Gabon botanists catalogue rainforest plants under threat

Botanists in Gabon are working to identify and preserve plant species in the country's rainforests, where they say many species remain poorly understood and some habitats are under pressure from development.

Archange Boupoya, director of the Sibang botanical garden in Libreville, said his team is still identifying Gabon's biodiversity so it can be protected. He said botanists discover an average of 10 new species each year during surveys.

Boupoya said Gabon is believed to have between 7,000 and 10,000 known plant species, about one-tenth of them under threat. The country is part of the Congo Basin and remains 88 percent covered by jungle.

The Sibang team works with scientists from the Missouri Botanical Garden in the United States. Researchers collect plants in the forest, dry and document them in Gabon, and then work with botanists from the United States, Britain, France and Belgium to identify samples.

The botanical collection, made up of about 100,000 plants, is now stored at the national parks agency after surviving a fire at its former site during post-election violence in 2016.

Boupoya said threats include urbanisation, industrialisation, deforestation, mining and oil activity. He said some aquatic plants near waterfalls are threatened by the Kinguele hydroelectric dam, whose construction is expected to be completed within weeks.

The work comes as the United Nations COP17 biodiversity conference opens in Armenia, where protection of rare and exceptional species is a central theme.