Tropical rainforests face serious threats of land-use conversion and increasing pressure of resource use and Kakamega forest was no exception.The forest was a biodiversity-rich unique ecosystem and supports high popul...Tropical rainforests face serious threats of land-use conversion and increasing pressure of resource use and Kakamega forest was no exception.The forest was a biodiversity-rich unique ecosystem and supports high population.Poverty,prevalence of diseases and rising modern healthcare costs had increased dependence on herbal medicines from the forest.However,the effect of collecting medicinal plant materials and the related disturbances that contributed to habitat and biodiversity loss remained a little investigated.This paper examined the effect of ill human health on health of and Kakamega forest,western Kenya.A sample of 250 out of 2,100 households within 5-km distance around the forest was studied.A household questionnaire,observation schedule,digital camera and secondary literature were used to gather information.The study found a weak inverse relationship between usage of herbal medicine and health of and Kakamega forest.Also,binary logistic regression revealed that the health of the forest worsened with increased use of herbal medicine(at p<0.01 level)as demonstrated by debarking ceteris paribus.Thus,herbal therapy reduced the forest biodiversity population size and density.Understanding effects of harvesting herbal materials on the forest was critical for drawing up conservation priorities,and incentives which balance human and forest ecosystem health.展开更多
In the study area located in Western Kenya near the Lake Victoria, severe soil erosion occurred and it thought to relate to vegetation degradation caused by overgrazing. The livestock density estimated by analyzing sa...In the study area located in Western Kenya near the Lake Victoria, severe soil erosion occurred and it thought to relate to vegetation degradation caused by overgrazing. The livestock density estimated by analyzing satellite image (1.39 TLU/ha for available grazing lands) was lower than that of measured for seven farmers’ grazing lands using GPSs (4.41 TLU/ha, 2011) with variation from 0.83 to 12.36 TLU/ha. Thus, it is clear that the grasslands used by farmers are limited compared with the area of estimated available land for grazing identified by analyzing the satellite image. According to growth-consumption rate model that was developed by the Nyangito et al. (2008) in southeastern Kenya, if livestock density reaches over 7 TLU/ha, pasture growth rate became lower than consumption rate. Grass biomasses of the grazing lands were kept low (less than 50 g/50 × 50 cm2) under high livestock density (three farmers out of seven were higher than 7 TLU/ha). In addition, rainfall pattern is very unstable and we observed stunted growth of grasses during dry spells. Therefore, we concluded that overgrazing. It means that inhibition of continuous re-growth of grasses due to high grazing pressure has been occurred even for small area and contributed to the soil erosion.展开更多
文摘Tropical rainforests face serious threats of land-use conversion and increasing pressure of resource use and Kakamega forest was no exception.The forest was a biodiversity-rich unique ecosystem and supports high population.Poverty,prevalence of diseases and rising modern healthcare costs had increased dependence on herbal medicines from the forest.However,the effect of collecting medicinal plant materials and the related disturbances that contributed to habitat and biodiversity loss remained a little investigated.This paper examined the effect of ill human health on health of and Kakamega forest,western Kenya.A sample of 250 out of 2,100 households within 5-km distance around the forest was studied.A household questionnaire,observation schedule,digital camera and secondary literature were used to gather information.The study found a weak inverse relationship between usage of herbal medicine and health of and Kakamega forest.Also,binary logistic regression revealed that the health of the forest worsened with increased use of herbal medicine(at p<0.01 level)as demonstrated by debarking ceteris paribus.Thus,herbal therapy reduced the forest biodiversity population size and density.Understanding effects of harvesting herbal materials on the forest was critical for drawing up conservation priorities,and incentives which balance human and forest ecosystem health.
文摘In the study area located in Western Kenya near the Lake Victoria, severe soil erosion occurred and it thought to relate to vegetation degradation caused by overgrazing. The livestock density estimated by analyzing satellite image (1.39 TLU/ha for available grazing lands) was lower than that of measured for seven farmers’ grazing lands using GPSs (4.41 TLU/ha, 2011) with variation from 0.83 to 12.36 TLU/ha. Thus, it is clear that the grasslands used by farmers are limited compared with the area of estimated available land for grazing identified by analyzing the satellite image. According to growth-consumption rate model that was developed by the Nyangito et al. (2008) in southeastern Kenya, if livestock density reaches over 7 TLU/ha, pasture growth rate became lower than consumption rate. Grass biomasses of the grazing lands were kept low (less than 50 g/50 × 50 cm2) under high livestock density (three farmers out of seven were higher than 7 TLU/ha). In addition, rainfall pattern is very unstable and we observed stunted growth of grasses during dry spells. Therefore, we concluded that overgrazing. It means that inhibition of continuous re-growth of grasses due to high grazing pressure has been occurred even for small area and contributed to the soil erosion.
