Indigenous traditional knowledge on landscapes, biodiversity use in Mt. Elgon Forest Ecosystem and implication for conservation

Abstract

The integrity of the forest ecosystem is shaped by communities’ uses, traditional knowledge, and practices. Because community participation is critical in the management of conservation areas, it is essential that resource managers and policymakers understand local traditional knowledge, biodiversity use to inform appropriate interventions. This study was undertaken to document traditional indigenous knowledge on landscapes, biodiversity uses, and their impacts. It formed part of a wider study meant to develop forest restoration efforts to enhance the flow of ecosystems services and livelihoods of local communities in the Mt. Elgon forest ecosystem. The study used Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) techniques to capture traditional indigenous knowledge on landscapes, forest biodiversity uses, and their importance to local livelihoods. Types of landscapes and biodiversity uses were free listed and importance value assessed using the weighted ranking method. Twelve landscapes were identified as important to local people and their associated faunal and floral species. Fifteen plant and ten animal species were ranked in order of importance to local communities. These forest biodiversity resources provide human health, shelter, cultural and spiritual wellbeing, and cash income. This study has shown that forest biodiversity is important to the local livelihoods and local people have wealth of traditional knowledge on forest biodiversity, uses, and management practices. Although traditional knowledge is gradually declining because of socioeconomic and cultural change; it is imperative to integrate some of this knowledge in forest management.