Forest Policy and Economics 12 (2010) 505512

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Forest Policy and Economics

j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s ev i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / f o r p o l

Community perception of biodiversity conservation within protected areas in Benin

Fifanou G. Vodouh a,, Ousmane Coulibaly b, Anselme Adgbidi c, Brice Sinsin a
a
b
c

Laboratory of Applied Ecology, University of Abomey-Calavi, 01 BP 526 Cotonou, Benin

International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, 08 B.P. 0932 Tri Postal, Cotonou, Benin
Laboratoire d'Etude sur la Pauvret et la Performance de l'Agriculture de la Facult des Sciences Agronomiques Universit d'Abomey-Calavi, 01 BP 526 Cotonou, Benin

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 28 August 2009
Received in revised form 25 May 2010
Accepted 9 June 2010
Keywords:
Benin
Biodiversity conservation
Pendjari National Park
Local communities
People perception
Resource use

a b s t r a c t
Commitment of local communities to protected areas is essential for conserving biodiversity. However, in
many developing countries like Benin, former management strategies kept human from protected areas
using coercion. Fortunately, more recent regimes attempt to give local populations more control on the
management but little is known about local residents' perceptions, beliefs and attitudes toward the
management of these areas. This study, carried out around the Pendjari National Park, determined factors
which support local communities' positive perceptions towards biodiversity conservation in the park,
analysed their assessment of current park management activities compared to former management
approaches and draw the implications for effective participatory management of protected areas. We
collected socio-demographic data from 164 residents on their awareness of conservation methods. We
used Stepwise Discriminant Analysis to differentiate the variables that had the greatest power for
discriminating between local residents' perception to conserve or not biodiversity and to manage the park.
The ndings indicated that the positive behavior of local communities towards conservation of
biodiversity within Pendjari National Park was highly correlated with the current management strategy
that involved more effectively local communities, the educational level of participants and their
geographical origins. Participants' perceptions of biodiversity conservation were strongly related to
locally perceived benets. Although 89% of participants were favorable to the concept of biodiversity
conservation within the park, the decision to ban encroachments due to agricultural activities increased
negative opinion on this park management option. Our results suggested that understanding local
residents' perceptions and using them as a starting point to improve the parkpeople relationship could
help park management staff to involve more effectively local communities and improve their awareness
about biodiversity conservation within the park.
2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
In Africa, protected areas are the cornerstone of biological
conservation. As dened by the International Union for Conservation
of Nature (IUCN), protected area is a clearly dened geographical
space, recognized, dedicated and managed, through legal or other
effective means, to achieve the long-term conservation of nature with
associated ecosystem services and cultural values (Dudley, 2008). One
basic objective of a system plan for protected areas is to effectively
protect, develop and maintain representative samples of the various
biotopes in the areas where they are installed (Abuzinada, 2003).
Although protected areas have usually been set aside from human
exploitation, it is now increasingly recognized that they should play a
role in sustaining livelihood of adjacent local communities (Hamilton
et al., 2000; Walpole and Goodwin, 2001; Charnley et al., 2007). Forest

Corresponding author. 02 BP 8033 Cotonou, Benin. Tel.: +229 95067564.

E-mail address: vodouhefanou@yahoo.fr (F.G. Vodouh).
1389-9341/$ see front matter 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.forpol.2010.06.008

reserves must be protected for the benets of present and future

generations, but the ways to ensure this protection are open to debate
(Dahlberg, 2005; Charnley et al., 2007). Over the past century,
conservation has largely relied on national protected areas controlled
by central governments (Berkes, 2004; Berkes, 2007). The army was
deployed in these areas to protect forest and wildlife resources from
people (Hackel, 1999). The revenue earned from protected areas
management (mainly park entrance fees) went directly to the
government and little, if any, returned for local level development
(Hackel, 1999). All this fostered widespread parkpeople conicts and
led local people to hold negative perceptions toward these areas
(Hulme and Murphree, 2001; Manfredo et al., 2004).
Responding to perceptions of many conservationists especially
those working in poorer countries that wildlife conservation and
protected areas were doomed unless local communities become an
integral part of conservation efforts (Hackel, 1999; Hamilton et al.,
2000; Hulme and Murphree, 2001; Manfredo et al., 2004; Yeo-Chang,
2009), new strategies, often referred to as community conservation
have evolved over the past two decades (Ineld and Namara, 2001).

