The Archaeobotanical and Palaeoecological Legacy of
‘garden-based’ Agroforestry in the African Rainforest

By

Orijemie Emuobosa Akpo
Department of Archaeology and Anthropology,
University of Ibadan, Nigeria.
[email protected]

Abstract
Despite once being considered ‘pristine’ wildernesses, there is
emerging evidence that humans have had long-lasting legacies on
tropical forest structure, species distributions, and dynamics over the
course of millennia. In contrast to the Amazon, however, tropical
Africa has thus far been somewhat neglected in these discussions,
despite the significance of its forests to continental carbon and
hydrological cycles, global biodiversity, and human history, with much
debate focusing on the dichotomy of human versus climatic influence
on the so-called Holocene ‘Rainforest Crisis’. Here, I present and
evaluate novel and existing palaeoecological and archaeobotanical
datasets to provide more nuanced insights into past human impacts on
West African rainforests and their legacies in the 21st century.
Analyzing data from southern Nigeria, and regional archaeobotanical
datasets, I argue for the long-term presence of ‘Garden-based’
agroforestry in this part of the world, that has left signatures in the
form of economic plant distributions and environmental structure with
important implications for modern ecology, food security, and
conservation.
Keywords: Tropical rainforests, agriculture, ecosystem, cultural
niche construction, Nigeria