菊花视频

The Cross River gorilla, the world鈥檚 most endangered great ape, now has more room to roam. The 菊花视频 (WCS), the Government of Cameroon, and other partners have collaborated to create a new national park to help protect the population in Cameroon.

The new park known as Takamanda links up with Nigeria鈥檚 Cross River National Park. Across its span of 261 square miles, it safeguards an estimated 115 gorillas鈥攁 third of the Cross River gorilla population. In addition, the park will protect forest elephants, chimpanzees, and drills鈥攁nother rare primate and a close relative of the better-known mandrill. Trans-boundary protected areas allow species to roam freely between countries.

The creation of Takamanda National Park represents many years of work led by WCS and the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife in Cameroon. These efforts have included baseline surveys of gorillas and other large mammals, meetings and agreements with local communities, recommendations for upgrading the reserve to park status, and the establishment of trans-boundary activities with the Okwangwo Division of Cross River National Park.

鈥淭he Government of Cameroon is to be commended for taking this step in saving the Cross River gorilla for future generations,鈥� said Dr. Steven E. Sanderson, president and CEO of WCS. 鈥淏y forming this national park, Cameroon sends a powerful message about the importance of conservation.鈥�

The Cross River gorilla is the rarest of the four gorilla subspecies. Other subspecies include western lowland gorillas, eastern lowland or 鈥淕rauer鈥檚鈥� gorillas, restricted to eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, and mountain gorillas, made famous by Dian Fossey and George Schaller. Earlier this year, WCS scientists discovered more than 125,000 western lowland gorillas in the northern Republic of Congo. WCS is the only conservation group working to safeguard the four subspecies, all of which are classified as 鈥渃ritically endangered鈥� or 鈥渆ndangered鈥� by the IUCN Red List.

Habitat destruction and poaching represent the biggest threats to Cross River gorillas. Farming, road-building, and forest burning by pastoralists have fragmented their forest habitat. Gorillas are also targeted by hunters of bushmeat in the region.

Primary support for the creation of Takamanda comes from a funding partnership between the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife and the German Development Bank. The initiative was also supported by the World Wildlife Fund, the German Development Service, and the German Technical Cooperation.

WCS has a long history in Cameroon, which began with our scientists鈥� appointment as technical advisors at Korup National Park in 1988. In partnership with the Cameroon Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife and CAMRAIL (the Cameroon Railways), WCS continues to play a critical role in enforcing regulations that ban transportation of bushmeat or any other wildlife products from remote locations to urban markets by local trains. This effort in part has helped Cameroon uphold its obligations as a member nation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

WCS鈥檚 conservation work in Central Africa was funded in part from admission fees to the Bronx Zoo鈥檚 Congo Gorilla Forest exhibit. Since the exhibit鈥檚 opening in 1999, it has raised more than $8.5 million for conservation in this region.