NDLI: Revisiting Evidence for Sustainability of Bushmeat Hunting in West Africa

Content Provider	Springer Nature Link
Author	Waite, T. A.
Copyright Year	2007
Abstract	Bushmeat hunting, a key source of dietary protein, has been implicated as a major extinction threat to tropical vertebrate species in West Africa. Ideally, any such hunting of wild species should be done sustainably, with off-take levels low enough to ensure viability of harvested species. Recent work purports to show that a mature bushmeat market in a major city in Ghana operates sustainably after depletion of vulnerable, slow-reproducing species (Cowlishaw and others 2005). I revisit two aspects of this work. First, I retest the prediction that larger species are transported to the market from greater distances, as expected if overexploitation depletes large species close to the city. Cowlishaw and others failed to find a significantly positive relationship between species-specific body mass and distance between capture site and the market. However, my reanalysis provides evidence for a positive relationship after all, consistent with unsustainable harvesting. In particular, ungulate species were harvested significantly farther from the market than smaller-bodied rodent species. Second, I caution that just because species “persist” in the marketplace in no way implies that they can withstand hunting pressure elsewhere and so should be of little concern to conservationists. I reveal that such species, despite their high intrinsic rates of population growth, are not robust elsewhere. Several of them have disappeared from a network of protected areas in Ghana (Brashares and others 2001). I show that faster-reproducing species are not necessarily more likely to persist in protected areas. The mere presence of fast-reproducing species in a mature bushmeat market should not be construed as generalizable robustness; criteria for ecological sustainability should ensure viability; and harvested species should be robust, not highly prone to extinction, in protected areas.
Starting Page	476
Ending Page	480
Page Count	5
File Format	PDF
ISSN	0364152X
Journal	Environmental Management
Volume Number	40
Issue Number	3
e-ISSN	14321009
Language	English
Publisher	Springer-Verlag
Publisher Date	2007-07-18
Publisher Place	New York
Access Restriction	One Nation One Subscription (ONOS)
Subject Keyword	Bushmeat hunting Extinction Ghana Sustainable harvesting Viability Environmental Management Ecology Nature Conservation Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution Forestry Management Waste Water Technology / Water Pollution Control / Water Management / Aquatic Pollution
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Ecology Pollution Global and Planetary Change

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