Remote Sensing and Gis Assisted Participatory Biosphere Reserve Zoning for Wild Coffee Conservation: Case of Yayu Forest
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Date
2008-12
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Addis Ababa Universty
Abstract
The original habitat of coffee is the shaded understory of montane rainforests in southwestern
and southeastern Ethiopia. The wild Coffea arabica populations in these regions display a
complex geographical distribution pattern of genetic diversity with most regions possessing
their own genotypes. This confirms that the Ethiopian coffee is important source of coffee
genetic resources for the world coffee industry, however, the forests housing much of the
coffee gene pools are being lost at an alarming rate. This necessitates in-situ conservation in
the forest ecosystem housing coffee genetic resources. Yayu forest, apart from its high
abundance of wild coffee trees, is also known for its high plant species diversity. This study
aimed at identifying and mapping the core areas for in situ wild Coffea arabica and forest
biodiversity conservation, along with the buffer and transition zones required to establish a
biosphere reserve at Yayu. The study made use of Landsat 1973, 1986 and 2001 Remote
Sensing Satellite Image analysis to determine the forest change extent and pattern, and Multi
Criteria Evaluation in a GIS environment and community participation to come up with the
final biosphere reserve map. Dense forest, disturbed forest, farmlands and settlement, and
grasslands have been identified as the major land use/land cover types in the study area.
According to the change detection analysis, though there has been overall forest reduction by
7.2% over the entire period, there has been an increasing trend since 1986 owing to forest
regeneration resulting from displacement of settlers from near the forest to village centers,
following the then vilagization policy, and semi-forest coffee expansion. The forest cover
change pattern displayed distinct spatial pattern with complete clearance on the higher
altitudes and forest disturbance in the lower to mid altitudes. The complete forest clearance is
attributed to farmland and settlement expansion as a function of population growth and the
forest disturbance attributed to coffee expansion. Forest disturbance risk, coffee abundance
and species diversity distribution pattern have been mapped as a function of the influencing
environmental variables. The core zone has then been determined to represent areas of higher
wild Coffea arabica abundance, higher plant species diversity, less prone to human
disturbance, and areas that have never been under private management. However, as the
participatory approach in this study didn’t make individual based discussions, the output
should never be considered as an absolute conflict free map; but rather a considerably
socially resolved map that paves the way to a further detailed scrutiny, for a better conflict
free map of the biosphere reserve.
Key Words: in-situ conservation, wild Coffea arabica, multi-criteria evaluation, community
participation, core zone
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Keywords
In-situ conservation, Wild Coffea arabica, Multi-criteria evaluation, Community participation, Core zone