Wildlife of
Togo

Primary Threats

• Natural habitats are increasingly fragmented by expansion of farms and settlements, especially in the central corridor and around protected-area edges. Gallery forests and riparian strips are narrowed or cleared, reducing connectivity for wildlife between remaining forested hills and savanna patches.
• Smallholder expansion and intensification (food crops and cash crops) convert savanna, woodland and fallows; shortened fallow cycles reduce natural regeneration. Encroachment pressure is particularly acute around the margins of large parks such as Fazao-Malfakassa and in the Oti basin where fertile valley bottoms attract cultivation.
• Most forest loss is driven by informal/illegal cutting for timber, poles, and especially fuelwood/charcoal. Selective removal of valuable trees and chronic fuelwood harvesting degrade remaining forest patches and woodland savannas, even where complete clearing has not occurred.
• Bushmeat hunting using snares, dogs, and firearms persists in rural areas and around protected areas, depressing populations of medium and large mammals. Hunting pressure often spikes during the dry season and can undermine recovery even where habitat remains.
• Domestic and cross-border trade (via corridors to Ghana and Benin, and through Lomé) affects species targeted for meat, traditional medicine, and pets. Pangolins, primates, reptiles, and certain birds are commonly cited in West African trade dynamics, and Togo's transport links can facilitate movement.
• Urban and peri-urban runoff, unmanaged solid waste, and wastewater around Lomé degrade coastal waters, lagoons and wetlands. Agricultural inputs also contribute to nutrient loading and pesticide contamination in lowland wetlands, affecting fisheries and bird habitat quality.
• Artisanal coastal fisheries face high effort and gear pressure; nearshore stocks are vulnerable where nursery habitats (lagoons, mangrove remnants) are degraded. In inland waters and lagoons, intensive fishing and small-mesh nets can reduce recruitment and resilience.
• Rising temperatures and increasingly erratic rainfall heighten drought risk in the north and intensify flood/erosion events in lowlands. These changes increase wildfire frequency and severity in savannas, reduce dry-season water availability for wildlife, and exacerbate coastal erosion and saline intrusion in lagoon systems.
• Phosphate extraction and associated infrastructure are nationally significant and can drive localized habitat loss, dust/air emissions, and risks to water quality (including sedimentation) where extraction, processing, and transport intersect with communities and sensitive wetlands.
• Road upgrades and expansion of peri-urban infrastructure (especially in the Lomé corridor) increase habitat fragmentation and improve access to previously remote areas, which can accelerate logging, hunting, and land conversion around remaining natural habitats.
• Growth of Lomé and secondary towns converts coastal and lowland wetlands and increases demand for construction materials, sand, fuelwood and bushmeat. Informal settlement expansion can also block natural drainage, worsening flood impacts on wetlands.
• Wetland drainage, channel modification, small dams/impoundments, and dry-season water abstraction alter hydrology in lagoon and river systems. Fire regime changes (more frequent, late-dry-season burns) also simplify savanna structure and reduce tree regeneration.
• Aquatic invasive plants (commonly problematic in West African lagoons and reservoirs) can choke waterways, reduce dissolved oxygen, and degrade fish and bird habitat in lagoons and slow-flowing waters, increasing management burdens for wetland-dependent communities.
• Where wildlife persists near farms (notably around large protected areas), crop-raiding and occasional livestock losses can trigger retaliatory killing, increased snaring, or reduced tolerance for conservation, particularly during drought years when natural forage is scarce.