Meeting the challenge of conserving Africa's biodiversity: The role of GIS, now and in the future

Africa, with its rich biodiversity housed in large tracts of relatively intact forest, savannas and wetlands remains an important focus of global conservation efforts. In their attempts to stem the loss of this biodiversity, African conservation scientists are increasingly reliant on Geographic Information Systems (GIS) as important tools in their work with landowners, land managers and decision-makers. We discuss three interlinked areas where we feel GIS and spatial modelling has had, and continues to have much to offer African conservation science and practice: (i) in bringing spatial data to bear on diagnosing conservation problems; (ii) in considering the impact of future landscape change on Africa's natural resources; (iii) on identifying possible solutions to the problems identified in (i) and (ii) through conservation interventions and planning. We highlight how these GIS developments have helped broaden society's engagement in conservation in Africa. We discuss these developments using real world examples from Africa and conclude with some opportunities and challenges to the future application of GIS in conservation over the next decades.