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Bush Meat
by Frans van der Helm
In parts of Cameroon's south-east forest region, wildlife is being killed at an alarming rate. WWF is working to change this situation.
Cameroon is eating its wildlife. The poaching and trading of bush meat - the local name for game - is big business, and involves all layers of society. From reptiles to duikers and primates, almost all kinds of species are being hunted regardless of their conservation status. Macabre rows of gorilla skulls, for sale in Yaounde - Cameroon's second town - and heaps of roasted monkeys and antelope parts, illustrate beyond doubt that things are now out of hand.
Hunting has always been an important activity in this central African country and bush meat has a prominent place on the local menu. Traditionally, hunting was small-scale and sustainable, never exceeding the carrying capacity of the forest. But today, bush meat rates second to timber as an important forest product. Much of the poaching, even in protected areas, is for the supply of huge city markets.
In south-east Cameroon, numerous poaching camps border the logging roads. Local settlements, not only of indigenous Bantu and Baka, but also of recent immigrants, regard virtually all ground-dwelling mammals as good food. Mathias Heinze of GTZ, a German technical agency, knows the area well - and he is shocked by the amount of meat available in these camps.
"The scope of the problem is enormous. Ask for a gorilla or chimpanzee and you'll get it." He sees no reason to assume that the protected status of nature reserves would save them. "We'll have to hurry if we want to change this situation" he adds.
Often, logging companies and their agencies assist in this trade - their workers rely on bush meat since no other food is supplied. So logging roads boost the bush meat trade, providing the means to get hunters into remote areas of the forest. And the trucks are an efficient means of transport.
Although local people are engaged in poaching, new settlers in the area have a much greater impact, says Atanga Ekobo of WWF. "Many Cameroonians from other regions are involved and poachers from the Congo are also active here. They cross the Dja river, the unpatrolled international boundary. And live animals - young gorillas and chimpanzees - as well as ivory, leopard and bongo-skins, constitute products of high market value, too."
Commercial hunting of bush meat is about ten times greater than that done by local subsistence hunters. Brush-tailed porcupines, pangolins and all ground-dwelling mammals, from giant forest hogs to mongoose, are collected. >Forest antelopes, especially duikers, are taken in the highest numbers. An immigrant poacher in a worn-out Beverly Hills T-shirt, says that 'les petites biches' - the duikers - are economically the most important. "We sell roasted halves for about 1,500 francs (£1.60). Once a week, traders come to collect and to supply us with food. When we start to catch less, we move on to a new camp."
Most poaching is done by setting snares. Traditionally, Bantu used natural fibres for making these traps, so there used to be a limit to the size and strength of an animal that could be caught: a trapped buffalo or gorilla, for example, could escape easily and unharmed. But all that has changed: a straightforward bicycle cable and a few steel wires kill wildlife nowadays.
These snares indiscriminately catch and maim many fully protected species such as gorillas, leopards and bongos. Poachers place them along tracks that penetrate deep into the forest. Most will tell you they are using about 80 traps; some up to 200. Daily inspection has become impossible because one tour into the forest can take two or three days, sometimes even a week.
Guns are also used, mainly for special events such as elephant hunts.
But if the animals are trapped, then so, in a way, are the local people. First they saw parts of their forests disappear, followed by the arrival of poachers who made subsistence hunting more difficult. Today, local Bantu and Baka also participate in commercialisation of bush meat. And an old taboo has been broken. Many Baka don't like to eat apes, but even so, they catch and sell them.
The bush meat trade has been disastrous for gorillas. According to a recent estimate, only 40,000 western lowland gorillas are left in the wild. As well as poaching, they are also threatened by intensive logging, which destroys their habitat. But they are surviving and may even thrive in remaining secondary forest with lush ground vegetation. Some researchers think bush meat hunting is now the most significant threat to Africa's great apes.
More and more poachers are now using guns, with terrible consequences for wildlife. It's feared that almost all animals will vanish, including arboreal species such as monkeys. It has already happened along the old Yokadouma-Mouloundou road in the south-east, where wildlife has been virtually wiped out.
Staff from the Cameroon Ministry of the Environment and Forests (MINEF) within the area feel isolated. Legislation is not enforced, even within the proposed reserves. Setting snares, for instance, is forbidden by law. "We would like to intervene" says Lobeke co-ordinator Etienne Nlegue. "Unbelievable amounts of bush meat are traded here, day in, day out. There is no way this can be sustainable. But guards haven't been trained yet."
Even so, the local director of wildlife says he sees good prospects for conservation through an integrated approach that involves all people living in the area. "But we don't have the means, because of the structural adjustment programme that has been imposed on us by the World Bank."
It's a familiar theme within Cameroon politics, although conservation awareness is slowly growing on a national level.
Andrew Allo Allo, head of field projects in Cameroon, works closely with MINEF, but knows that many people still don't see the need for conservation. There is, he declares, an urgent need for change.
"We are recruiting guards ourselves now, and hope to be able to start patrolling in April or May this year. They will be government personnel, but paid by WWF."
In order to control the trade and provide alternatives, it is necessary to understand the dynamics and economics of the trade. A special WWF project is now assessing the pressures of bush meat hunting and trade on wildlife. In 1996, a start was made surveying the species that are being traded. The project is further investigating the volume of this trade and its impact on animal populations. There is, of course, a long way to go - but at least a start has been made.
© WWF
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