Natural stands diversity and population structure of Lophira lanceolata Tiegh. ex Keay, a local oil tree species in Burkina Faso, West Africa Benjamin Lankoande ´ . Amade ´ Oue ´draogo . Joseph Issaka Boussim . Anne Mette Lykke Received: 15 March 2015 / Accepted: 22 February 2016 Ó Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2016 Abstract Non Timber Forest Products play an important role as source of food and income gener- ation in developing countries. In Burkina Faso, many wild tree species provide various useful products, among them the local oil tree, Lophira lanceolata which occurs in the western part of the country. This study aimed at assessing the habitat diversity and population structure of L. lanceolata’s natural stands according to land cover types. Two sites were considered: Banfora, where the use value of fruits is unknown and Orodara, where fruits are exploited for oil production. A stratified and oriented sampling scheme based on the occurrence of L. lanceolata and land cover was applied using rectangular plots of 50 m 9 20 m. Phytosociological and quantitative inventories were carried out to assess the woody species diversity of stands and L. lanceolata popula- tion structure, respectively. Species diversity indices, structural parameters were computed and analyses of variance, Chi square test were performed to compare sites according to land cover types. The results showed high woody species diversity associated with L. lanceolata stands (H = 3.2–3.6). The densities of L. lanceolata ranged between 94 and 280 trees per hectare, with significant differences between land cover types and sites. The population pattern showed a good regeneration potential and high resource avail- ability. L. lanceolata was fairly resilient to human pressure and tended to recolonize disturbed lands. With a high potential for sustainable management, L. lanceolata is a promising NTFP species which can contribute to improve the local and national economy. Keywords Land cover  Lophira lanceolata  Oil plant  Species occurrence  Population structure  Regeneration potentials Introduction Earlier interests in forests were mainly focused on wood supplies, but recently the forest production concepts have widened to consider all forest products including non-timber forest products (NTFPs) (FAO 2010). NTFPs are essential for people’s livelihood in Africa (Shackleton et al. 2011; Traore ´ et al. 2011; B. Lankoande ´  A. Oue ´draogo (&)  J. I. Boussim Laboratoire de Biologie et Ecologie Ve ´ge ´tales, UFR Sciences de la Vie et de la Terre, Universite ´ de Ouagadougou, 03 B.P. 7021, Ouagadougou 03, Burkina Faso e-mail: lankoandehatina@yahoo.fr A. Oue ´draogo e-mail: o_amade@yahoo.fr; amadeouedraogo@gmail.com J. I. Boussim e-mail: ijboussim@gmail.com A. M. Lykke Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Vejlsovej 25, 8600 Silkeborg, Denmark e-mail: aml@bios.au.dk 123 Agroforest Syst DOI 10.1007/s10457-016-9913-3