Phytodiversity and Vulnerability of Protected Areas in Burkina Faso: Case of Péni Classified Forest

Abstract

Protected areas contain most of Burkina Faso's plant biodiversity which confer different benefits for the communities. However, the composition of some of them remains unknown. In a context of overexploitation and climate change, it is important to have a detailed knowledge of the vegetation of forests that have not been studied, such as Péni Classified Forest (PCF) to develop better preservation protocols. The aim of this study is to contribute to the knowledge of the flora of Burkina Faso. Phytosociological surveys were carried out in 213 plots, have identified 475 species distributed in 321 genera and 87 families. We identified during this study 201 woody species representing 38% of the woody flora of Burkina Faso. 64% of this flora is confined to shrub savannahs and 61% to tree savannahs. Among the vegetation units, shrub savannahs and tree savannahs have respectively 56.21% and 44.67% of very rare species. Poaceae (11.90%), Fabaceae-Faboideae (11.27%) and Rubiaceae (6.26%) are the most dominant families. The dominant biological types of the flora are phanerophytes (42.32%) and therophytes (30.32%), and Sudanian species (20.63%