Biodiversity and local priorities in a community near the Ivindo National Park Makokou, Gabon Report Marieke Sassen and Meilinda Wan Biodiversity and local priorities in a community near the Ivindo National Park Makokou, Gabon Report Marieke Sassen and Meilinda Wan 2006 Research mission carried out within the framework of the management and development of the Ivindo National Park (Ogooué-Ivindo/Gabon) 23 March - 02 May 2005 Project IRET/CENAREST and CIFOR: Réhabilitation et Re-dynamisation de la Station de Recherche de l’IRET à Makokou/Ipassa », Composante II du Programme Sectoriel de Valorisation des Aires Protégées au Gabon PSVAP, 8ACP GA 009 - FED Table of contents Abbreviations .............................................................................................................v Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................vi Summary...................................................................................................................vii 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................1 1.1. Context of the study .....................................................................................1 1.2. Site ...............................................................................................................4 1.3. People ..........................................................................................................5 2. Methods...............................................................................................................5 2.1. Village based activities .................................................................................6 2.2. Field-based activities....................................................................................7 2.3. Local ownership ...........................................................................................9 3. People, livelihoods, aspirations and the environment ...................................9 3.1. Loaloa, people and livelihoods .....................................................................9 3.2. History, culture and traditions.....................................................................12 3.3. Attitudes to researchers, participation in the survey...................................13 3.4. Aspirations and attitudes ............................................................................14 3.5. Local views of forest functions and threats to the environment..................16 3.6. Traditional regulations and taboos in the use of land and forest................17 3.7. Community mapping ..................................................................................18 4. Results of the field survey...............................................................................21 4.1. Plot selection and distribution.....................................................................21 4.2. Botanical summary.....................................................................................24 4.3. Forest structure ..........................................................................................25 4.4. Ethnobotany ...............................................................................................26 5. Local perceptions of the landscape ...............................................................33 5.1. Importance of land and forest types ...........................................................33 5.2. Importance of the forest in time..................................................................35 6. Local perceptions of resources......................................................................37 6.1. Importance of different sources of products ...............................................37 6.2. Importance of forest plant and animal species and their uses ...................37 7. Linking conservation and people’s livelihoods ............................................41 8. Conclusions......................................................................................................44 References................................................................................................................46 Appendices...............................................................................................................48 Appendix 1: Team members ..................................................................................48 Appendix 2: Work schedule (in French) .................................................................49 Appendix 3: Plant and animal resources and their location (in French) .................51 Appendix 4: Total numbers of species recorded in each plot.................................54 Appendix 5: Number of non tree species recorded in each plot by life form ..........55 Appendix 6: Complete list of the use values of all recorded species and the land type they were found in ......................................................................56 Appendix 7: List of species that are unique for a specific use ...............................72 Appendix 8: Terms of reference (in French)...........................................................74 ii List of figures Figure 1.1. Map of Gabon and its national parks, based on data from the Institut National de Cartographie du Gabon (2004) ..............................................2 Figure 1.2. Location of Loaloa, the Ivindo National Park and the Ivindo River, based on data from the Institut National de Cartographie du Gabon (2004)........3 Figure 2.1. Variable area sample unit for trees (Sheil et al. 2003)...............................8 Figure 3.1. Fragment of the map made by men from Loaloa.....................................20 Figure 3.2. Map of the village made by women from Loaloa .....................................20 Figure 4.1. Location of sample plots. Base map based on data from the Institut National de Cartographie du Gabon (2004) ............................................22 Figure 4.2. Number of useful species against species diversity in all plots for tree and non-tree species ......................................................................................28 Figure 4.3. Number of useful species per value class for trees .................................29 Figure 4.4. Number of useful species per value class for non-trees ..........................29 Figure 6.1. The importance of sources of animal and plant products for people from Loaloa. Mean of two groups (men and women, all ages)........................37 List of tables Table 2.1. Data collection techniques used in the village based activities...................7 Table 3.1. Sources of income and livelihoods in Loaloa ............................................10 Table 3.2. Local aspirations, attitudes and threats to the community ........................15 Table 3.3. Local views of forest functions and threats to the environment ................16 Table 3.4. Restrictions and taboos on the use of land and forest ..............................17 Table 3.5. River system nomenclature.......................................................................18 Table 3.6. Land types as perceived by the community ..............................................19 Table 4.1. Site description of each sample plot .........................................................22 Table 4.2. Summary of all plants recorded from the 30 plots.....................................24 Table 4.3. Mean numbers of species recorded per land type ....................................25 Table 4.4. Mean numbers of non-trees species recorded in each land type by life- form...........................................................................................................25 Table 4.5. Forest structural characteristics ................................................................26 Table 4.6. Number and percentage of useful tree and non-tree species per plot by land type ...................................................................................................27 Table 4.7. Distribution of the numbers of useful tree species per plot by use category .................................................................................................................30 Table 4.8. Distribution of the numbers of useful non-tree species per plot by use category....................................................................................................31 Table 4.9. Plant species which have four and more uses..........................................32 Table 4.10. General use categories and number of exclusive species within those categories ................................................................................................33 Table 5.1. PDM exercise summary. Scores and score means per land and forest type .................................................................................................................33 Table 5.2. PDM exercise summary. Means per land and forest type, per use-class, for all groups .............................................................................................34 iii Table 5.3. PDM exercise summary for the past, present and future importance of forest. Mean of two groups........................................................................36 Table 6.1. Example portion of PDM of plant and animal species importance for food by women of Loaloa ..................................................................................38 Table