PARKS parksjournal.com 2017 Vol 23.1 39 PATTERNS OF FOREST LOSS IN ONE OF AFRICA’S LAST REMAINING WILDERNESS AREAS: NIASSA NATIONAL RESERVE (NORTHERN MOZAMBIQUE) James R. Allan1*, Falk Grossmann2,3, Rob Craig2, Alastair Nelson2, Joseph Maina4, Kathleen Flower2, James Bampton2, Jean-Bapste Deffontaines2, Cornelio Miguel5, Baldeu Araquechande5 and James E.M. Watson1,6 * Corresponding author:
[email protected] 1 School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Queensland, Australia 2 Wildlife Conservaon Society, Mozambique Country Programme, Maputo, Mozambique 3 Faculty of Geo-Informaon Science and Earth Observaon, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands 4 Department of Environmental Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia 5 Naonal Administraon of Conservaon Areas, Ministry of Land, Environment and Rural Development, Mozambique 6 Wildlife Conservaon Society, Global Conservaon Programme, Bronx, NY, USA ABSTRACT Niassa National Reserve (NNR) supports Mozambique’s largest populations of endangered fauna and sustains the livelihoods of > 40,000 people who utilise its natural resources. Accurately monitoring fine- scale spatial and temporal trends in land-use and tree-cover is increasingly used for monitoring the ecological state of conservation areas. Here we provide essential information on land-use changes in NNR to support ongoing conservation efforts in the region. We examined patterns of forest and woodland loss in NNR between 2001 and 2014 using high resolution maps of global tree-cover change, and compared this with changes in the wider region. We found that NNR lost 108 km2 of forest (0.9 per cent of its 11,970 km2 aggregated forest extent), with the majority (89 km2) of forest loss occurring due to expanding agriculture around settlements and along main roads.