Two United Nations-supported conservation partnerships have launched a new web-based tool that shows how protecting great apes in Africa and Asia can help countries fight climate change.
The online app, developed by the Great Apes Survival Partnership (GRASP) and the UN Collaborative Programme for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (UN-REDD), superimposes maps of great ape ranges and of forest carbon stocks, allowing policymakers to better identify conservation priority areas.
The GRASP–REDD+ Mapping Project was introduced at the GRASP regional meeting for West Africa in the Liberian capital, Monrovia, on Wednesday. The meeting brought together partners from nine countries to discuss key conservation issues in the region, according to joint press release issued by GRASP and UN-REDD.
“Addressing both great ape habitat conservation and forest protection through the cooperation between these two UNEP-supported global programmes is a prime example of a more integrated approach to sustainability that demonstrates the potential for co-benefits,” said Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).
The mapping project is designed to identify priority areas for implementing REDD projects while considering co-benefits for the conservation of great apes. The maps are designed to help decision-makers, climate specialists and conservation organizations access data and link the carbon and great ape layers with other context data.
GRASP and UN-REDD worked with the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology to develop the on-line tool, which can be accessed through the Ape Populations, Environments and Surveys (A.P.E.S.) database, a web-based decision support system http://primatdbext.eva.mpg.de/redd/.
“You cannot protect apes in Africa or Asia without also protecting the forests in which they live, and this project does an excellent job of emphasizing the overlap,” said GRASP coordinator Doug Cress.
The GRASP–REDD+ Mapping Project places special emphasis on potential corridor areas that could link fragmented and endangered great ape populations and have the potential for reforestation.
Carbon stocks in forests perform essential ecological functions and supply clean water and air. The loss of these stocks through agricultural development, logging and fires can account for up to 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. In order to limit the impacts of climate change, it will be necessary to reduce emissions from the forest sector.
