Community forests as beacons of conservation: Enabling local populations monitor their biodiversity

Abstract

Habitat fragmentation is one of the main threats to biodiversity in Africa. In this article, we highlight the importance of conserving the Guinean forests of West Africa, which are rich in biodiversity and endemism but threatened by habitat loss, degradation and fragmentation. The size of forest patches is critical, with larger fragments containing more species than smaller ones. The protection of intact, dense forest patches is vital for any conservation strategy in West Africa, but improving the management of forests that are already used for logging and hunting is also essential. Community forests (CFs) can play a crucial role in conservation, especially if there is a substantial network that can promote ecological connectivity. However, biomonitoring in CFs remains a challenge due to inadequate resources. By developing standardised, easy‐to‐apply and inexpensive methods for biomonitoring, communities can be involved in biomonitoring instead of relying solely on scientists and expensive equipment. We present a monitoring framework here where we suggest local communities should become the main agents for biomonitoring in their own forests; we highlight a five‐step scheme. The importance of the various CFs in terms of conservation should be made through a combination of accurate, standardised face‐to‐face interviews with selected persons in the target communities and biomonitoring be based on the RAPELD scheme. The latter will be implemented after specifically training local ‘wise’ persons. We are proposing a kind of ‘citizen science’ scheme, applied to enhance the ability of local communities to monitor their own biodiversity.

Pine plantations and native forest fragments adjacent to intact forests provide surrogate habitats for birds in an Afrotropical forest landscape

“…and (3) What is the influence of habitat characteristics in the forest fragment and intact forest on bird species composition, diversity and functional traits? Overall, this study contributes knowledge about the conservation value of plantation forests and forest fragments from the perspective of bird assemblages (Fa & Luiselli, 2023).…”

“…Given the increasing proportion of forest fragments and plantation forests in the tropics (FAO, 2020;Law et al, 2017), it is critical to understand their role in complementing the remaining intact forests in conserving biodiversity (Fa & Luiselli, 2023). This can guide their prudent management and incorporation into national and global habitat management strategies (Fischer & Lindenmayer, 2007).…”

Ecological networks as planning tools for African fragmented landscapes: Overcoming weaknesses for an effective connectivity conservation

“…In this regard, EN plans should be considered a sum of several CC local projects, each one focused on specific threats originating HF. Communicate and involve people : Finally, to be effective, an EN plan should be largely communicated (Beunen & Hagens, 2009). A great (conservation) revolution should be to involve all the local populations in a participatory approach (Fa & Luiselli, 2023; Tiemann & Siebert, 2009). The involvement should have the aim of increasing awareness of the great biodiversity values present in ecosystems where people live (including remnant and degraded habitat patches) to start a progressive process of sustainable management by local people.…”

“…People are already active in the conservation of some habitat fragments that cover a historical value and a traditional role (e.g., sacred groves protected by local people for cultural or religious reasons; Alohou et al, 2017). Following these examples, local communities themselves could autonomously manage local landscapes, contrasting anthropogenic threats and using a citizen‐management perspective (Battisti & Cerfolli, 2021; Fa & Luiselli, 2023). In a context such as the African one, this would also make it possible to overcome the top–down approach of many EN designs which are traditionally defined by Public Agencies over vast areas, instead launching many local, bottom–up projects involving people for participation (Luiselli, 2023).…”

Palms predict the distributions of birds in southwestern Amazônia and are potential surrogates for land-use planning by local communities

“…The inclusion of local people in monitoring biodiversity could provide an inexpensive and potentially large labour force(Fa and Luiselli 2023). Initiatives that consider collaborative sampling by amateurs could be used in conjunction with traditional methods to evaluate the distribution of endangered species(Adamantopoulou et al 2023) and conservation planning(Soteropoulos et al 2021).…”