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The community conservation approach seeks to accommodate local

peoples' needs and aspirations by empowering them, promoting their
active participation in local resource management, and improving
their economic welfare (Songorwa, 1999; Ineld and Namara, 2001;
Mehta and Heinen, 2001).
Indeed, local communities' perceptions of protected areas inuence the kinds of interactions people have with them, and thereby
conservation effectiveness (Ormsby and Kaplin, 2005; Allendorf et al.,
2006; Ramakrishnan, 2007). Their perceptions of protected areas
management play also an important role in their attitudes toward
them (Alexander, 2000; Adams and Hulme, 2001; Ineld and Namara,
2001; Holmes, 2003; Picard, 2003; McClanahan et al., 2005; Ormsby
and Kaplin, 2005; Allendorf et al., 2006; Anthony, 2007). Therefore,
understanding residents' perceptions about conservation is the key to
improve the protected areaspeople relationship if protected areas
are to achieve their goals (Weladji et al., 2003).
Many factors inuence the perceptions of the protected areas
held by residents living in their periphery. These include the history
of park management, the degree of awareness of protected areas
existence (Ormsby and Kaplin, 2005), the education level (McClanahan et al., 2005), the reference to future generation (Bauer, 2003)
and the gender and ethnicity (Gillingham and Lee, 1999; Mehta and
Heinen, 2001). The understanding of all these factors is important to
improve the relationship between local residents and protected
areas and will improve people awareness about biodiversity
conservation within these areas.
However, little research has focused on the status of Benin's
protected areas, and little is known about the perceptions of local
residents toward the management of these areas. Knowing the
interest of understanding the factors which support local people
positive perception about protected areas and biodiversity conservation within them in the development of management plan, it is
crucial to develop strategies to achieve this goal. The present study
carried out in Pendjari National Park in Benin (West Africa) provides
a good example to assess local communities' perceptions about
protected areas. Pendjari National Park was declared a Game Reserve
in 1954, and upgraded to a National Park in 1961 and Biosphere
Reserve in 1986 (IUCN, 2002). Until 1993, the conservation
strategies of this protected area and the management of the park
resources, did not include communities living adjacent to it, often
resulting in situations of conict between local people and forest
administration (Tiomoko, 2007). Forest classication in Benin has
been governed by the 1987 law 87-014 (CENAGREF, 1997), which
was underpinned by the idea of protecting forest reserves from
human use (Tiomoko, 2007; Belem et al., 2007). Today, the current
management regime governed by the law no. 93-009 of 2 July 1993
attempts to give local populations more control on the management
of resources in the peripheral areas (CENAGREF, 2005). In accordance with current management approach, most of the villages
adjacent to the park have formed Village Associations for the
Management of Wildlife Reserves known and referred to as
AVIGREF. This association enables villagers to participate in
decision-making process about the park and to share the benets
from park entry fees for tourism, hunting licenses and nes imposed
for illegal activities (IUCN, 2002). In the Pendjari National Park
management approach, the AVIGREF are direct partners of the
National Centre for the Management of Wildlife Reserve, an
autonomous institution created by the government in 1996 to take
charge of the conservation and management of the protected area
(CENAGREF, 2005).
To assess the effectiveness of these new park management
policies for the long-term conservation of the park resources, it is
important to gain insights into the factors that determine local
communities' current positive perceptions about conservation of
biodiversity within the park and their impressions relating to the
park managers' activities. Following insights from previous research

