KORUP NATIONAL PARK




o an industrialist, commercial logger, or planter, Cameroon's Korup Forest is only marginally interesting. Access to the terrain is difficult, the area has high rainfall and low sunshine. The land is poor in minerals, it has neither gold nor oil, and the soil is acidic and not suitable for many crops.

But, precisely because the land is considered so commercially poor, its remarkable natural wealth has been allowed to flourish. Located in south-western Cameroon, Korup's rainforest has the largest number of plant species in Africa, including a vine that has shown potential as treatment for HIV infection.

In order to preserve one of Africa's greatest natural treasures, WWF urged the Cameroon government to upgrade the status of the Korup area from forest reserve to national park. In 1986, Korup was decreed Cameroon's first, and currently only, rainforest national park.

But declaring the area a national park was only the first step. In order to protect the rainforest, WWF had to gain the trust and cooperation of the Korup people. There are 29 villages in the Korup area, six of them inside the park. For hundreds of years, the Korup people have lived in or around the rainforest, and a great part of their culture is entwined with it. For example, all the fibres and dyes used in making the costumes of the Ekpe, or Leopard Spirit cult, come from the forest.

The fundamental idea behind the Korup National Park project was to protect the biologically important forest through its integration into the local socio­economic fabric. Today, it is one of WWF's best known and largest projects.

The project covers an area of 4,500sq km which includes the Korup National Park, three forest reserves of Nta­Ali, Rumpi Hills and Ejagham, and park buffer zones for agriculture, watershed protection and hunting. The project has five sub­programmes including management, park development, environmental education, and training.

The Korup project has been jointly funded by WWF­UK and the Overseas Development Administration (ODA) of the British Government. German Technical Assistance (GTZ) also contributes to the funding and personnel complement under an ongoing technical assistance agreement with the government of Cameroon. The project was, moreover, supported until June 1993 by Wildlife Conservation International (now Wildlife Conservation Society) to conduct research in the Korup Forest. This responsibility was later assumed by WWF.

The development of the actual park in terms of its infrastructure­­delimitation of boundaries, creation of nature trails, building of surveillance posts and camp sites­­was achieved fairly easily. The infrastructure for the Support Zone Integrated Development programmes such as bridges, wells, dispensaries, schools, community halls and access roads came much later.

The biggest problem facing this WWF project is the threat to wildlife from hunting activities not only by the villagers but by hunters from all over the country. One of WWF's primary goals has been to provide the villagers with alternative sources of income so that the pressure to hunt and poach is eased.

To discourage poaching and strengthen the park's links with the local communities, WWF recently employed local men to act as park guards. Villagers are now farming fertile lands outside the park. WWF has provided dozens of young men the opportunity to learn new skills by offering fellowships for carpentry and masonry at local technical colleges.

In order to promote centres of interest outside the park, WWF solicited funding from the European Community to build a road that would link Korup villages to the neighbouring town of Mundemba. Some of the money was also to be used for resettlement work. Additional assistance to build schools, bridges and dispensaries throughout the area came from the US Department of Defense.

Poverty is a big problem. In order to improve local living standards, WWF is setting up women's village cooperatives and holding workshops on market gardening, handicrafts such as soap-making, and teaching the people how to raise crops and livestock successfully in the forest. Community farms have been established, and tree nurseries set up to ease the pressure on the park's trees.

So far the results have been encouraging. Hunting by villagers in the northern section of the park has declined, and hunters from other areas have been asked to leave. Many villagers have voluntarily surrendered their weapons, while others living inside the park have accepted relocation to areas outside the reserve. WWF continues to support the development of these villages.

One significant achievement of the Korup Project is the discovery of the plant, Ancistrocladus korupensis (Ancistrocladaceae). This plant (found in Korup and the adjacent area of the Oban National Park in Nigeria) was one of the two plants identified during a massive screening campaign by the US National Cancer Institute as being active against the human HIV in vitro. The National Cancer Institute has supplied research funding for this anti­AIDS plant. If it does prove medically useful, its cultivation could provide a valuable source of income for local farmers as well as contribute significantly to world health.




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Copyright 1996, The World Wide Fund For Nature