TRI Fellows Research Projects, 2005

Africa

  Jessica Albietz

Watershed Protection for Ecosystem Services in the Makira Forest Area, Madagascar: a preliminary biophysical assessment.

A zebu in a pasture — a primary cause of deforestation in the Makira Forest Area.

Madagascar’s farmers have been accused as being the “proximate agents” of land conversion in one of the world’s “hottest” biodiversity hotspots (Myers et al., 2000). The area around the Masoala Peninsula in Madagascar experiencessome of the highest population growth rates in the country, and therefore the area has also seen an increase in swidden or tavy agriculture, known more widely as slash-and-burn farming, the common land use characteristic for the production of the food staple, rice. This study analyzes the ecological impacts of land use on the water quality and quantity in the Andranomena River basin, part of the Antaninambalana River watershed.

Andre Marcel, President of the Marovovonana commune, scouting streams along the Andranomena river.

The Antaninambalana River, which bisects Makira running northwest to southeast, has experienced considerable human influence by way of land clearing, burning and cattle grazing. The most common reasons for deforestation in the Andranomena River basin are clearing for cattle pasture or mixed hillside cultivation, called savoka.

In order to study the relationship between land use and water quality and quantity, I established three long-term water monitoring stations on basins with different land use characteristics. In addition to measuring the land use characteristics, I analyzed each stream’s characteristics, measured the stream’s temperature, conductivity, sediment load, and discharge rate, and took water samples for further analysis of nitrogen and phosphorous concentrations. By linking forest protection in the watershed as a key element to maintaining or improving water quality and discharge, I hope to provide an ecosystem value for preserving the rapidly depleting forest resources.

 Oliver Enuoh

The Impact of Community Development Programs (as conservation strategy), on Biodiversity Conservation, Amongst Support Zone Communities of Cross River National Park, Nigeria

The Cross River National Park in South Eastern Nigeria has been, since its creation in 1989, implementing community development activities as its major conservation strategy. The rationale for the strategy is that development interventions will alleviate poverty, raise living standards and attract communal cooperation and support for biodiversity conservation. Several reviews on integrated conservation and development projects (ICDP) in parks and protected areas have offered critical appraisals and insights on ICDP effectiveness in enhancing the actualization of biodiversity conservation objectives.

This research study elucidates the perceptions by local communities in buffer zones of certain natural resources and use regimes, and their land use practices, in response to ICDP initiatives. Findings in the study demonstrate that ICDP in Cross River National Park (given its peculiar social context) can promote biodiversity conservation by reducing communal dependence on forest-based activities. The park’s ICDP activities should, however, be redesigned to focus more effectively on livelihood interventions and community based natural resources management, adhering to conservation objectives.

 Gonzalo Griebenow

Conflicts in the human-elephant border: case study in the BIA conservation area, assessing the conservation status

The Forest Elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis), a smaller and less studied species in comparison with its savannah counterpart, is an endangered species in Ghana. They are threatened by the continuous change in the land use and the illegal ivory trade. Thus, gaining insight into this species’ behaviour and studying the actual state of its conservation has been an increasing challenge in recent years. Unfortunately, there is not much detailed information on the animal, not only because it lives in remote and inaccessible areas but also because its natural ethology keeps it hidden in the forest.

My research was based in The Bia Conservation Area (BCA) located in the Western region of Ghana, a forest patch of 305.62 square kilometres in the transitional zone between moist evergreen and moist semi-deciduous forest types, holding the lasts portions of Guinean Rainforest in West Africa. Due to its importance as a conservation area, BCA was recognized as a Biosphere Reserve by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1984 - concentrating the biggest population of Forest Elephant in the country.

Information on elephant abundance and factors that affect abundance over time is essential to manage wild elephant populations effectively. There are a wide variety of techniques available to obtain estimates of elephant numbers. My study employed the dung pile counting methodology to assess the conservation status of the forest elephant in the BCA; abundance and age clusters data were collected to be correlated with the presence of human activities in order to determine the direct relation between farms and changes in the moving patterns of the elephants. The output of my investigation will be an attempt to clarify the conservation status of the forest elephant and the main causes of the human-elephant conflict in the BCA, in coordination with the National Strategy for Elephant Conservation of the Ghanaian Wildlife Service.

 Radhika Dave

Mangrove Forests in Baie D’Assassins, Madagascar: An Ecological Assessment and Documentation of Socioeconomic Importance to the Vezo Fishing Communities.

The Baie D’Assassins region of Southwest Madagascar is slated to be included within a planned Site de Conservation as part of Madagascar’s implementation of its “Durban Vision,” a three-fold increase in protected area coverage. (5th World Parks Congress, 2003). About eight traditional Vezo fishing communities are located around this bay and depend heavily upon the mangrove forests occurring in the area for subsistence. However, no data documenting the ecology of the mangroves or their utilization by neighboring communities exists to inform a planning process to designate the conservation site. I focused my study on two aspects--social surveys to estimate the extent of subsistence dependence on mangrove ecosystems by two villages, and ecological measurements to document the mangrove species found, estimate plant biomass within .1-hectare plots and measure the level of human impact on the forests.

