Canquelifa

Canquelifa is a proposed forest reserve in the Gabu Region of eastern Guinea-Bissau.^[1] The World Database on Protected Areas maps it in the north of the region.^[2] The 2018 United Nations List of Protected Areas, compiled from the July 2018 World Database on Protected Areas, records it with Proposed status and an area of 247.04 km2.^[3] It is one of five forest reserves, with Salifo, Dungal, Sumbundo and Mansoa, in the protected-area institute's long-term plan to expand the terrestrial system.^[4]

The Guinean forest-savanna mosaic ecoregion supports mammals such as leopard, hippopotamus and red-flanked duiker, and birds such as turacos and hornbills.^[5]

Inland Guinea-Bissau lies within the Guinean forest-savanna mosaic, where grassland with scattered fire-adapted trees alternates with forested zones.^[5]

The Gabu Region is an inland area covered with savannah or light savannah woodland, and its highest point is Monte Torin at 262 m.^[6]

The reserve lies in north-eastern Guinea-Bissau, which has a Sudanian climate with two distinct seasons: a dry season from November to May and a rainy season from June to October.^[7] Rainfall there is 1,200 to 1,500 mm a year, spread over about 107 days, and the mean annual temperature is 27.4 degrees C.^[7]

The Gabu Region has its capital at Gabu and five sectors (Boe, Gabu, Piche, Pirada and Sonaco); it recorded 205,608 residents in 2009.^[6] A village of the same name in the Piche sector had a fortified structure in the pre-colonial period: an 1849 drawing shows the tata of Kankelefa, the residence and administrative centre of the leader of Paquesi within the Kaabu Empire, with concentric rammed-earth walls 12 m tall.^[8] The Kaabu state lasted from 1537 to 1867.^[9]

Canquelifa appears in the 2018 United Nations List with Proposed status and no year of designation.^[3] IBAP, the national institute for biodiversity and protected areas created in 2004, does not name Canquelifa among the eight protected areas on its institutional presentation page.^[10] A 2018 terminal evaluation of a UNDP-GEF project lists Canquelifa among the five forest reserves in IBAP's long-term plan. The plan was to expand the terrestrial protected-area estate in phases, tied to growth in management capacity and funding, with the first phase limited to the Dulombi-Boe-Tchetche complex.^[4]

Gabu is the regional capital.^[6]

The 2018 UNDP-GEF terminal evaluation notes that most of the areas proposed for protection are inhabited by long-standing communities with traditional land uses, so the new categories and internal zoning were expected to lean toward sustainable use rather than strict conservation.^[4] Across the Bafata and Gabu regions more broadly, an FAO community-forestry programme working with four communities reports local forest committees, land restoration and nursery work, alongside firebreaks that are hard to maintain and illegal logging that persists on the edges of community lands despite local bylaws.^[11]