Basic Facts

You're probably wondering where the Guinean forests are and what they are. The Guinean forests are located in the southern part of western Africa. This hotspot stretches from Guinea all the way to Cameroon. The Guinean forests have varying terrain. It goes from moist forests, to marshy swamps, and dry forests. There are many different climates in this hotspot. The Guinean forests are very biodiverse. They have many unique residents, and they contain 25 percent of Africa’s mammal species. The Guinean forests are also very threatened in many ways.

Human Impacts

Humans have heavily decreased the size of the Guinean forest. A staggering 15% (93,047 km²) of the original Guinean forest still stands. Even though so little still stands, humans are still destroying it. People are illegally cutting down trees to export as lumber. In Ghana, they can harvest about one million cubic meters of trees in a sustainable manner from reserves in one year, but in 2002 the country produced 3.7 million cubic meters of lumber (almost four times what it can be produced in a sustainable manner).

Another thing humans do impacts the Guinean forest’s biodiversity more directly. Poachers are very common in the Guinean forests, because the Guinean forest holds many rare species people will hunt.

Both habitat loss and poaching have negative impacts on the Guinean forest’s biodiversity.

Inhabitants of the Guinean Forests of West Africa

The Guinean forest is very biodiverse. There are about 9000 plant species in the Guinean forest; they are closely related to the plants of central Africa. There are many animal species too. There are roughly 1948 animals species in the Guinean forest. 320 of said species are mammals, which is about one fourth of the animal species in Africa. But birds have the most biodiversity in this hotspot; there are roughly 785 bird species in the Guinean forest. There are also 512 freshwater fish species, 221 amphibians, and 210 reptiles. The Guinean forest has many unique species; they don’t call it a hotspot for nothing.

How This Hotspot is Protected

For many years people have set aside pieces of land in the Guinean forest. Though these reserves may not have been for conserving biodiversity, they may become very important to just save the forest as a whole. A mere 17 percent of the land that still stands is protected, but that land is not protected very well which turns out to be only about 3% of land has the appropriate level of protection.

The forest has many things humans need which is another problem for the developing countries in West Africa. Of course there are alternatives to using the forest, but it will be hard for the people there to use these sources because they are in developing countries. Land in the Guinean forest is protected, but it may cause problems for the people there in the future.