Lamboara village children, women interviewees and Radhika

Mangroves are integral components of coastal ecosystems, providing ecosystem benefits such as breeding and feeding grounds for coral reef fish and crustaceans, nutrient assimilation, shoreline protection and carbon sequestration. Mangrove forests in the Baie d'Assassins are a source of construction wood, fuelwood and supplemental income through fishing and selling polewood to
villages up the coast. Analysis of both the ecological and socio-economic data will help inform local stakeholders, conservation bodies and government during the designation process for the Site de Conservation. While many mangrove areas in Madagascar and elsewhere are under threat from aquaculture and tourism development, the Baie D’Assassins region is not yet faced with these challenges because of its fairly remote location. This allows for a comprehensive management process that can ensure responsible development of tourism in addition to biodiversity conservation and sustainable use of mangrove resources by communities in the area.

 Krupa Patel

Boundary Dynamics in the Lubombo Transfrontier Conservation and Resource Area

Walking the boundary road between South Africa and Mozambique

I conducted my Masters research in the Lubombo Transfrontier Conservation and Resource Area (TFCA) which spans a portion of South Africa, Mozambique, and Swaziland. In the Lubombo TFCA, I focused on an examination of land use policy and boundary dynamics. The TFCA initiative in Southern Africa is a transnational ecological concept that is being linked to rural economic development and poverty alleviation through community-based initiatives. Given the framework of the TFCA, I studied these processes from a transboundary perspective, examining boundary politics and community participation on an eco-scale. Through the examination of conservation structures and processes, I also gained an understanding of land governance dynamics on communal lands that will be merged with the greater TFCA as Community Conservation Areas, and learned about the politics of power relations between the various actors involved. I studied these issues by gathering data from both a community-level perspective as well as a national policy-making level, mapping spatial patterns of land use in an effort to understand the harmonization of land use policy and community participation across the political boundaries of the Lubombo TFCA. A fellowship from the Tropical Resources Institute at Yale allowed me to complete my Masters research while gaining valuable insight into transboundary land use policy and governance dynamics.

 Caroline Simmonds

Questioning Roads: The social landscape of the Bakili Muluzi Highway, Malawi

The Bakili Muluzi Highway, named for the former president of Malawi, was completed in April 2003 at a cost of $58 million. This 142-kilometer highway parallels the border with Mozambique and serves as a major transportation network for Malawi’s southeastern region. It runs adjacent to the Namizimu Forest Reserve and numerous Yao villages. Officially, the Bakili Muluzi Highway was built to promote national economic, agricultural and social development, and to facilitate the transport of farm products to commercial and export centers. Unofficially, it was built to benefit the large-scale tobacco estates that cover the Eastern Corridor of Malawi.

When asked why they are selling mounds of freshly cut firewood along the newly paved Bakili Muluzi Highway, many Malawian villagers admit that they do so because of kulaga. To the Yao tribe of southeastern Malawi, kulaga means ?suffering.? Malawi is one of the world’s poorest countries with extremely high rates of firewood consumption — an estimated 94% of energy requirements are provided through forests for fuel and charcoal. Forest resources also provide construction materials, medicines, food, and thatch grasses for domestic purposes. In a country of 12 million people, where the majority are rural farmers who live on less than $1 a day and face such hardships as severe crop shortages, high rates of HIV/AIDS infection, and poor education and healthcare systems, alleviating kulaga is a daily concern.

Sitting with friends at my favorite Malawian restaurant in Katuli, after dining on goat stew and rice.

This project addresses the social and economic impacts of the Bakili Muluzi Highway on local Yao communities’ agricultural and natural resource use strategies. From late May through August 2005, research was conducted along the Bakili Muluzi Highway in the Mangochi district of Malawi to address the linkages between local agricultural livelihoods, markets, and the impacts on the Namizimu Forest Reserve. Household surveys, participant observation, in-depth interviews, and oral histories were collected in three villages located at varying distances from the highway.

 Tendro Ramaharitra

Effect of Anthropogenic Disturbances on Rainforest Structure and Composition

The rainforest of Ranomafana National Park represents one of the last remaining strips of primary vegetation in the eastern escarpment of Madagascar. This remaining fragment of forest is essential for the lives of thousands of people who depend primarily on the forest as a source of food, land and income. This study focuses on the vegetation structure and composition of the middle altitude evergreen rainforest, and the resulting effects of anthropogenic disturbances from wood extraction, selective logging, and trails for non-timber forest product harvesting.

Camp site in village of Torotosy, located in the peripheral zone of Ranomafana Nationa Park.

The study site has a total area of 3.36 Ha of forest; subdivided into twenty-one (21) botanical plots of 40 meters by 40 meters, distributed along three transect lines. All botanical plots were setup from the edge to the interior of the forest in order to depict the edge effects. We fully inventoried the site and collected data on disturbance indicators such as number of vines, number of trees cut, number of trails, and percentage of ground and canopy cover. In spite of the difficulties and biases in this study, the forest pattern suggests that the human disturbances had significantly altered the vegetation composition around the edge of the forest. These impacts are translated largely into a proliferation of some shrub species and loss of canopy trees at the forest edge.

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