Chimpanzees - Population & Distribution

Severely reduced across the continent

Current Population and Distribution
Chimpanzees are distributed over a wide but fragmented area in Equatorial Africa which has considerably shrunk. Populations are no longer found in Gambia, Burkina Faso, Benin, and possibly in Togo, while they have been severely reduced in numbers in Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Nigeria, Burundi and Rwanda. Senegal, Mali, the Cabinda enclave of Angola, Equatorial Guinea, and Sudan contain small, dispersed populations that are seriously at risk.

Due to a lack of survey data in many regions, estimates for the wild population are wide, ranging from 172,700 to 299,700 individuals. The largest remaining populations occur in central Africa, mainly Gabon, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Cameroon. A recent survey suggests that Côte D'Ivoire also contains substantial numbers.