that local people perception is inuenced by the type of management and the benets they perceived from protected areas (Ormsby
and Kaplin, 2005), we hypothesized that people who developed
positive perception about Pendjari National Park and its biodiversity
are those who get high benets from the park. We also made the
assumption that people who have positive opinion about the current
park management methods developed positive perception about
biodiversity conservation within it. Based on preliminary results
(Gillingham and Lee, 1999; Mehta and Heinen, 2001) and knowledge of cultural differences among ethnic groups and gender in the
area (Vodouh et al., 2009), we also made assumption that local
communities perceptions are function of their sex, origin, main
activities, formal educational level and ethnic group afliation. The
objectives of this study were to (1) determine factors which support
local communities' current positive perceptions towards biodiversity conservation in Pendjari National Park, and (2) analyse their
assessment of current park management activities compared to
former management approaches and draw the implications for
effective participatory management of protected areas.
2. Methods
2.1. Study area
The study was conducted in the Pendjari Biosphere Reserve
located in the north west of the Republic of Benin (1030 to 1130 N;
050 to 200 E; Fig. 1).
The region mostly lies between 150200 m above sea level and
covers 5000 km2 (IUCN, 2002). The reserve is not fenced, but is
limited by two peripheral roads. The climate is of tropical type with a
seven-month dry period. The vegetation is dominated by savannah
including open grasslands, gallery forest and network of ponds that
are associated with populations of water birds (IUCN, 2002). The
reserve supports and offers the best protection to the largest
populations of roan antelope, western hartebeest, western kob,
buffalo (both the small red forest buffalo and the larger black
savannah form are found), lion and elephant in West Africa (IUCN,
2002; CENAGREF, 2005).
Nearly 30,000 people, divided into three main ethnic groups
(Berba, Gourmantche and Waama) live in 20 villages in the transition
zone of the Pendjari Biosphere reserve (CENAGREF, 2005). The
literacy rate in the study area is very low and the people surrounding
the parks and hunting zones still retain much of their traditional
lifestyles and have extensive knowledge of wildlife resources (IUCN,
2002). The most important livelihood activity is subsistence
agriculture.
Until 1993, the Pendjari National Park was managed using
coercion to keep human from protecting park. This results in
frequent conicts between forests guards and local communities.
To stop this situation, the current management regime attempts to
give local populations more control on the management of the
peripheral areas (CENAGREF, 2005). Therefore, each village has their
villagers associations of wildlife management (AVIGREF); direct
partners of the structure in charge of the park. Their missions are to:
1. Educate the communities from adjacent villages on the necessity to
preserve the fauna and its habitat;
2. raise awareness of local people about the Pendjari National Park's
regulations;
3. assist the National Centre for the Management of Wildlife Reserve
carry out control and surveillance (anti-poaching) activities and
ensure the adherence to regulations related to hunting;
4. promote the sustainable management of fauna (protably for the
local communities);
5. contribute to the management of the zone of controlled activities
and buffer zones; and

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507

Fig. 1. Map of Pendjari National Park and its biosphere reserve in the northern part of Benin. It illustrates the location of park surrounding villages and different zones as suggested by
biosphere reserve concept.

6. contribute to the economic development of adjacent villages by

building social infrastructures.
2.2. Household surveys
To collect data, we selected eight villages based on the dominant
ethnic group in each of them (four Berba villages, two Gourmantche
villages and two Waama villages) (Fig. 1). This village's selection
strategy is justied by previous studies who revealed that the
perception of the value of park resources is strongly inuenced by
socio-cultural characteristics of population (Weladji et al., 2003; Case
et al., 2005; Baral and Heinen, 2007). We also identied and
interviewed 14 Fulani living in some selected villages. Fulani is
minority ethnic group scattered all over the reserve surrounding
villages. Each ethnic group was represented in proportion to their
occurrence in the overall Pendjari Biosphere Reserve population
(Table 1).
In total, we selected 164 households based on household
members' willingness to be involved in the study. Indeed, within
Table 1
Characteristics of research sample showing number of participants per study village
and their socio-cultural and gender characteristics.
Villages

Total number of households

interviewed

Number of participants by ethnic

group and by gender

Batia
Kan

20
32

Koualgou
Kourou

20
44

Mamoussa
Nanbou

2
12

Gourmantche (6 F, 14 M)
Berba (14 F, 10 M)
Fulani (0 F, 8 M)
Gourmantche (8 F, 12 M)
Berba (16 F, 28 M)
Fulani (0 F, 2 M)
Berba (0 F, 2 M)
Waama (2 F, 6 M)
Fulani (2 F, 2 M)
Waama (14 F, 14 M)
Fulani (4 F, 2 M)

Tchawassaga 28
Wanthoun
6
F = female; M = male.

