Accepted Manuscript

Title: Why is biodiversity data-deficiency an ongoing

conservation dilemma in Africa?

Author: Ahmed A.H. Siddig

PII: S1617-1381(18)30426-6
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnc.2019.125719
Article Number: 125719

Reference: JNC 125719

To appear in:

Received date: 19 December 2018

Revised date: 22 June 2019
Accepted date: 24 June 2019

Please cite this article as: Siddig AAH, Why is biodiversity data-deficiency an
ongoing conservation dilemma in Africa?, Journal for Nature Conservation (2019),
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnc.2019.125719

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Why is biodiversity data-deficiency an ongoing conservation dilemma in Africa?

Ahmed A. H. Siddig1, 2 & 3

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Faculty of Forestry, University of Khartoum, Khartoum North, Postal Code 13314, Sudan

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Harvard Forest, Harvard University, 324 North Main Street, Petersham, Massachusetts 01366, USA

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3
Department of Environmental Conservation, University of Massachusetts, 160 Holdsworth way, Amherst, MA

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01003, USA

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Corresponding author: Ahmed A. H. Siddig

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ahmed_nyala@yahoo.com

Phone (cell): +24 991 294 0222

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Abstract:
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Recent reports illustrate deficiencies in knowledge about current conditions and long-term trends in population sizes

of hundreds of African plants and animals’ species. In this commentary, I discuss the lack of standardized data for
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assessing and monitoring biodiversity in Africa. I present my own views on the causes for these knowledge and data
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gaps, their consequences for conservation, and future directions that could improve the current situation.
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There are many reasons for lack of standardized data including; ongoing conflicts and political instability in many

biodiversity-rich countries; absence of regular and policy-driven monitoring programs; weak facilities; and irregular
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or insufficient funding. Existing biodiversity monitoring initiatives are often short-term, poorly-designed surveys,

largely dependent on volunteer researchers or international partners, biased towards large “charismatic” animal
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species, and published in difficult-to-access outlets. Consequently, up-to-date and rigorous reports about conditions

and trends of African biodiversity are limited, and conservation planning, comparative studies and accurate

valuation of ecosystem services continue to be difficult.

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Urgent actions include: 1) commitments and support of local governments to implement effective conservation

monitoring programs; 2) establishment of a network of carefully designed long-term and continent-wide monitoring

initiatives for endangered species and biodiversity; and 3) involvement of universities, research centers, Non-

Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and local communities in such monitoring efforts. Such actions could

stimulate further in-depth studies and systematic analysis of the root causes and solutions for the decades-long

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African biodiversity knowledge gap.

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Keywords:

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Africa, biodiversity, data-deficiency, conservation monitoring, and governance

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Background:
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Recently, the news reported the death of the last known male white Rhinoceros in Kenya that had been under
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24-hour guarded surveillance for two years. Similarly, the Great Elephant Census recently reported that the
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abundance of elephants in the African savannah are declining at an unprecedented rate, from about 20 million during

pre-colonization era to only 352,271 individuals in 2016; 30% of this decline has come in the last decade alone
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(Chase et al., 2016; see also http://www.greatelephantcensus.com/). These recent reports not only are emotionally
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devastating but also raise the question of future declines of other populations of African wildlife species

(Courchamp et al. 2018).

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Africa is known for its unique and diverse ecological regions including deserts, savannas, tropical forests,
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and Mediterranean coasts, all of which host irreplaceable species. This diversity of ecosystems yields great fauna

and flora diversity which play a significant role in Africa’s economy and the livelihoods of its people. For example,

The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) reported that forests of Africa support over 50 million people by
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directly providing foods, fuels, building woods, and medicines (UNEP 2013). Likewise, wildlife-based tourism is

greatly supports the economy for many African countries including Kenya, Uganda, South Africa, Tanzania, and

Zambia (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005).

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 Despite our beliefs about the richness and significance of Africa’s biodiversity, recent reports indicate that

data supporting these beliefs are sparse, especially with respect to current conditions and population trends of

hundreds of African plants and animals’ species (IUCN 2016). Moreover, these species are facing many on-going

conservation challenges (e.g. deforestation and habitat loss), any of which can be attributed to political instability

and inadequate governance (Amano and Sutherland 2013; Siddig 2014). To fill these data gaps and to respond to the

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ongoing African biodiversity crises, large-scale, well-funded national and international initiatives have established

conservation monitoring efforts across the continent (e.g. Elephants Without Borders, International Union for

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Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN), Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), Tropical Ecosystems

Assessment and Monitoring (TEAM), and the Smithsonian’s ForestGEO plots in some African countries; e.g.

