GUINEA The rainforests of Guinea have been highly impacted by fires and agriculture. Today only scattered fragments of forest remain in a sea of grasslands. Some of these small sections of forest still contain emergent overstory trees, valuable for timber, which are only slowly exploited due to lack of heavy machinery. As of 2005, less than 1 percent of forest cover in Guinea was primary forest.

In the late 1990s, the government started to push conservation and sustainable development measures, but the effectiveness of these efforts was limited by lack of funds and resources. Guinea's few reserves, which cover just over 4 percent of the country's land mass, are still under-managed and underfunded, and are threatened by mining projects (Guinea has major mineral resources) and subsistence agriculture, which has limited productivity due to severe soil erosion.

From a biological diversity standpoint, of Guinea's 100 or so endemic species, over 40 percent are considered endangered by poaching and loss of habitat. The World Resources Institute says that Guinea has some 3,000 species of plants, 640 birds, 190 mammals, 94 reptiles, and 121 fish.



Suggested reading - Books

• Lonely Planet West Africa

Image copyright Google Earth, MDA EarthSet, DigitalGlobe 2005

CIA-World Factbook Profile
FAO-Forestry Profile
World Resources Institute


Last updated: 4 Feb 2006