The impacts of BaAka net hunting on rainforest wildlife

Abstract

Conservation programs often implicitly assume that subsistence hunting by indigenous peoples using traditional hunting methods is ecologically sustainable. Indeed communal net hunts are less detrimental to wildlife than are the other principal hunting methods in central African forests, namely cable snares and firearms. However, research in the Dzanga-Sangha Special Reserve of the Central African Republic suggests that BaAka net hunters may overexploit primary game species including the blue duiker Cephalophus monticola and the bay duiker Cephalopus dorsalis. The method itself spares protected and endangered species, but overexploitation of game species results from increases in hunting intensity as BaAka populations grow and hunting ranges decline. Given the dynamic socio-economic conditions, subsistence hunting over the long-term is not ecologically sustainable. Wildlife management programs therefore must address not only hunting method and hunting area, but also must develop viable subsistence and economic alternatives for local residents.