The attribution of community forests to local populations has emerged as a new participative management system of plant biodiversity in Cameroon. Further to the intensification of anthropogenic activities in these forests, the logging impact on this biodiversity remains poorly known. This study was conducted in two different community forests located in the Kompia and Nkolenyeng villages, respectively. It aims to provide information on the state of the flora and plant structure of the community forests subjected to logging activities. Floristic inventories were carried out in nine biotope types using the variable-area sampling method. A total of 2772 individuals with dbh ≥ 10 cm were recorded in the community forests. In the whole biotopes, the species richness ranges from 19 to 98 species, the Shannon diversity index from 3.63 to 5.99 and the Pielou evenness from 0.65 to 0.93. The density of trees ranges from 73 ± 27 to 661 ± 119 stems ha-1 , the basal area from 15.68 ± 13.14 to 70.05 ± 28.76 m² ha-1 , the mean diameter of 18.85 ± 4.80 to 57.39 ± 20.70 cm and the canopy height from 12.26 ± 1.22 to 25.18 ± 1.02 m, on the average between biotopes. The two community forests showed decrease in tree density, a proliferation of the pioneer species, increase of small-diameter light-demanding species, a scarcity of large-diameter trees, and lowering of canopy height. These changes could compromise the sustainable management of these forests and their ability to ensure long-term local development. The large number of useful species identified in the two community forests is a reason to reinforce the preservation and management measures of the plant biodiversity of these forest areas.
To contribute to the sustainable management of the plant formations of Martap, it was a question for us to first of all know its composition and structure of before elaborating a suitable development plan. A floristic inventory in five plant formations (protected savannah, wooded savannah, exploited savannah, pasture and gallery forest) of 15 ha was carried out in four villages (Bawa, Maloua, Lissey-Mayo and Marko) of the said Martap Council. Over an area of 15 ha, 6105 individuals were collected belonging to 31 species, 21 genera and 15 families. The most represented species are the following: Daniellia oliveri, Terminalia macroptera, Annona senegalensis, Piliostigma thonningii, Ficus glumosa, Zanthoxylum xanthozyloides, Harungana madagascarensis, Syzygium guineense var. macrocarpum, Hymenocardia acida, Terminalia glaucescens, Lophira lanceolata, Sarcocephalus latipholius, Combretum nigricans. The horizontal distribution of the vegetation represented in class shows that the first class (]0-1[) is the one with the largest number of individuals (2844 individuals). The Shannon index varies from 1.74 to 2.26 bit; while Pielou’s fairness varies rather from 0.13 to 0.78. It is clear that overexploitation is real, it is amplified by population growth in this locality, and this results in the presence of a large number of small species. It would be wiser in the days to come to develop successful projects within the planning framework to meet this challenge.
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