Table 9: Summary of Important Bird Areas (IBA) in Liberia

Table 9: Summary of Important Bird Areas (IBA) in Liberia

The Western subspecies is called Pan troglodytes verus. It once occurred in 10-12 countries from southern Senegal east to Togo, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau, Mali, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia to the Niger River in Central Nigeria but has had the range greatly reduced.

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  The Central subspecies, Pan troglodytes troglodytes, occurs from Nothern Cameroon to Central African Republic to Ubanghi River in Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and south to the Congo River.
  

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  Pan troglodytes schweinfurthi is the eastern subspecies, which occurs from the confluence of the Ubanghi and Congo Rivers in Western DR Congo east to Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania and from the northwards to Burundi, Rwanda, Sudan, Uganda and DR Congo.
  

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  The East Nigeria – West Cameroon chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes vellerosus forms the population between the Niger River in Nigeria and the Sanaga River in Cameroon.
  

The survival of the chimpanzees is threatened by several factors, among which are the following:

1. 
   The commercial bush meat trade is the greatest threat posed to the survival of the chimpanzees. The females have very slow reproductive rate. Females are said to give birth every 5.5 years. Subsistence hunting increases with logging and mining as the bush meat may serve as food for the large labor force.
   

2. 
   Progressive habitat loss as a result of commercial logging compounds the problems as the habitats are converted for cash crops production, subsistence farming, forest fires, mineral prospecting and mining. These activities leave small-unconnected patches in which the chimpanzee populations are isolated and therefore become vulnerable.
   

3. 
   Deforestation, as a result of logging, creates remnant track of primary rainforest where the eastern and western subspecies are located. In these areas, unauthorized hunting, logging, mining and even farming occur thereby putting the subspecies at risk.
   

4. 
   The problem is further increased during civil wars when there is proliferation of guns, displacement of people and reduced agricultural output, all of which increase the hunting levels for livelihood.
   

5. 
   Trade in live animals, including killing of adults and capture of infants for pet trade and entertainment industry as well as the international biomedical trade are additional pressures that have negative impact on the survival of the subspecies.