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Rovero et al. 2014). There also are well-developed policy frameworks, methodologies, and indicators set by

international agreements (e.g., the Aichi targets of the Convention on Biological Diversity) to monitor biodiversity

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in standardized ways. UNE regularly assesses the status and trends of the environment in almost all of Africa (e.g.

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Africa Environment Outlook 3 - 2013). The United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the
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European Union (EU), the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), the German Research
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Foundation (DFG), the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), and China (Sino-African Joint Studies on

Biodiversity) are some of the many additional international partners and donors to African environmental and
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conservation programs. As all of this attention from the international community has resulted not only from the

perceived urgent need to conserve Africa’s declining biodiversity and ecosystems from deforestation, drought,
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desertification and recent climatic changes, but also from the desire to secure sustainable ecosystem services and
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livelihoods for local communities that have suffered from decades of crises and being ignored by their central

governments, the actual lack of useful and available data is even more surprising and unjustified.
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Deficiency in biodiversity data is a global challenge:

Deficient, incomplete, and biased biodiversity data is a global issue (e.g., Donaldson et al. 2016), but it is a
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chronic challenge in Africa for several reasons. First, Africa continues to suffer from conflicts and political

instability across the continent. Ddecades of unrest have contributed substantially to the decline of habitats and plant

and animal populations, while limiting biodiversity monitoring and reporting efforts of current status and trends (e.g.

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Brito et al. 2018). In some areas, government-rebel or tribal conflicts (e.g., in Darfur in Western Sudan and the

Central African Republic) further compound the problem and disrupt the already limited sustainable development

projects in these areas.

Second, there is an absence of an effective pan-African intergovernmental agency that is uniquely responsible

for devising and prioritizing continental, policy-driven biodiversity actions.

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Third, there is little support from national governments for environmental programs including biodiversity

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monitoring, which leads to limited funding, weakens institutions and facilities, and forecloses opportunities for

education in the field.

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Fourth, although there have been decades of local biodiversity monitoring efforts in many parts of Africa,

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these existing initiatives have many common limitations. They rarely are policy-driven and lack standardization

among datasets in time and space that makes comparisons among datasets nearly impossible. They are dependent
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largely on the contributions and objectives of volunteer researchers or international partners. They tend to be biased
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towards large charismatic animal species. They tend to be short-term and the results are scattered in difficult-to-
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access reports.
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Consequences of ongoing deficiencies in biodiversity data:

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There are many issues that can be considered a result of a shortage of information about current biodiversity

conditions. Here I list the most critical consequences:

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 Absence of rigorous reports about current states of biodiversity components, thus demonstrating the failure

of African countries to fulfill their international commitments and role in conventions (e.g. Convention on
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Biological Diversity – CBD).

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 Conservation planning and prioritization will be a hard task due to the absence of up-to-date information.

Consequently, we will continue to see more dramatic local extinctions or decline, such as in the cases of the

white rhino or woodland elephant.

 Comparative biodiversity studies will be difficult, if not impossible.

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  Focusing only on charismatic and megafauna such as elephants, lions and to somewhat less primates will

lead to an imbalanced conservation approach, and will ultimately provide a trend of missing information

about other taxonomic groups.

 Decisions about the utilization of plants and animals as natural ecosystem services will be inaccurate, and

based solely on rough estimates.

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Urgent interventions and ways forward:

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Obviously, decades of biodiversity data-deficiency in Africa, as indicated by many recent reports (e.g. UNEP

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2013; IUCN 2016), has proven to be a failure of local governments in their conservation exercise (Ellison 2016), as

well as documented inefficiency of current conservation monitoring approaches (i.e. monitoring for the sake of

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monitoring – see Lindenmayer 2013) to provide reliable biodiversity information. Unfortunately, and in addition to

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factors related to political instability in Africa, recent climatic changes, drought, desertification, and other human-

induced threats are further compounding this issue, thus urging for robust measures to be taken based on systematic
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and informative monitoring programs.
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Here I argue that there are many efforts that have to be initiated and done now, consistent with many recent
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calls from scientists around the world (e.g. Ellison 2016; Brito et al. 2018). Among these crucial and required

actions at the moment are: 1) first and foremost, having committed and supportive local governments to implement
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conservation monitoring programs, 2) establishing a network of long-term and continent-wide endangered species

and biodiversity monitoring initiatives, and 3) encouraging citizen-sciences’ biodiversity monitoring programs by
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involving the universities, research centers, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and local communities in one
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standardized monitoring efforts.

