Pangolin Conservation in West Africa: The Overlooked Crisis

While international attention to pangolin trafficking tends to focus on Asian demand and the massive seizures that make headlines, the quieter crisis unfolding in West Africa may be equally devastating. Three pangolin species inhabit the forests of the region, and they face a dual threat that is unique to this part of the continent: industrial-scale bushmeat hunting driven by local demand, and a growing pipeline of scales feeding international trafficking networks. For decades, conservation investment in the region has lagged far behind what is needed. That is now beginning to change.

Three Species Under Pressure

All three species range across the Guinea forest belt from Sierra Leone through Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, and Cameroon into the Congo Basin. The white-bellied pangolin was reclassified from Vulnerable to Endangered on the IUCN Red List in 2019, reflecting inferred population declines over the previous 21 years driven by forest loss and escalating exploitation. The giant pangolin was also uplisted to Endangered. The black-bellied pangolin remains classified as Vulnerable but is expected to follow the same trajectory.

Bushmeat: The Primary Driver

A landmark study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution in June 2025 fundamentally reshaped understanding of why pangolins are being killed in West Africa. Researchers led by Dr Charles Emogor of Cambridge and Harvard interviewed more than 800 hunters and traders across 33 locations in southeastern Nigeria’s Cross River Forest. Their findings were stark: 98% of pangolins caught in the region were hunted for food, not scales.

Approximately 70% of pangolin scales were discarded after butchering. Pangolin meat fetched three to four times the price of scales at local markets. Approximately 97% of pangolins were captured opportunistically during other hunting activities rather than through dedicated pangolin hunts. Local palatability ratings ranked pangolin among the most prized meats available, scoring nearly 9 out of 10. The study estimated that approximately 21,000 pangolins are killed annually in the Cross River Forest region alone.

This research challenges the dominant narrative that international scale trafficking is the primary threat to African pangolins. In West Africa, local bushmeat consumption appears to be the more immediate driver of decline.

Cameroon: Landmark Legislation and Demand Reduction

Cameroon passed one of the strongest pangolin protection laws on the continent in July 2024. Law No. 2024-008, a major revision of legislation originally established in 1994, classifies all three pangolin species as Class A protected animals — the highest protection category. Penalties for slaughtering, capturing, keeping, or marketing Class A species include fines of 20 to 50 million CFA francs (US$34,000–$84,000) and prison sentences of 15 to 20 years. Crucially, possessing pangolin scales is treated as equivalent to killing a pangolin.

Enforcement has already begun. On 10 August 2024, MINFOF agents conducted a surprise operation at the Nkoldongo bushmeat market in Yaoundé, seizing five white-bellied pangolins. A seller was arrested and subsequently sentenced to two years in prison.

WildAid’s “No Pangolin On My Plate” campaign has taken a parallel approach, working directly with the restaurant sector. Campaigners approached 394 restaurants across Yaoundé, Douala, Bertoua, Ebolowa, and Mbalmayo. Of 137 restaurants found to be serving pangolin meat, 59 (43%) pledged to stop. In total, 214 restaurants have joined the campaign. A 2024 WildAid survey found a 27% decline in monthly pangolin meat consumption in the surveyed cities compared to 2022 baseline data.

There are also encouraging signals from the market side. According to data compiled by wildlife law enforcement group LAGA, pangolin scale prices in Cameroon dropped 45–75% between 2020 and 2025. This coincided with China’s end-of-2024 announcement of strict controls on pangolin scales in traditional medicine, and the removal of 13 patented medicines containing pangolin scales from the 2025 Chinese Pharmacopeia.

Nigeria: A Legislative Turning Point

Nigeria, which hosts all three West African pangolin species and serves as a major transit hub for international scale trafficking, has been operating under wildlife legislation that conservation groups have long described as inadequate. That may be about to change. In October 2025, Nigeria’s Senate passed the Endangered Species Conservation and Protection Bill, which lists pangolins under Schedule 1 — species in which hunting, eating, and trade are entirely prohibited.

The bill introduces penalties of up to 12 million naira (approximately US$8,300) and up to 10 years in prison for trafficking pangolin scales, ivory, and other products from threatened species. It also grants enhanced investigative authority for financial transactions and intelligence-led operations, along with asset recovery powers. The bill has been forwarded to the President for assent, and organisations including Wild Africa, EIA UK, and the Pangolin Conservation Fund have been actively supporting its passage.

The 30-Year Action Plan

In December 2025, the IUCN Species Survival Commission Pangolin Specialist Group launched the West Africa Regional Pangolin Conservation Action Plan at CITES CoP20 in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. It is the first regional action plan ever created for any African pangolin species.

The plan covers 11 West African range states with a 30-year roadmap spanning 2026 to 2056. It was developed through a participatory workshop in Accra, Ghana in March 2023, bringing together 85 stakeholders from government agencies, NGOs, wildlife rehabilitation centres, and research institutions. The plan identifies six major threat and intervention categories and establishes 16 conservation goals.

Dr Matthew H. Shirley, co-chair of the Pangolin Specialist Group, and Professor Olajumoke Morenikeji, the Group’s regional chair, led the process. The plan’s ambition reflects both the severity of the crisis and the growing institutional capacity in the region to respond to it.

On-the-Ground Conservation

Field-level conservation in West Africa is anchored by a growing network of organisations. In Cameroon’s Dja Faunal Reserve, the African Wildlife Foundation has supported over 430 anti-poaching operations between 2022 and 2024. Rangers and community scouts apprehended 26 poachers, destroyed 315 poaching camps, seized over 6,000 kilograms of bushmeat, and confiscated weapons and traps. Early morning patrols in villages on the reserve’s periphery have uncovered dedicated pangolin poacher hideouts.

In Benin, IFAW has expanded its K9 Brigade to include pangolin scale detection at key transit points, while in Ghana, university-led research programmes are building baseline data on white-bellied pangolin populations. The Conservation Leadership Programme has funded projects specifically focused on safeguarding white-bellied pangolins in Ghana’s remaining forest fragments.

These efforts remain underfunded relative to the scale of the problem. Most West African pangolin range states lack dedicated pangolin monitoring programmes, and baseline population data is sparse for all three species. The 30-year action plan acknowledges this explicitly: building research capacity across the region is one of its 16 core goals.

What Comes Next

West Africa’s pangolin crisis is structurally different from the trade-driven declines in Asia or the targeted poaching in southern Africa. Here, the primary threat is deeply embedded in local food systems, which means solutions must address both enforcement and livelihoods. Cameroon’s combination of severe legal penalties, bushmeat market interventions, and restaurant-level demand reduction campaigns may offer a model. Nigeria’s pending legislation, if signed and enforced, would close significant legal gaps. And the 30-year action plan provides, for the first time, a coordinated regional framework.

Whether these efforts can outpace the estimated 21,000 pangolins killed annually in just one region of one country remains the defining question.