Foreword FOREWORD This book is based on the efforts of very many people. Its purpose is to support the efforts of the Government of Guyana to develop a National Protected Areas System in the country. Much of the information presented in the book is technical and scientific in nature, while some chapters synthesise what little is known on a particular subject. For those interested in the main objectives and results of the book reading Chapters 1 and 12 may suffice. Some basic information on Guyana’s plant diversity is presented in Chapter 2. The other Chapters deal with certain aspects of plant diversity or typical regions in Guyana. In the first place I would like to thank all the persons who contributed in raw data and words to this book. Their names can be found on top of the chapters and in the list of contributors below. Without their help this book would never have been written. On their and my behalf I would like to thank all those who have contributed otherwise to the successful completion of this book. Thanks to the Guyana Natural Resources Agency, the Office of the President, the National Agricultural Research Institute, the University of Guyana, the Guyana Forestry Commission for their continuing support to the Tropenbos-Guyana Programme. Thanks to the Environmental Protection Agency, the Guyana Forestry Commission and the Iwokrama International Centre for the Rainforest Conservation and Development for their support and co-operation through the several workshops we had in Guyana. Thanks also to the Tropenbos-Guyana Programme, notably George Walcott and Roderick Zagt, the Tropenbos Foundation and the Utrecht University, notably Thijs Pons and Wim Dijkman, for the support in Guyana and the Netherlands. Thanks to all our colleagues who have produced and/or published materials that we needed so much to carry out the analyses, especially Roger de Milde, Derk de Groot and Ivan Welch for leaving behind such important forest inventory data, the Guyana Forestry Commission for permission to utilise these old and valuable datasets (Chapters 4, 5, 8), Romaine Too-Kong for the data input (Chapter 5) and Gavin Nicol to come up with even more data (Chapter 5), Barama and the Edinburgh Centre for Tropical Forests for raw plot data (Chapters 3, 8), CELOS, Suriname, for data of the Suriname FAO forest inventory (Chapter 4) and Bernard Fleury and Jean-Jaques de Granville for forest inventory data and literature of French Guiana (Chapter 4). Thanks to Scott Mori (NYBG), Carol Kellof, Vicky Funk and Tom Hollowell of the Smithsonian Institution, Tinde van Andel and Claude Persaud for databases with specimen data (Chapter 6), André Chanderballi, Tobi Pennington, Mark Johnston, Scott Mori, Susan Fraser and Jan Lindeman for help with collection lists (Chapter 6), Ben ter Welle, Paul Maas, Ara Görts-van Rijn for botanical collection data 1 Plant Diversity in Guyana (Chapters 6 and 11), the Hydrometh Department for meteorological data (Chapters 5, 6 and 7). Thanks to Nazeem Nasir of the Centre for the Study of Biodiversity for teaching how to link databases to Arcview and Joselyn Grimond of Iwokrama for digitising map data and other GIS tasks. Many persons reviewed chapters. Thanks to (in alphabetical order): Tinde van Andel (Chapter 6), David Cassells (Chapters 5, 6), Wim Dijkman (Chapter 6), Renske Ek (Ch apter 6), Nancy Garwood (Chapter 7), Jaboury Ghazoul (Chapter 7), David Hammond (Chapters 5, 6), Otto Huber (Chapter 10), Maarten Kappelle (Chapter 7), Valerie Kapos (Chapter 7), Paul Maas (Chapter 6), Scott Mori (Chapter 5), David Newbery (Chapter 3), Mark van Nieuwstadt (Chapter 3), Thijs Pons (Chapters 3 and 8), Mark Ritchie (Chapter 7), Kalle Ruokolainen (Chapter 3) Doug Sheil (Chapter 7), John Terborgh (Chapter 3), René Verburg (Chapter 3), George Walcott (Chapter 5), Graham Watkins (Chapter 6), Ivan Welch (Chapter 5), Ben ter Welle (Chapter 11), Marinus Werger (Chapters 3, 7), Tim Whitmore (Chapter 7), and last but not least Roderick Zagt who read and commented on all chapters and is almost the editor of the editor. In the final stages Wanda Tammens did a thorough final check on lay-out and consistency of the book. Country base-maps were obtained from ESRI Inc. (http://www.esri.com), digital data was further obtained from the USGS EROS Data Center (http://edcdaac.usgs.gov/1KM/comp10d.html, NOAA AVHRR NDVI data, and http://edcdaac.usgs.gov/gtopo30/gtopo30.html, Digital terrain model) and NASDA (JERS-1 radar satellite data). The work that led to this book was financially supported by project “Conservation and Sustainable Use of Botanical Diversity in Guyana” (B7-6201/98-13/FOR) of the European Community, in Brussels, special thanks to Marjukka Mahonen of the Brussels Office and Maria Ralha of the EU Delegation in Guyana for