At the moment, governance is Africa’s most pressing issue, not only for environmental conservation projects,
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but also for contributing to the development process in the continent (Collier 2008; Amino and Southerland 2013;

Siddig 2014). Not surprisingly, any effective conservation effort will not be successful in Africa without having

responsible, committed and supportive governments who create safe and peaceful working climates, provide

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budgets, strengthen conservation institutions and facilities, and continuously offer training opportunities to young

African ecologists and conservation biologists.

Once these governance and instability issues are settled, then we can confidently move forward. An example

of moving forward in an innovative and feasible direction can be accomplished by establishing a central

conservation monitoring initiative (i.e. agency) to implement a network of permanent Long-Term Ecological

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Research (LTER) and monitoring plots across Africa, directed by the African Union, and get its technical guidance

and methodologies from the CBD and other relevant bodies (see values of LTER sites at Hobbie et al. 2003; Gitzen

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et al. 2012; Peters et al. 2013; Anderson-Teixeira et al. 2015). This is important for showing support from the

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highest political and governmental authority towards conservation or unifying monitoring efforts to providing

valuable, standardized and timely information, and it is expected to make a noticeable improvement in the way that

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we currently collect, analyze, disseminate ecological and biodiversity data in Africa. These proposed permanent

LTER sites could ultimately answer a wide number of pertinent questions related to data-deficiency at the continent,
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regional and country scales, or even to a certain ecosystem level within the country. Vie et al. (2008) has suggested
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several umbrella questions with regard to biodiversity conservation, which could potentially be achieved through
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these suggested LTER sites. These questions include:

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• What is the overall status of biodiversity, and how is it changing over time?
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• How does the status of biodiversity vary between regions, countries and sub-national areas?

• What is the rate at which biodiversity is being lost or restored?

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• Where is biodiversity being lost most rapidly?

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• What are the main drivers of the decline and loss of biodiversity?

• What is the effectiveness and impact of conservation activities?

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In addition, a network of LTER sites in Africa can help serve several secondary goals including; allowing a

collection of other environmental information; creating training opportunities for students; creating centers for

involving citizen-scientists, and establishing new facilities and recruiting research infrastructure. Importantly,

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existing or new LTER plots must consider the huge technological advances such as the use of Unmanned Aerial

Vehicles and wildlife camera-traps to gather accurate, timely, and cost-effective biodiversity data (Koh et al. 2012;

Paneque-Gálvez et al. 2014; Rovero et al. 2014).

Finally, citizen-science projects are also proved to be a promising practice and to be amongst the reasonable

procedures to collect biodiversity information and serve conservation monitoring efforts (e.g. McKinley et al. 2017).

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Therefore, increasing the adoption of citizen-science programs in Africa under the umbrella of the above proposed

LTER sites will not only allow for the acquisition of valuable and standardized biodiversity data in a cost-effective

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way, but will also significantly increase environmental awareness and the importance of conservation monitoring

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among the public. Not surprisingly, data collected by citizen scientists can span great spatial coverage, which is

particularly relevant when the intention is to come to, for example, country-wide conclusions. Also, the involvement

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of local people in such interactive monitoring schemes will stimulate and promote the utility of the rich ecological

traditional knowledge of these communities.

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Overall, we expect this work to stimulate further in-depth studies and systematic analysis to the root causes and
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solutions for this decades-long of knowledge gap and absence of standardized biodiversity data in Africa.

Acknowledgements:
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I am grateful to Aaron Ellison from Harvard Forest for encouraging me to write this paper as well as his
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considerable editing in this work. Many thanks go to Carstem F. Dormann at the University of Freiburg and John S.

Richardson at the University of British Columbia for the kind reception and mentorship during my postdoctoral
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research that supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD - P.R.I.M.E., grant agreement No.
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605728). I also acknowledge the valuable comments and edits that I received in this paper from Carsten F. Dormann

and Mariella Becu from the University of British Columbia.

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