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Wildlife in the Central African Republic is in the vast natural habitat located between the Congo Basin's rain forests and large savannas, where the human density was smaller than 0.5 per km2 prior to 1850. The forest area of 22.755 million has, considered as one of the richest storehouses of wild life spread over national parks, hunting reserves and community hunting areas, underwent a change over to an alarming situation of loss of wild life due to greed for ivory and bushmeat exploitation by the hunters, mostly Arab slavers from across the borders of the Central African Republic (Central African Republic) with Chad and Sudan.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title= Central African Republic )〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Parks, Reserves, and Other Protected Areas in Central African Republic )〕 Realising the serious threat to the wildlife, the colonists – French Administration – in 1935 and later the Government of the Republic of CRA, enacted laws and created National parks and preserves, which covered 16.6% of the country. The three most coveted national parks are the Manovo-Gounda St. Floris National Park with its reported "greatest concentrations of hippos in the world", the Bamingui-Bangoran National Park in the north; and the Dzanga-Sangha Reserve which covers rain forests.〔 The Manovo-Gounda-Saint-Floris National Park, in particular was inscribed to the UNESCO List of World Heritage Sites in 1988 in recognition of the diversity of life present within it in respect of its wealth of flora and fauna.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Brief Description )〕 However, the legal instruments were not effective in controlling poaching activities for profits, as institutional support for protected areas has all along been weak with hunters and loggers not letting go their activities even in national parks. Most of the timber extracted from the CRA is exported to Europe.〔 The richness of the wild life of the Central African Republic is reflected in its about 3,600 species of plants, 663 birds, 209 mammals (includes two endemic species and 11 threatened species〔(【引用サイトリンク】title= Animal Info – Central African Republic )〕), 187 reptiles and 29 amphibians.〔 ==Geography== The Central African Republic, a landlocked country in Africa, which was once a French colony under the name Ubangi-Shari, is a rich rainforest area of 22.755 million ha with tropical forest covering 35% of the area of the country.〔 The rich forests of the Central African Republic vary and are largely delimited within the major tropical rain forests of Africa and the great open savannas that stretches from across the continent, south of the Sahara. Depending on the climatic conditions, it is distributed with thick forests in the south, woody savanna in the centre and grasslands in the north. The wild life in these forests reflects all the species identified in Africa; the most conspicuous species are the elephants, chimpanzees, crocodiles, hippos, giraffes and many more.〔 The ecosystem in Central African Republic comprise the Western Congo Basin Forests, the Northeastern Congo Basin Forests, and the Sudanian Savannas. The land use is categorised under the grass and shrub as 59%, under crops and settlements at 5% and major forests at 36% of the total land area of the country. Anthropological pressure is reported to be low in 46% area; medium in 44% and high in 10% of the land area.〔 Apart from all the savanna species of wild animals, the unique species found here is of forest gorillas.〔 It had recorded the least percentage of forest loss in the period between 1990 and 2005 of 1.9%. Subsequently logging roads were built not only to sustain subsistence agriculture but mostly for poaching for bush meat and ivory hunting, which has caused severe depletion of the abundant and diverse wildlife of CRA.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wildlife of the Central African Republic」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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