each selected village, we entered in any house, established contact by

introducing ourselves while presenting the objectives of the study.
We used a structured questionnaire to interview one adult, the
household heads, or in their absence, any adult member older than
18 years who is willing to participate in our research. The participants'
age ranged from 18 to 80 years.
We collected data from November to March, which is the best
period of year for interviews since few people work in eld during the
dry season. Questionnaires were written in French but the interviews
were entirely conducted in participant local languages (Berba,
Gourmantche, Waama and Peulh). Two months before data collection,
we conducted a pilot interview with a sample of 20 households to test
the questionnaire in Tanongou, one of the park surrounding villages.
During this test, the interviewers were trained on how to administer
the questions.
Most of the questions were closed-ended, although we included
some open-ended questions to investigate participants' perception
towards biodiversity conservation and park management. We also
recorded data about participants' age, gender, profession, origin,
ethnic group afliation and educational level. We asked participants
about their involvement in park activities, their link with local
organization in charge of park management, the benets they obtain
from park and their opinion on park management. We also collected
data on participants' economic activities, their various sources of
income and conservation awareness. We presented a summary of the
main questions in the questionnaire in Table 2.
2.3. Data analysis
We used Stepwise Discriminant Analysis in SPSS version 16 to
differentiate factors which determine local residents' perceptions to
conserve or not the biodiversity and to manage the park from the
others. The most common application of Stepwise Discriminant
Analysis is to include many variables in the study, in order to
determine the ones that discriminate between groups. The grouping
variable (dependant variable) is categorical variable and can have

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Table 2
Summary of the main questions of the questionnaire and some examples of answers.
Questions

Answers

Age, gender, ethnic group, education level, origin, main activity?

1880 years old; male/female; Berba/Gourmantche/Waama; illiterate/rst/second school

level; farmer/trainer
Do you know the main objective of the park?
Yes/no
Why was the park created?
Conservation/tourism/no opinion
Are you involved in park activities?
Yes/no
Are you member/responsible or have you a parent who is member/responsible of Father/mother/brother/cousin/uncle
AVIGREF?
Simple member/secretary/security guard/anti-poaching agent/tourist guides
Cite the most wanted resources from the park?
Non-Timber Forests Products/ceremony site/sh/other
Importance of the presence of the park to surrounding people?
Road maintenance/incomes from tourism/development projects/infrastructure
Point of view about the current park management method?
Good/bad/various reasons
Comparison between the current and former park management methods
Better/same/various reasons
Your expectation about the park management?
More involvement of local people/more land for agriculture/more revenue from protected
areas management

AVIGREF is the Village Associations for the Management of Wildlife Reserves.

more than two values. In this kind of analysis, the model of

discrimination is built step-by-step. Specically, at each step all
variables are reviewed and evaluated to determine which one will
contribute most to the discrimination between groups. That variable
will then be included in the model, and the process starts again.
Therefore, in our study case, to identify factors which determine
local residents' perceptions to conserve or not the biodiversity and
to manage the park, we used data related to participants' socioeconomic, demographic and perception towards biodiversity conservation and park management. These variables were identied in
previous studies as signicant predictors of perceptions about
conservation (Mehta and Kellert, 1998; Gillingham and Lee, 1999;
Sah and Heinen, 2001). Stepwise Discriminant Analysis attempts to
model the value of the dependent categorical variable (favorable or
unfavorable participants' viewpoints about biodiversity conservation in the National Park of Pendjari) based on its relationship to one
or more predictors. Predictors are participants' view about current
and former management approaches (their involvement in park
activities, their link with local organization in charge of park
management, the benets they obtain from park and their opinion
on park management) and their socio-demographic and cultural
characteristics (ethnic group afliation, origin, main activities,
gender and formal educational level). The values of each predictor
have a normal distribution and before their integration in the model,
we veried the correlation between them. Stepwise Discriminant
Analysis attempts to nd linear combinations of predictors that best
separate the two categories of the dependant variable. A forward
iterative inclusion of variables was performed to choose the
parameters with a higher discriminatory power based on the
Wilk's Lambda statistic (Johnson and Wichern, 1998). A tolerance
of 0.1 was set to eliminate the variables that provide superuous
information at 90% level along with those previously included in the
model. Given that we had unequal sample size for gender, ethnic
grouping and origin, we used the a priori classication probabilities
(McLachlan, 1992; Gll-Kaka et al., 2005). The validity of the
Stepwise Discriminate Analysis model is given by the value of the
model global correlation and the signicance of the Wilk's Lambda
statistic. More the canonical correlation value is near the value 1
better is the model. For the selected predictors, the signicance of
the Wilk's Lambda statistic was also considered. We used chi-square
test to investigate the difference in all combinations of independent
(educational level, benet got from the park, ethnic group, origin
and membership of AVIGREF) and dependent variables between
different groups.
2.4. Conceptual framework
Our perception of the world depends on our environment
through a complex network of mental answers learned and kept

