Risk assessment of the impact of present land use and environmental factors on the distribution of useful woody species and diversity in and around W-National Park (Burkina Faso)

Useful woody species contribute enormously to maintain livelihoods in rural areas of West Africa and are strongly influenced by environmental conditions and human activities. In order to assess species-specific responses to these factors, we studied distribution and diversity patterns of useful woody species in relation to several environmental factors in- and outside of a protected area in eastern Burkina Faso. We used a species distribution modeling approach and modeled separately for adults and juveniles. While adult distributions can be interpreted as the current state of the species, juvenile distributions give hints about the species population development in the future. Our results reveal that elevation and precipitation were the most influencing environmental factors on distributions of both juvenile and adult diversity. Furthermore, we demonstrated that the responses to human activities differed widely between species and often even between adults and juveniles of the same species emphasizing the difficulty of giving over-simplified statements about the human impact on useful woody species. We were able to classify the useful species into five groups with similar reaction to human activities. We discuss which species groups might persist under increasing human pressure and which groups are likely to face a declining trend in the future.