Fisheries in the Southern Border Zone of Takamanda - Impact ...

130 Sunderland-Groves et al.
In more recent years, gorilla groups in Cameroon-
Nigeria border region the study area have become more
fragmented and isolated as their habitat has succumbed to
agricultural and other land development activities.
Construction of the new road between the towns of
Mamfe and Akwaya, when completed, will cut directly
between Takamanda and the Mone and Mbulu forests,
preventing gorilla movement between the areas.
Hunting and agricultural activities will have a similar
effect on the chimpanzee populations of the area that, like
the gorillas, are fragmented and confined to highland
areas. In 1997, the chimpanzees of eastern Nigeria and
Takamanda were described as a distinct sub-species Pan
troglodytes vellerosus (Gonder et al. 1997), and although
their numbers in the wild have not been thoroughly
investigated, it is thought that the populations are
declining.
The Cross River Gorilla Research Project
(Cameroon) has initiated conservation efforts to
eliminate hunting of these two species in the region. The
focus is on working with local communities and
dissemination of educational materials in collaboration
with the joint Ministry of Environment and Forests
(MINEF)/GTZ project—Protection of the Forests
Around Akwaya (PROFA).
3 Study area
The 675-km 2 Takamanda Forest Reserve is mostly
covered by Atlantic evergreen forest, ranging from 100 m
to 1500 m above sea level (Figure 2 in Chapter 1). Much
of the lowland forest in the southern and central parts of
the Reserve is between 100 m and –400 m in elevation.
The terrain is rolling in the lowlands, but rises sharply to
1500 m in the northern part of the Reserve where slopes
are extremely steep and areas of semi-deciduous forest,
woody savannah (often degraded), and montane woody
savannah with grasslands prevail between 1200 m and
2200 m (Letouzey 1985). Around villages, the vegetation
has been modified and is degraded evergreen lowland
forest and farmbush (a mosaic of cultivation and fallow).
The lowland forest is particularly diverse; it is thought to
be part of a Pleistocene refugium. The forest formation is
Takamanda: the Biodiversity of an African Rainforest
distinct as there is a relative paucity of the
Caesalpinioides, which are normally common in the
Atlantic coastal forest (see Sunderland et al. this volume
for a more detailed discussion of the vegetation in the
area). 0
In 1985, the human population density in the
Takamanda area was estimated at between 6 and 12
people/km 2 (Letouzey 1985). In 1999 the approximate
total human population, based on a complete census of
nine villages, was estimated at 2,490 (Groves and
Maisels 1999). A more recent socio-economic survey
conducted by PROFAthat covered 43 villages within and
surrounding the Takamanda Forest Reserve, including 12
villages on the Nigerian side of the border, estimated total
human population at 15,707 (Schmidt-Soltau et al.
2001). Socio-economic activities in the region revolve
strongly around the forest and its resources, especially for
the villages that are far from markets (Ifeka 1999,
Sunderland et al. this volume), and people who live in the
most remote villages depend almost entirely on
bushmeat for their protein requirements. They also rely
on the harvest and sale of non-timber forest products as
their main source of cash, particularly Irvingia
gabonensis, or “bush mango,” rather than on cultivated
crops or livestock.
The area has been historically partially protected by
lack of access, but this is changing. Accessibility to the
Takamanda Reserve from the Nigerian side is by foot
only, but a new road from Mamfe (Figure 2 in Chapter 1)
now allows access to within 5 km of its limits from the
Cameroonian side. The Mone Forest Reserve is
separated from the Takamanda reserve by a corridor of
ungazetted forest, which, at its narrowest, is about 7 km
wide.
During the 1998-1999 surveys, two main vegetation
types were sampled: lowland forest and sub-montane
forest. The study area comprised two lowland sites along
the Makone and Oyi/Magbe rivers and three hill, or
highland, areas—Matene, Obonyi, and Basho Hills—
within Takamanda Forest Reserve (Figure 2 in Chapter
1). The Makone flows through the middle of the Reserve,
and the Oyi forms part of the Reserve’s southwestern