by cultural (cultural code, believes, languages, religion, values) and

individuals factors (emotion, self esteem, personal experiences,
theoretical knowledge, intuition, prejudice). The connection between these elements determines the way we internalize each
situation. The concept of perception refers to the outcome of
applying our knowledge to a particular situation (Leeuwis, 2004).
For example, if an individual thinking about useful plants in his area
see that their availability diminish year by year, depending to the
importance he accords to these species, he will develops strategies
to ensure their sustainability. Therefore, our perception inuences
our attitude (Trakolis, 2001). Indeed, attitudes are formed in part by
communities' and individuals' perceptions and experiences (Ineld
and Namara, 2001). The attitude itself can be considered an
independent variable affecting behavior, however, and it can also
affect the independent variable of motivation. In one sense, the
attitude can also be considered an intervening variable since it is a
derivative of motivation which determines behavior (see review
Ouellet, 1978). We argue that people consider the implications of
their actions before they decide to engage or not to engage in a given
behavior (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980). Therefore, knowing people's
perceptions can produce useful information that could be incorporated into the decision-making process and lead to resolution of
conicts between local people and park authorities by improving
attitudes and altering behavior (Trakolis, 2001; Manfredo et al.,
2004).
Indeed, communities whose livelihoods chiey involve the direct
exploitation of local natural resources often come into conict with
the institutions of protected areas, which are primarily designated
for natural resource conservation or preservation (Anthony, 2007).
Sociologically, livelihood is dened as the activities, the assets, and
the access that jointly determine the living gained by an individual
or household (Ellis, 1998). Therefore, communities living around a
protected area developed activities which permit them to gain
materials for their survival from this area. One of the most common
uses of protected areas is tourism (see review Walpole and Goodwin,
2001). Protected areas in developing countries are increasingly
popular destinations for wildlife tourists, and tourism has the
potential to generate sustainable local benets, sufcient for local
people to value, and therefore protect, their wildlife heritage as a
source of income (Goodwin, 1996). But local people also rely on
protected areas to exploit Non-Timber Forest Products which are the
main source of livelihood of forest-dwelling communities (see
review Ros-Tonen, 2000). There are important for the livelihoods
of rural poor and contribute between 7 to 95% of household annual
cash income (Marshall et al., 2006). Concerning the Pendjari
National Park, local communities especially young residents, get
money from anti-poaching and tourism activities once they are
member of the Village Associations for the Management of Wildlife
Reserves.

F.G. Vodouh et al. / Forest Policy and Economics 12 (2010) 505512

3. Results
3.1. Factors affecting community acceptance on biodiversity conservation

509

Table 4
Stepwise Discriminant Analysis results showing the variables that have the highest
power for discriminating between local residents' perceptions to support or not the
biodiversity conservation within the Pendjari National Park.
Variables

Degree of
freedom

Wilks'
Lambda

Statistics Signicance
(F)

0. 949

8.446

0.004

0. 924
0. 903

6.394
5.487

0.002
0.001

The model of Stepwise Discriminant Analysis used to differentiate

the most discriminatory variables explaining the local communities
positive perception of the need to conserve biodiversity within the
Pendjari National Park is globally valid (Table 3).
The most discriminatory variables identied by the model were
participants' assessment of park management (VOIR) (Wilks' Lambda= 0.949, p b 0.004), educational level (NIV) (Wilks' Lambda = 0.924,
p b 0.002) and region of origin (ORI) (Wilks' Lambda= 0.903, p b 0.001;
Table 4).
Participant with higher education level and a favorable view of
the park management approach tended to have positive view
towards biodiversity conservation (Table 4). The proportion of
participants from villages near the park and who had favorable
perception of biodiversity conservation was higher than the number
of participants originating from other regions with unfavorable
views. Participants who had non-favorable perception of biodiversity
conservation were illiterate (Table 5).

