ORYX VOL 27 NO 3 . Tanzanian coastal forests - new information on status and biological importance Neil D. Burgess, Alex Dickinson and Nicholas H. Payne This paper presents the current results of a continuing survey of the distribution, status and biological importance of Tanzanian coastal forests. The Frontier- Tanzania Coastal Forest Research Programme has shown that at least 34 locations, and possibly another eight, support important coastal forests. There are probably 350-500 sq km of forest remaining, with most sites smaller than 20 sq km. Most sites, and 75-85 per cent of the total area, are located in Forest Reserves. Coastal forest supports many endemic taxa and many individual forests support species and subspecies known from nowhere else. All these forests are severely threatened and effective conservation action is a priority. The Frontier-Tanzania project findings are contributing to conservation programmes co-ordinated by the Wildlife Conservation Society of Tanzania and the World Wide Fund for Nature (Tanzania). Introduction Sheil (1992) presented a general outline of the biological importance of Tanzanian coastal forests and the intense human pressure they face. The Frontier-Tanzania Coastal Forest Research Programme, a collaborative venture of the Faculty of Science of the University of Dar es Salaam and the Society for Environmental Exploration (London), has been visiting these forests since June 1989 and plans to continue operating until all forest sites have been sur- veyed and assessed in terms of their biology and socio-economic features. This paper gives an up-to-date summary of the distribution, status and biological importance of coastal forests in Tanzania and shows how this infor- mation is assisting conservation efforts. Methods of assessment Probable locations of coastal forests were de- duced from a forest cover map for Tanzania produced using satellite images from the 1970s (Rodgers et ah, 1985) in conjunction with the Forest Reserve Map for Tanzania (1962) and 1:50,000 topographic maps. Staff at the University of Dar es Salaam and the Wildlife Conservation Society of Tanzania also pro- vided information on the location of forest sites. Field visits are being carried out to all po- tential sites to determine the type of vegeta- tion and to map areas of forest. Most field visits have been undertaken by expeditions of the Frontier-Tanzania Coastal Forest Research Programme, the remainder by the Danish and Tanzanian sections of the International Council for Bird Preservation. Coastal forests in Tanzania The positions of all known and probable coastal forests in Tanzania are presented in Figure 1 (updated from Sheil, 1992). Table 1 presents summary information on the extent of forest vegetation at each site (where known) and the legal status and extent of any associ- ated protected area. A minimum of 350 sq km of coastal forest is known to remain in Tanzania, but there could be a further 100-200 sq km in regions yet to be visited. Few of the 34 known coastal forests are larger than 20 sq 169 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605300027976 Published online by Cambridge University Press