About this site
Providing tropical forest news, statistics, photos, and information, rainforests.mongabay.com is the world's most popular rainforest site. [more]
Weekly Newsletter
Mongabay will never distribute your email address or send spam.
Share
The Expanding African Bush Meat Trade
Today the visitor to many Central African cities like Kinshasa (Zaire-now the Democratic Republic of Congo), Brazzaville
(Congo), Ouesso (Congo), Bangui (Central African Republic), Libreville (Gabon), and Yaoundè (Cameroon) can
purchase the meat of virtually any forest animal, endangered or not, whether it be gorilla, chimpanzee, monkey,
pangolin, duiker, antelope, forest cat, crocodile, flying fox, eagle, monitor lizard, elephant, turtle, hippo,
snake, or civet. Demand for bush meat is driven by the desire for protein, not necessarily the animal source of
the protein -- the popularity for which varies from market to market. In Gabon, McRae reports that annual per capita
consumption of bush meat may reach eight pounds annually.
The expanding urban and rural demand for bush meat is driven by robust population growth in these sub-Sahara countries.
The availability of bush meat is made possible by the logging industry whose road construction opens stretches
of rainforest to hunters and settlers. Villages sprout up regularly and the population of established villages
grows rapidly.
Hunters can subsist selling bushmeat is passing loggers, traders, and local villagers. According to McRae (1997),
a smoked gorilla can fetch about US$40 for the hunters, a chimp, US$20, and a monkey, US$5. The majority of bushmeat
reaches market on the logging trucks, returning to cities with their freshly cut timber. The International Primate
Protection League estimates that 400-600 gorillas are killed each year in Congo alone by poachers, many of whom
follow logging roads deep into the forest interior.
The trade continues to prosper despite the 1996 Bertoua (Cameroon) Conference agreement to crack down in
on "bushmeat" organized by the London-based World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA). The conference
sought to bring all parties (logging, governmental, local, conservation) together to discuss the issue. Among the
things accomplished by the conference was limiting of the production of chevrotine cartridges, shotgun shells used
for hunting large, protected game.
As more logging roads open up the most remote African rainforests, regional bush meat hunting will expand
as the trees continue to fall. Unfortunately the trade of bush meat will continue to flourish until hunters are
provided with another viable option to make a living.
"Rainforest" is used interchangeably with "rain forest" on this site. "Jungle" is generally not used.
Recent news
Beef consumption fuels rainforest destruction (02/16/2009)
Nearly 80 percent of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon results from cattle ranching, according to a new report by Greenpeace. The finding confirms what Amazon researchers have long known – that Brazil's rise to become the world's largest exporter of beef has come at the expense of Earth's biggest rainforest.
How to save the Amazon rainforest (01/04/2009)
Environmentalists have long voiced concern over the vanishing Amazon rainforest, but they haven't been particularly effective at slowing forest loss. In fact, despite the hundreds of millions of dollars in donor funds that have flowed into the region since 2000 and the establishment of more than 100 million hectares of protected areas since 2002, average annual deforestation rates have increased since the 1990s, peaking at 73,785 square kilometers (28,488 square miles) of forest loss between 2002 and 2004. With land prices fast appreciating, cattle ranching and industrial soy farms expanding, and billions of dollars' worth of new infrastructure projects in the works, development pressure on the Amazon is expected to accelerate. Given these trends, it is apparent that conservation efforts alone will not determine the fate of the Amazon or other rainforests. Some argue that market measures, which value forests for the ecosystem services they provide as well as reward developers for environmental performance, will be the key to saving the Amazon from large-scale destruction. In the end it may be the very markets currently driving deforestation that save forests.
Amazon rainforest damage surges 67% in 2008 (12/20/2008)
The area of rainforest in the process of being deforested — razed but not yet cleared — surged in the Brazilian Amazon during 2008, according to new figures released by Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE). The announcement comes shortly after the Brazilian government reported a 4 percent increase in forest clearing for the year. Using an advanced satellite system that tracks changes in vegetation cover INPE found that 24,932 square kilometers of Amazon forest was damaged between August 2007 and July 2008, an increase of 10,017 square kilometers -- 67 percent -- over the prior year.
Cutting deforestation can fight climate change, reduce poverty and conflict (09/24/2008)
Forest conservation can play a critical role in efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and alleviate poverty, said a prominent group of politicians, development experts, and environmental NGOs meeting in New York City to discuss U.S. climate policy.
Future threats to the Amazon rainforest (07/31/2008)
Between June 2000 and June 2008, more than 150,000 square kilometers of rainforest were cleared in the Brazilian Amazon. While deforestation rates have slowed since 2004, forest loss is expected to continue for the foreseeable future. This is a look at past, current and potential future drivers of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon.
