Outlook Brighter for Gorilla Subspecies, Many Other Primates Still in Peril

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND--In a startling announcement, experts at the Wildlife Conservation Society said they've discovered 125,000 western lowland gorillas thriving in the northern forests of the Republic of Congo. The gorillas have survived in part because they are so remote from human settlement.

"This announcement is enormously exciting. The discovery literally more than doubles the known population of western lowland gorillas and once again indicates how much we've yet to learn about many of Africa's most remote regions," said Craig Sholley, Senior Director at the African Wildlife Foundation.

The findings, released at the 22nd International Primatalogical Society Congress, brighten the outlook for the western lowland gorilla, which is classified as highly endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

While good news for one subspecies, the findings do little to eclipse the extinction crisis facing the world's other primates. According to another report released by IUCN and other groups, almost half of the world's species and subspecies of primates, some of humankind's closest relatives, are threatened with extinction. Among the factors putting these apes at risk are commercial poaching, civil conflicts, logging and deforestation, and disease.

Nearly a third of the world's 25 most endangered primates are found in Africa, where AWF's work includes a long-running program to protect the highly endangered mountain gorilla. Only about 720 mountain gorillas remain in the world; half the population is found in the mountains of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in Uganda and the other half in the Virunga Volcanoes, a mountain range on the borders of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda.

Since 1979, AWF has conducted its work to protect the mountain gorilla and its fragile habitat through the Mountain Gorilla Project and the International Gorilla Conservation Program, coalitions established with Fauna and Flora International and the Worldwide Fund for Nature.

To learn more about AWF's work to conserve mountain gorillas, click here.

To learn more about the western lowland gorilla census, click here, and the IUCN report, here.