ABSTRACT
For generations, communities in Ghana have protected small forest areas for cultural reasons. Many of these forests, deemed sacred, are considered to house local gods, also called fetishes. The sacred grove at Tafi Atome Monkey Sanctuary in Ghana provides an example of how economic incentives can link with traditional protection for successful natural resource conservation. For centuries, traditional law protected this sacred forest and the natural resources it housed, including a species of sacred mona monkey (Cercopithecus mona mona) that was taboo to hunt. As newly-introduced religion began to erode traditional beliefs, the incentive to protect the forest and monkeys was weakened. It was not until the introduction of ecotourism, and the benefits that followed, that traditional protection was reaffirmed and incentives to use and destroy the forest were replaced by incentives to protect it. Ethnographic research conducted in 2004 and 2006 at Tafi Atome revealed the history of the sacred site, purposes for its protection, taboos relating to natural resource use and community attitudes toward the forest and ecotourism. A qualitative, ethnographic research methodology was used, including semi-structured, open-ended interviews. Results indicate that participation in management, level of community involvement in the ecotourism project and ecotourism profit sharing are key to effectiveness of the forest's protection. Tafi Atome represents the potential of community-based ecotourism to combine the objectives of community development and natural resource conservation of sacred forests.
