3,000 km²
Lowland forest, for the most part pristine. Several forest clearings ("bais"). The largest & most impressive waterfalls in African equatorial rain forests (Koungou, Mingouli, Djidji).
Forest elephants, western lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, forest buffalo, bongo, sitatunga, red river hog, leopard, slender-snouted crocodiles.
Since 2000.
Gabon National Parks Office, Gabon Ministry of Water and Forests, Tropical Ecology Research Institute (IRET), FIGET, CARPE, Pond Foundation, MacArthur Foundation.
Ivindo National Park contains the most
impressive waterfalls in the equatorial forests of Africa.
Name : Nigel Orbell
Title : Director of the Ivindo NP Project
Email :
Address :
Wildlife Conservation Society,
BP 7847,
Libreville,
Gabon.
For more information, see www.wcs.org/africa
Wildlife Conservation Society International
Conservation,
Africa Program,
2300 Southern Blvd.,
Bronx, NY 10460, USA
The Wildlife Conservation Society's International Conservation program saves wildlife and wild lands by understanding and resolving critical problems that threaten key species and large, wild ecosystems around the world.
• Site-based conservation
• Research
• Training and capacity-building
• New model development
• Informing policy
• Linking zoo-based and field-based conservation
Contributions to this project can be sent to the WCS Africa Program in NY (address above)
Djidji waterfalls, northern Ivindo National Park © Lee
White
Ivindo National Park, located in east-central Gabon and bisected by the Equator, was created in August 2002 by Presidential decree.
WCS presence dates before this, as the Park was traversed by Mike Fay during the Megatransect expedition. Since 2001, a research camp has been established in proximity to Langoué Bai to monitor large mammal activity. This includes gorillas, sitatungas, buffalos and elephants (including four which have been fitted with GPS transmitters to analyze their movements).
Apart from the abundant fauna, birds & flora, Ivindo National Park contains the most impressive waterfalls in the equatorial forests of Africa.
Ivindo National Park is fortunate in that, with the exception of the north-eastern corner, there are few human habitations in close proximity (less than a one day walk) from the boundaries. However there are incursions into the park by villagers living on the road to the north of the Park, as well as people coming down the Ivindo River by pirogue for fishing & hunting expeditions. Our socio-economic team, funded by the Pond and MacArthur Foundations, is concentrating its efforts in this area. The Park can only be accessed by the railway, by plane using an unpaved airstrip, by boat on the larger rivers, or on foot. There is no road link to the rest of Gabon
The main threats are in the north with fishing, hunting & ivory poaching, as well as commercial hunting outside the Park boundaries. There have also been incursions by neighboring forestry companies to exploit within the park. A future threat would be the proposed building of a hydro-electric dam on the Ivindo River & the construction of a railway in proximity to the Park to evacuate iron ore to the north-east of the Park. An indirect threat is weak & inexperienced government involvement in Park protection.
Bongo in northern Ivindo National Park ©Philipp Henschel