Hasina RAKOUTH, University of Antananarivo, Faculty of Sciences, Plants Biology and Ecology Department, Madagascar
Maciej NOWAK, Sorbonne Université, Laboratoire Médiations, France
Malagasy woody species of the Diospyros genus (Ebenaceae) are among the most exploited and prized on the international market. Due to the high market value of this precious wood, the irrational and increasingly illegal exploitation of Diospyros in Madagascar threatens the disappearance of some species that are still poorly recognized. Moreover, the uncontrolling looging affects the reduction of forest compactness that shelters species diversity. In an attempt to mitigate the overexploitation problem, all species of the Diospyros were included in CITES Appendix II (CITES, 2013). Among the currently estimated 250 species of Diospyros existing in Madagascar, about half have been described, such that 84 are currently classified as potentially exploitable wood source species (Schatz et al., 2021). Therefore, as many of these species grow side by side in the forest, it is essential to be able to distinguish between those that are suitable for harvesting and those that should be protect. Furthermore, in the face of global climate change and environmental factors such as forest area reduction and fragmentation, the lack of knowledge enabling current and future prediction of Diospyros distribution requires the developing of maps providing the base for environmental strategy such as sustainable harvesting programme. Therefore, the first study on the potential current and future distribution modelling of Diospyros using the theory of maximum entropy (Merow et al., 2013) was conducted. We selected 17 species belonging to the monophyletic group of Section Forbesia, five of which were assessed as non-threatened and therefore would be species with potential for exploitation (Linan et al.,2021). During the modeling process, we used climate scenarios from WorldClim data resources, forest cover changes data and digital elevation model of Madagascar. The main outcome showed, that the future distribution of our studied species will differ significally from the present state.
Mots clés : Deforestation|Precious wood|Ebony tree|Species distribution
A104000MN