Similarly, 98% of people involved in livestock commented negatively

on the staff decision to ban animal rearing within the park.
Less than a quarter of participants (mainly consisting of those who
were not members of Village Associations for the Management of
Wildlife Reserves) disagreed with the fact that they need authorization before going in the park to collect medicinal plants or fruits such
as Shea butter tree Vitellaria paradoxa seeds. Nearly 37% of
participants think that the 30% of total revenues generated through
hunting activities that were distributed to the population through
AVIGREF was insufcient.

3.2. Park benets as perceived by local people

4. Discussion

Participants referred to the park mainly for source of food (99% of

participants), medicinal plants (93%) and appropriate site for usage
ceremonies (57%). People's links with park for usage ceremonies vary
signicantly according to their ethnic group (24 = 35.368, b 0.0001).
Gourmantche people relied more on the park for usage ceremonies
than the Waama and Berba ethnic groups. Fulani used the park less for
this purpose.
Forty three percent of the participants got indirect benets from
the park in term of jobs (anti-poaching agent and tourist guides) with
a median annual salary of 18,500 FCFA (US$ = 450 CFA). Young people
(1825 years old) received signicantly higher salary (median = 29,000 FCFA; 22 = 87.26, b 0.0001). The building of socioeconomic infrastructure such as roads, health centers, schools and the
presence of many development projects are perceived by 30% of
participants as indirect benets from the park. Only 39% of
participants appreciated the existence of the park because of the
possibility for their children to see animals and benet from the park
resources.

4.1. Factors affecting local people perceptions about biodiversity

conservation around Pendjari National Park

Participants' assessment of 156

park management
Participants educational level 155
Participants region of origin
154

Our results suggest that people's positive perceptions of biodiversity conservation were strongly inuenced by their origin, educational
level and assessment about park management. Gender, age, ethnic
grouping, family size or membership of AVIGREF had less inuence.
These meaningful factors may be grouped into socio-demographic
(origin and educational level) and perception factors (assessment
about park management). Perceptions were relative to benets
obtained from park due to the current management approach. Similar
results were found by Pyrovetsi and Daoutopoulos (1997), Sah and
Heinen (2001) and Allendorf et al. (2006) who concluded that
indigenous people may express anti-environmental attitudes for
variety of reasons, including low education levels, lack of awareness
about environmental issues and lack of participation.
People's perceptions of park management strongly inuenced
their perception about biodiversity conservation (Alexander, 2000;
Holmes, 2003; Picard, 2003; McClanahan et al., 2005; Allendorf et al.,
2006). Our results revealed the importance of cooperation between

3.3. Community perceptions of the Pendjari National Park management

All participants were well acquainted with the park management
staff (National Centre for the Management of Wildlife Reserve) and
their role in the management of the park and biodiversity conservation. Nearly 75% of participants we interviewed appreciated the
management method used by the current staff, in comparison with
the repressive method previously used. The participants who were
members of the Village Associations for the Management of Wildlife
Reserves tended to have favorable view of park management
strategies (23 = 13.657, b 0.003). Ninety two percent of the participants (mainly farmers) said that the decision of the park management
staff to ban agricultural activities within the park boundaries
generated a strong negative opinion on the park management.
Table 3
Summary statistics to valid results of Stepwise Discriminant Analysis.
Indicators

Values

Degree of freedom

Chi-square

Signicance

Wilks' Lambda
Canonical Correlation

0.823
0.421

8.099

0.004

Table 5
Results of 2 tests of comparison between participant educational degree and their
perception about biodiversity conservation within Pendjari National Park (favorable or
unfavorable); N = 164.
Variables

Illiterate Primary Secondary Chi-square Degree Signicance

of
school school
freedom
and more

60.97
Frequency of
participants
favorable to
biodiversity
conservation
within the
park (%)
10.98
Frequency of
participants
unfavorable to
biodiversity
conservation
within the
park (%)

19.51

8.54

373.56

0.0000001

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F.G. Vodouh et al. / Forest Policy and Economics 12 (2010) 505512

resource users and managers in achieving conservation goals.