their support in the start-up phase of the project. I sincerely hope I have not forgotten anyone who has contributed to the completion of this book. This is not intentional, my apologies if this has happened. This book was written to help in the planning of Protected Areas in Guyana. We hope that it fulfils a significant role in this process by generating the proper information and serving as an example for the analysis of other biological groups in Guyana. The readers and end-users will have to decide whether we have succeeded in reaching these goals. Hans ter Steege Utrecht April 28, 2000 2 Foreword List of contributors Alexandre Adalardo de Oliveira Joost Duivenvoorden Researcher/Lecturer Post Doc Researcher/Lecturer Universidade Paulista Hugo de Vries Laboratory Laboratorio Botânica University of Amsterdam Avenida Paulista 900 1o andar Kruislaan 318 São Paulo-SP, 01310-100 1098 SM Amsterdam Brazil The Netherlands Tinde van Andel Renske Ek PhD Fellow Post Doc Researcher Herbarium Division Herbarium Division Utrecht University Utrecht University Heidelberglaan 2 Heidelberglaan 2 PO Box 801.02 PO Box 801.02 3508 TC Utrecht 3508 TC Utrecht The Netherlands The Netherlands Per Bertilsson Jessica van Essen Executive Director Department of Comparative Environmental Protection Agency Physiology IAST Building Utrecht University UG Campus, Turkyen Padualaan 14 Greater Georgetown 3584 CH Utrecht Guyana The Netherlands Hernan Castellanos Peter van der Hout Researcher/Lecturer Senior Forester Universidad Nacional Experimental The Tropenbos-Guyana Programme de Guayana 12E Garnett street Calle Chile, Urbaniz Chilemex Campbellville Puerto Ordaz Georgetown Estado Bolívar Guyana Venezuela Marion Jansen-Jacobs Vijay Datadin Senior Lecturer Professional Development Fellow Herbarium Division Iwokrama International Centre for Utrecht University Rainforest Conservation and Heidelberglaan 2 Development PO Box 801.02 67 Bell Air, New Haven 3508 TC Utrecht Georgetown The Netherlands Guyana 3 Plant Diversity in Guyana David Hammond James Singh Principal Forest Ecologist Commissioner of Forests Iwokrama International Centre for Guyana Forestry Commission Rainforest Conservation and 1 Water street Development Kingston 67 Bell Air, New Haven Georgetown Georgetown Guyana Guyana Hans ter Steege Ramesh Lilwah Post Doc Researcher National Biodiversity Coordinator Department of Plant Ecology Environmental Protection Agency Utrecht University IAST Building PO Box 800.84 UG Campus, Turkyen 3504 TB Utrecht Greater Georgetown The Netherlands Guyana Raquel Thomas Paul Maas Post-Doctoral Fellow Professor of Plant Systematics Iwokrama International Centre for Herbarium Division Rainforest Conservation and Utrecht University Development Heidelberglaan 2 67 Bell Air PO Box 801.02 New Haven 3508 TC Utrecht Georgetown The Netherlands Guyana Scott Mori Roderick Zagt Curator of Botany Programme Team-Leader Institute of Systematic Botany The Tropenbos-Guyana Programme The New Botanical Garden 12E Garnett street Bronx, New York 10458-5126 Campbellville USA Georgetown Guyana Indarjit Ramdass Head of Department Gerold Zondervan Department of Biology Country Director University of Guyana WWF-Suriname Turkyen, Greater Georgetown Gravenstraat 63, Suite E Guyana Paramaribo Suriname Daniel Sabatier Botanist ORSTOM Laboratoire Botanique 163 Rue A. Broussonet 34000 Montpellier France 4 1 Introduction 1 INTRODUCTION Hans ter Steege, Per Bertilsson, Roderick Zagt The forest of Guyana, situated on the north-eastern edge of South America (Figure 2.1), has among the lowest deforestation rates of the world and these rates have been consistently low over the past decades (Lanly 1982, Luning 1987, Burgess 1993, Bryant et al. 1997). The low deforestation pressure on Guyana’s forest can be attributed to its very low population of 732,000 people, mostly concentrated in the coastal area. Guyana is at crossroads where utilisation, conservation and preservation of its forests are concerned. As a country with little industry but rich in natural resources, the Government of Guyana (GoG) has a need to exploit its natural resources for the development of the country and its people. The GoG has expressed its intention to do this in a sustainable manner (Chandarpal 1997, Ministry of Finance 1996). To effectuate this, large tracts of forest (approximately 4.5 million ha) have recently (1997) been designated as State Forest Lands and are available as exploratory concessions (no logging in the first two/three years). In addition, the granting of exploratory mining concessions is considered over large stretches of the country. In 1994 Guyana ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity. To effectuate its Environmental Policy the Government, through an Environmental Protection Act,