WWF's Approved Projects
in Gabon

WWF in Gabon

With a population of barely a million and a size roughly that of the United Kingdom, Gabon is a relatively wealthy country in a largely underdeveloped, poor part of the world. However, the riches of this African country don't only lie in its financial worth.

Gabon has substantial biological wealth too--in its thick tropical forests that still cover a staggering 85 per cent of the country, its lagoons, mangroves, coastal areas, and grasslands. In the words of WWF's Tom McShane , the country is probably one of the few remaining places on the African continent where elephants can be found swimming in the ocean and gorillas lying around on the beaches.

In fact, there are believed to be 35,000 lowland gorillas and 64,000 chimpanzees living in Gabon's forests--higher than previous population estimates for the whole of Africa. Moreover, a new primate species, Cercopithecus solatus, was discovered in central Gabon in 1984.

The country's elephant population is estimated to be equally healthy--around 50,000 elephants live here. And they are among the least disturbed in the continent. The marine fauna is no less rich. A recent study discovered 10 new Mormyridae species--a family of fish that perceives its environment with electronic sensors. Four of these are endemic to Gabon.

The country's flora too is among the richest in tropical Africa. Of the 8,000 plant species known to exist here, 19 per cent are found nowhere else. Many among them have special advantages--the Artabotrys vine, for example, is used to treat Parkinson's disease. The list does not end there; almost every expedition to inventory vegetation in the country discovers new plant species on a regular basis.

However, as elsewhere around the world, economic development is casting its shadow on this biological treasure. This is largely because Gabon's economy is based mainly on the extraction of mineral resources such as oil, manganese, uranium, gold and forest resources. Selective logging, unsustainable means of development, the traffic of supply lorries, and the increase in human population have also led to problems.

Nor have the animals been spared. Poaching and the illegal transport of bush meat, by road or rail, flourish. In fact, at least four tons of bush meat (that is, the flesh of duiker, monkey etc) are smuggled out to the capital from forest areas each month.

It was the realization of this potential disaster that prompted the Gabonese government to invite WWF to the country in 1985. Its specific purpose was to review the country's protected areas system. During the review, the most urgent requirements identified were the need to halt logging activities and to improve the management of existing reserves. As a follow-up to the survey, WWF funded research on the effects of logging on the lowland gorilla, chimpanzee and forest elephant in the LopΘ Reserve in central Gabon.

Eleven years later, government ministries are working closely with WWF in its conservation efforts. The organization signed an official convention with the Gabonese government in 1991, the first international environmental group to do so. The government and WWF collaborated to draw up a five-year environmental conservation programme. The focus is on institutional support, education and public awareness building on the environment; protected areas development and management; training; and research and monitoring.

Besides this, WWF provides technical and material support to the government's Wildlife Department. It also helps it select biologically important sites for future conservation action--though the country has five faunal reserves, it does not have any national parks. The Ministry of National Education is also working with WWF to set up a nation-wide environmental education and public awareness programme.

WWF support has strengthened the Wildlife Department's ability to manage protected areas and enabled it to purchase vehicles and equipment for mobile anti-poaching units. It has also greatly enhanced the department's stature within the government, helping it to establish environment as a policy issue. The Gabonese Environment Ministry now actively seeks WWF's technical advice on environmental issues.

Recently, the organization extended this spirit of cooperation further by sponsoring the Wildlife Department's first national training session on incorporating wildlife management and environmental issues with forest management. WWF continues to support scholarships for Gabonese students attending the French-speaking Wildlife College in Garoua, Cameroon.

It has also funded research into the country's ecology and the behaviour of gorillas and chimpanzees. And has carried out studies on the biological cycles of leaf, flower and fruit production in 89 tree species in an attempt to better understand how apes utilize their environment.

Other ministries are now contributing to WWF's efforts. The ministries of water and forests and national education are currently setting up a rural environmental education programme in three regions of Gabon with the help of WWF's education team. As McShane says: ''WWF's focus is the foundation of long-term conservation.'' An issue of importance not only to Gabon but to the entire world.