Nimba Mountains: Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia work towards harmonised cross-border database

To ensure the preservation of the ecosystems of the forest landscape of the Nimba Mountains Reserve located between Guinea, Ivory Coast and Liberia, the GIS and Environmental Management Officer, Moussa Diallo, organised a cross-border meeting in Danané with the reserve’s managers. Teams from the three countries, including CEGENS (Guinea), OIPR (Côte d’Ivoire) and FDA-CMC (Liberia), took part in a four-day exchange to set up a consistent data collection database common to all three countries. Among the participants were ENNR’s chief biologist, Grâce Kotee Sanzi, ENNR’s park manager, El Amarah Konowah, RBMN’s chief curator, Maoro Zoumanigui, and OIPR’s GIS officer, Ange Alex Beda.
The data is recorded using Kobo Toolbox software stored on a smartphone and then analysed with SMART, mapping software and Kobo Toolbox. The data collection form designed for the three countries (Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia) was revised to take into account the concerns of all and unanimously approved.

At the end of the consultation, several recommendations were made:

• to organise a joint patrol of the three countries to identify illegal occupants in the landscape;
• to establish a common ecological monitoring database for the three countries;
• and periodic meetings to agree on certain themes concerning the World Heritage Site.