Claim: “Liberia hosts more than 40% of the remaining forest in West Africa.”
Source: Emmanuel Urey Yakpawolo, EPA Executive Director.
Full Text: On Thursday, November 14, 2024, Emmanuel Urey Yakpawolo, the executive director of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), told the BBC “Focus on Africa” program hosted by Victoria Fritz Wiki on the climate crisis at the COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, that Liberia hosts more than 40% of the remaining forest in West Africa.
Yakpawolo told the BBC that Liberia, a country rich in natural resources and home to more than 40% of West Africa’s remaining forest cover, is uniquely positioned to play a key role in climate adaptation and environmental preservation.
Verification: To verify this claim, we contacted Paul Kanneh, the lead focus person of the Liberia Forest Media Watch (LFMW), to determine whether the EPA boss’s claim was correct.
The Liberia LFMW is a conglomeration of like-minded journalists who conduct independent investigative reports covering the natural resources sector. They emphasize forest-related issues, ranging from commercial or community forestry to conservation.
Kanneh agreed that the EPA boss was correct. “It is true.” He further stated that Liberia hosts about 40 or 41%, of the upper Guinea Forest.
Continuing, he said, “It was 46 some years ago.” It dropped to 44, 43, 42, etc. Some people can’t be exact. Meaning there is no exact data for it.”
Our research also found that Liberia has one of the highest percentages of forest coverage in West Africa. According to recent estimates, about 43% of Liberia’s total land area is covered by forest, making it one of the most forested countries in the region. The country is part of the Upper Guinean Forest ecosystem, a biodiversity hotspot known for its rich tropical rainforests.
Liberia has experienced significant deforestation due to logging, agriculture, and civil conflicts. Despite this, it still maintains substantial forest coverage compared to many other West African nations. However, Liberia has significant forest coverage that’s noteworthy in West Africa.
Liberia contains the largest portion (about 43%) of the remaining Upper Guinean Forest Ecosystem of West Africa; this is a different statistic from the total African forest coverage. The Upper Guinean Forest is a specific forest system that once stretched from Guinea to Cameroon.
Based on available data, Guinea has the highest forest coverage in West Africa, with approximately 65-70% of its land area still forested. This is primarily due to the country’s extensive tropical rainforests in the Upper Guinea region, which includes significant portions of the Guinea Highlands and dense forest zones.
Liberia’s forests are still very significant because they cover approximately 4.3 million hectares. They represent one of the last major remnants of the Upper Guinean Forest; they are considered a global biodiversity hotspot and they provide critical habitat for numerous endangered species.
According to the FAO’s Global Forest Resources Assessment, Africa has approximately 636.6 million hectares of forest cover.
The largest forest areas in Africa are found in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Angola, Zambia, Mozambique, and Tanzania. Our search further found that the Congo Basin rainforest, the world’s second-largest tropical forest after the Amazon, accounts for about 180 million hectares of this total.
Here are the countries with the highest forest areas in Africa.
Conclusion: Based on our search and findings, Guinea-Bissau has the highest forest area in West Africa, according to FAO‘s recent report. Therefore, the EPA head is correct on the claim that Liberia has over 40%.
Written by Watson Richards, Grant Fellow
