Conservation in Angola

Modern conservation efforts began in 1911 under Portuguese rule when a conservation fund paid into by the sale of hunting licenses was set up; this was followed in the 1930s by the establishment of natural parks and game reserves.[3] During the early 1970s, the colonial government greatly expanded its conservation efforts, and the outlook for Angola's ecological future looked promising.[2] At the time of independence in 1975, about 6% of Angola's land area was officially protected.[1] However, the outbreak of war saw functionally all conservation efforts abandoned, and formerly protected areas ceased to be managed.[4] Poaching was rampant, especially of the country's large mammals.[4] Infrastructural and agricultural collapse caused by the war, along with the associated mass migrations within the country, dramatically reduced the environment's capacity to sustain the nation's population.[4]

Angola is one of the most biodiverse countries in Africa, owing in large part to highly varied ecological regions within its borders.[1] However, recent speciological data is greatly lacking, to such an extent that USAID claimed that there was less known about Angola's biodiversity in 2013 than there was in 1975.[5] Nonetheless, a 2019 synthesis of all available data reports that the country is home to a verifiable 6,850 vascular plants, 940 bird species, 358 freshwater fish, and 291 mammal species (these numbers are expected to significantly increase as more surveys are conducted).[1]

Since the end of the civil war in 2002, the rate of deforestation in Angola has been increasing.[6] During the war, mass urbanization took place as people fled the countryside, and as a result the amount of land used for agriculture decreased.[6] When the violence died down, hundreds of thousands of people returned to their native homes and began farming and ranching on land that the forest had begun to reclaim.[6] This deforestation presents two major problems. First, the Guinea-Congolian forest system, of which much of Angola's forests are a part, provides carbon sequestration that is vital to efforts to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions.[7] Second, a large portion of the population lives in rural areas and relies on subsistence, which requires a healthy and diverse ecosystem to support.[7]

Stuffed specimen of the Giant sable antelope at the American Museum of Natural History

Angola has historically been home to a large number of African bush elephants, though their population was severely diminished during the civil war.[8] Researchers who studied the elephant population in 2005 found their numbers to be increasing as a reasonable pace.[9] Between 2006 and 2015, the Angolan government refused to allow surveys of elephant populations.[8] New research conducted in 2015 revealed a 21% decline in population over the previous ten years, likely due to increased poaching and human habitat encroachment.[8]

The giant sable antelope is a major national symbol of Angola.[10] While it once could be found across Africa, numbers declined in the 20th century to the point that it was thought potentially extinct until one was photographed in 2004.[10] Currently there are estimated fewer than 200 extant individuals, with habitat loss and the bushmeat trade driving this massive decline in numbers.[10]