Maputaland World Heritage Site Application: Specialist Study of Terrestrial plants and vegetation

This brief account covers the terrestrial vegetation (i.e. excluding mangroves and salt flats) of the proposed Ponta do Ouro Partial Marine Reserve and the Maputo Special Reserve World Heritage Site within Mozambique.

The area covered extends from the northern margins of Maputo Bay, including Inhaca and associated islands, southward to the Mozambique–South Africa border and west to the north–south-flowing Rio Fúti. Additional information is provided here on an interfluve area of c.5 million-year-old Pliocene dunes that are of significant conservation importance and which lie immediately west of the Rio Maputo. Part of this area is now semi-protected as the Licuáti Forest Reserve. Owing to its major conservation values, it is proposed that this western extension forms an integral part of the proposed World Heritage Site. Protection of the Licuáti thickets in a buffer zone is not considered adequate protection given their ecological fragility, depending on what management practices are allowed within it.

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• Maputaland World Heritage Site Application: Specialist Study of Terrestrial plants and vegetation