Indeed, the former management strategies of the park resources
did not include communities living adjacent to it. This brings local
people to have a feeling of injustice and they think that the central
government steals their resources. This results in frequent conicts
between forests guards and local communities who defy the
interdiction to go inside the park and to hunt animal or to do
agriculture. Therefore, the former management strategies had
conducted surrounding people to develop negative perception
about biodiversity conservation within the park. Unlike these
periods, the ongoing participatory approach in the Pendjari National
Park is much appreciated by participants. Local communities were
more concerned by conservation objectives. The participatory
management strategy allows them to harvest medicinal plants and
useful fruits once they receive authorization from Village Associations for the Management of Wildlife Reserves. Indeed, local
communities see through this institution their partner for the park
management activities. Their trust in this association is reinforced by
the fact that it's entirely made up of the representative community's
members who inform them about the well-founded of each park
activities. Their appurtenance into this association gives them the
privilege to have less costly meat during game hunt. All this
opportunities reinforce local people positive perception about park
management method and increase their awareness about biodiversity conservation. Moreover, the Pendjari National Park also permits
local people, especially young residents, to get money from antipoaching and tourism activities. Local communities also benet from
many development projects and infrastructure due to the presence
of the park. The ndings clearly suggest that benets are strong
incentive for people to perceive conservation positively. Correlation
between benets and positive perception of biodiversity conservation has been conrmed to be positively signicant in many cases
(Mehta and Heinen, 2001; Bauer, 2003; Silori 2007; Baral and
Heinen, 2007). The improvement of benets that local communities
got from the park will be a powerful incentive to increase their
willingness about biodiversity conservation within this area.
Educational level is one of the variables which affect people's
perception about biodiversity conservation in the Pendjari National
Park. All participants who are unfavorable to biodiversity conservation have a weak formal education level. This result supports the
positive link between consciousness about biodiversity conservation
and education showed by previous authors (Gillingham and Lee,
1999; Sah and Heinen, 2001; McClanahan et al., 2005; Anthony,
2007). In the case of this study the main reason which can explain
this situation is the participation of people with good formal
education level in many fairly paid activities such as anti-poaching
and tourism. They accompany tourists and get money and can also
developed solid friendship with some of them; some tourists use to
assist them for training and travel opportunities. Higher level of
education also helps to understand the role of the park and the
usefulness of the conservation of its biological diversity. Another
important reason which explains the relative high impact of
education on people's positive perception on biodiversity is that
those with good level of education rarely practice agriculture as their
main activity. They are involved in non agricultural jobs such as
teaching or working in local or national non government organizations. Thus, they have less contact with park staff and resources. This
nding reinforces the important role of education in sustainable
biodiversity conservation.
Although benets obtained directly from the park are the main
factor which improve people awareness about biodiversity conservation, those who originated from villages near the park also
supported the existence of the park because of the possibility for
their children to discover many animals and benet from the park
resources. They are developing biodiversity conservation consciousnesses that also involve future generations; that is good for park

