forest hog, sitatunga, and yellow-backed duiker densities far exceed those of other recorded large mammal species. Primate densities were also remarkably low. Neither survey provided evidence which suggests that Pennant’s red colobus, Piolocolobus pennanti bouvieri, continues to survive in the region as was suggested by some primatologists. The census and socio-economic study portrayed village populations which rely nearly entirely on natural resources for sustenance and income generation. The lack of natural resource protection and enforcement measures coupled with rampant human immigration and enhanced accessibility to insatiable bushmeat markets provided by a two lane road, appears to have resulted in over-exploitation of limited resources. Efforts to preserve this ecologically unique mosaic of forest and savanna habitat must provide alternatives to resource “mining” and implement measures to promote a local will to maintain the integrity of the rapidly decaying resource.