Death by chocolate: the cost of cocoa to primates in Cote d'Ivoire's protected areas

Chocolate is leaving a bitter taste in the mouth. New research shows that illegal cocoa plantations have massively encroached on many of Cote d'Ivoire's protected areas and decimated primate populations. 

Since the country's independence, Cote d'Ivoire has become the world's largest producer of cocoa, supplying 33% of the world's cocoa to chocolate producers. As plantations age, they become less productive, so cocoa farming policies have favoured the practice of clearing new arable land rather than maintaining old pastures. Over the last 3 decades, as global demands for chocolate have increased, cocoa producers have sought out new areas of productive pasture - contributing to wide-scale deforestation. According to Global Forest Watch, between 2001-2013, Cote d'Ivoire lost about 1.3 million hectares of forest, cleared at a rate of about 100,000 hectares a year. In addition, political and economic instability during the 2000's led to widespread human migrations, the erosion of conservation capacity and the installation of thousands of people adjacent to, and within protected areas. 

Researchers recently conducted primate surveys in 23 protected areas in Cote d'Ivoire, and the results are depressing. Illegal farms - the majority cocoa plantations- were found in nearly all the protected areas, 16 of them with more than 65% of the forest degraded. Overall, about 74% of the total surveyed area had been transformed into plantations, with some protected areas having being entirely converted. The researchers estimate that this converted land amounts to about 195,600 tons cocoa per year-  about 12% of the country's annual yield. Human settlements were found in 15 of the 23 protected areas, with over 10,000 people living within some of them, and there was significant hunting pressure in areas that were still forested. 

Not surprisingly, this has taken a heavy toll on the country's primate populations. Every protected area had lost at least one primate species, with 13 having lost all of their primates. Four taxa were completely absent from all 23 protected areas, and for one, Miss Waldron's red colobus- which has not been sighted since 1978- it seems more likely that the species has become extinct in the wild. 
Human population pressure has led to widescale deforestation and over-hunting in many parts of West Africa, where the conservation toll is high and the outlook is bleak. This study illustrates just how valuable- and vulnerable- are Central Africa's remaining intact rainforests. Gabon still harbours globally significant tracts of tropical forest, yet any number of changes in economic policy and population demography could spark rapid land transformations and losses to biodiversity. 
For the chocoholics among us, make sure your chocolate is Rainforest Alliance Certified.

Reference (pdf at this link)
Bitty EA, Gonedelé Bi S, Béné JCK, Kouassi PK and McGraw WS (2015) Cocoa farming and primate extirpation inside Cote d'Ivoire's protected areas. Tropical Conservation Science,Vol.8 (1): 95-113

Genetics expose the island-hopping reed frogs of Sao Tome

The oceanic islands of Sao Tome and Principe are millions of years old and have never been connected to mainland Africa. Due to their isolation they have accumulated hundreds of endemic species, including reed frogs of the genus Hyperolius, a diverse group found across Sub-Saharan Africa. Islands are good places to study evolutionary processes, and in the Gulf of Guinea, reed frogs are thought to be the islands' only endemic vertebrates to have diversified within a single island as well as having dispersed between islands.
A new study looks at patterns of diversification and dispersal among reed frogs of Sao Tome and Principe. Using mitochondrial DNA and genome wide SNP markers, the researchers looked at Hyperolius molleri - endemic to the two islands - and the Endangered H. thomensis, found only on Sao Tome island. They compared them with the sister species H. cinnamomeoventris from neighbouring Gabon. They found that Hyperolius initially colonised the younger Sao Tome island and later "rafted" to the older Principe island, following the direction of ocean currents. The two island populations are genetically distinct, indicating that dispersal happened in the past, but is not ongoing today. Furthermore, geographic separation of Hyperolius on the island of Sao Tome led to speciation and the divergence of H. thomensis and H. molleri.  Since then, secondary contact- possibly facilitated through the advancement of agriculture- has allowed the two species to re-connect and hybridize.
Island endemics are particularly vulnerable to extinction through habitat loss, invasive species and human activities; all the more important that novel research on vulnerable endemics contributes to sound conservation management strategies.

Bell, R.C., Drewes, R.C., Zamudio, K.R., 2015. Reed frog diversification in the Gulf of Guinea: Overseas dispersal, the progression rule, and in situ speciation. Evolution 69, 904–915.

Cinnamon-bellied reed frog (H. cinnamomeoventris), Libreville, Gabon (photo: K.Jeffery)

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