page_title: Bushmeat
section_title: In Africa
hierarchical_section_title: Bushmeat / Affected wildlife species / In Africa
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Préparation et cuisson du pangolin au Cameroun (Ngog-Mapubi, région du Centre)
context_page_description: Bushmeat is meat from wildlife species that are hunted for human consumption. Bushmeat represents
  a primary source of animal protein and a cash-earning commodity for inhabitants of humid tropical forest regions in Africa, Asia and South America.
  Bushmeat is an important food resource for poor people, particularly in rural areas.
  The numbers of animals killed and traded as bushmeat in the 1990s in West and Central Africa were thought to be unsustainable.
  By 2005, commercial harvesting and trading of bushmeat was considered a threat to biodiversity. As of 2016, 301 terrestrial mammals were threatened with extinction due to hunting for bushmeat including primates, even-toed ungulates, bats, diprotodont marsupials, rodents and carnivores occurring in developing countries.
  Bushmeat provides increased opportunity for transmission of several zoonotic viruses from animal hosts to humans, such as Ebolavirus, HIV, and various species of coronavirus including SARS-CoV-2.
context_section_description: The volume of the bushmeat trade in West and Central Africa was estimated at 1-5 million tonnes per year at the turn of the 21st century. In 2002, it was estimated that 24 species weighing more than 10 kg (22 lb) contribute 177.7 kg/km² (1,015 lb/sq mi) of meat per year to the bushmeat extracted in the Congo Basin. Species weighing more than 10 kg (22 lb) were estimated to contribute 35.4 kg/km² (202 lb/sq mi). Bushmeat extraction in the Amazon rainforest was estimated to be much lower, at 3.6 kg/km² (21 lb/sq mi) in the case of species weighing more than 10 kg and 0.6 kg/km² (3.4 lb/sq mi) in the case of species weighing less than 10 kg.
  Based on these estimates, a total of 2,200,000 t (2,200,000 long tons; 2,400,000 short tons) bushmeat is extracted in the Congo Basin per year, ranging from 12,937.737 t (12,733.405 long tons; 14,261.414 short tons) in Equatorial Guinea to 1,665,972.491 t (1,639,661.000 long tons; 1,836,420.321 short tons) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
  The 301 mammal species threatened by hunting for bushmeat comprise 126 primates, 65 even-toed ungulates, 27 bats, 26 diprotodont marsupials, 21 rodents, 12 carnivores and all pangolin species.
  Primate species offered fresh and smoked in 2009 at a wildlife market by Liberia's Cavally River included chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes), Diana monkey (Cercopithecus diana), putty-nosed monkey (C. nictitans), lesser spot-nosed monkey (C. petaurista), Campbell's mona monkey (C. campbelli), sooty mangabey (Cercocebus atys), king colobus (Colobus polykomos), olive colobus (Procolobus verus), western red colobus (P. badius). Duiker species constituted more than half of the total 723 animals offered.
  In 2012, the bushmeat trade was surveyed in three villages in the Sassandra Department, Ivory Coast. During six months, nine restaurants received 376 mammals and eight reptiles, including dwarf crocodile (Osteolaemus tetraspis), harnessed bushbuck (Tragelaphus scriptus), Maxwell's duiker (Philantomba maxwellii), bay duiker (Cephalophus dorsalis), Campbell's mona monkey, lesser spot-nosed monkey, potto (Perodicticus potto), tree pangolin (Phataginus tricuspis), long-tailed pangolin (P. tetradactyla), African brush-tailed porcupine (Atherurus africanus), giant pouched rat (Cricetomys gambianus), greater cane rat (Thryonomys swinderianus), striped ground squirrel (Xerus erythropus) and western tree hyrax (Dendrohyrax dorsalis).
  About 128,400 straw-coloured fruit bats (Eidolon helvum) were estimated in 2011 to be traded as bushmeat every year in four cities in southern Ghana.
  In 2006, it was estimated that about 1,437,458 animals are killed every year in the Nigerian and Cameroon parts of the Cross-Sanaga-Bioko coastal forests, including about 43,880 Emin's pouched rats (Cricetomys emini), 41,800 tree pangolins, 39,700 putty-nosed monkeys, 22,500 Mona monkeys (Cercopithecus mona), 3,500 red-eared guenons (C. erythrotis), 20,300 drills (Mandrillus leucophaeus), 15,300 African civets (Civettictis civetta), 11,900 common kusimanses (Crossarchus obscurus), more than 7,600 African palm civets (Nandinia binotata), 26,760 Nile monitors (Varanus niloticus) and 410 African forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis).
  Between 1983 and 2002, the Gabon populations of western gorilla (Gorilla gorilla) and common  chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) were estimated to have declined by 56%. This decline was primarily caused by the commercial hunting, which was facilitated by the extended infrastructure for logging purposes.Marsh mongoose (Atilax paludinosus) and long-nosed mongoose (Herpestes naso) are the most numerous small carnivores offered in rural bushmeat markets in the country.
  In the late 1990s, fresh and smoked bonobo (Pan paniscus) carcasses were observed in Basankusu in the Province of Équateur in the Congo Basin.
  The main species killed by bushmeat hunters in Tanzania's Katavi-Rukwa Region include impala (Aepyceros melampus), common duiker (Sylvicapra grimmia), warthog (Phacocherus africanus), Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer), harnessed bushbuck, red river hog (Potamochoerus porcus) and 
caption: Pangolin in Cameroon
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