sustainability. This nding appears to conrm surveys around parks

in Nigeria and Cameroon where people's agreement on the necessity
to protect forest for future generations conduct them to develop
positive attitudes about protected areas (Ite, 1996; Bauer, 2003;
Abdullahi et al., 2007). The reference to future generation in
supporting biodiversity conservation is very important and needs
support from the park staff for more generalization.
Fulani people, who are not from the region, expressed less
support for the existence of the park because they are mostly
traditional livestock keepers and used to rely on the park for grazing
and water for their cattle in dry season. They do not agree with the
ban on livestock access to the park and think that it isn't good if this
is just done to keep all local people out of the park area. This result
corroborates work done by Sah and Heinen (2001) in Nepal, Bauer
(2003) in Cameroon and Allendorf et al. (2006) in Upper Myanmar
(Burma) and highlights the diversity of perceptions that communities can hold toward biodiversity conservation.
Our ndings did not support other authors' results that age,
gender and ethnic grouping are signicant predictors of positive
perceptions about biodiversity conservation (Mehta and Kellert,
1998; Gillingham and Lee, 1999; Sah and Heinen, 2001; Nyhus et al.,
2003). The rst reason of this is the fact that in the Pendjari National
Park, all communities have equal access to park benets regardless
of gender, age or ethnic group afliation. There was also no
restriction in getting membership status of Village Associations for
the Management of Wildlife Reserves. Moreover, the non signicance of ethnic group afliation would also be explained by the
inexistence of the caste system in the area. The three main ethnic
groups settled in the area during the same period (early 19th
century) and there is not no supremacy relation between them
concerning the management of the park resources (Kiansi, 2008;
Vodouh et al., 2009). Therefore, these factors have less importance
in supporting people awareness about biodiversity conservation in
the Pendjari National Park. For long-term biodiversity conservation
in the area, there are need to improve people environmental
education and their positive assessment about the park management strategy.
4.2. Conclusion and implications for policy making
Although our ndings should be considered within the Pendjari
National Park's cultural and geographical context, this study has a
noteworthy relevance beyond the case we examined. The study
shows that the majority of participants knew about the park and
appreciated its existence. Participants were more likely to be
favorable towards biodiversity conservation because they could
benet from conservation activities. The partnership between
Village Associations for the Management of Wildlife Reserves and
park staff is a good experience for sustainable use of park resources
and deserves to be experimented in other protected areas. People
who benet from the Pendjari National Park, especially in terms of
employment opportunities such as anti-poaching ranger and
tourism guide, can hold more favorable attitudes towards the park,
and extension of these benets, in addition to locally relevant
education, may have the greatest potential in shaping attitudes
towards conservation.
This study allows to make some broad suggestions for wider
applications. Firstly, as presented in the study, local community
involvement in park management through Village Associations for
the Management of Wildlife Reserves had reinforced their positive
perceptions about biodiversity conservation. That is a good channel
which can be used by park staff to strengthen park sustainability.
Park staff should pursue the collaboration with Village Associations
for the Management of Wildlife Reserves and spark off the
integration of all park surrounding people in these associations.
Negotiations and exchange of information should be improved to

F.G. Vodouh et al. / Forest Policy and Economics 12 (2010) 505512

reduce the number of people who do not support park biodiversity

conservation. The minority that disliked the park was primarily
frustrated with management practices which limit surrounding
people access to land for agriculture and the weakness of part of
revenue returned to community. The reduction of people's demand
for more land for farming activities can be done with the
development of less extensive farming systems and the promotion
of some alternative income generating activities. The ongoing
organic agriculture project developed by park staff in collaboration
with AVIGREF could help in this way.
Secondly, the people's positive perception on park management is
a good opportunity for biological diversity conservation. Previous
studies had showed that people's perceptions of the protected areas
management also strongly inuenced their attitude about conservation (Alexander, 2000; Ormsby and Kaplin, 2005; Allendorf et al.,
2006; Ramakrishnan, 2007). The park staff should develop a policy to
increase this positive perception about its management strategy. This
can be done if these political arrangements could secure and enhance
benets get from park by local residents.
Thirdly, as education is one of the factors which has positive
impact on people perception of biodiversity conservation, it will be
necessary for park staff in collaboration with AVIGREF and nancial
and technical partners to develop environmental education. This
could be done especially for young people mainly in schools and in the
local language with adults. Indeed, to guaranty a better future for the
biodiversity, it's important to start involving kids and young, the
future managers of our environment. Young people will be trained on
the importance of biodiversity conservation and they will be directly
taught on how they could contribute to conserve it. They will be also
charged to aware their parents. Concerning the adults, the environmental education should build on positive perceptions that people
already hold and work on mitigating negative perceptions where it's
possible. This could be done through informal educational methods
(sensitization, organized activity, etc.). Education could be an
important way to motivate people to develop or reinforce positive
perception about biodiversity conservation.
Acknowledgements
This study was funded by Man and Biosphere United Nations
Educational, Scientic and Cultural Organization (MAB-UNESCO). We
thank Orou Gaoue, Margaret Pasquini, Romain Gll-Kakai, Aristide
Adomou and Ismail Moumouni for comments on an earlier version of
this paper. Thanks are also due to Tiomoko Djafarou, Kiansi Yantibossi
and Thou Aristide for their support.
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