A Rapid Biological Assessment of the Lely and Nassau Plateaus, Suriname Research Paper

The Lely and Nassau Plateaus are located in north-eastern Suriname and range in elevation 
from 500-700 m. They are covered mostly by high dryland rainforest on the plateaus and 
slopes and mountain savannah forest on the plateau. The Brownsberg Plateau is a third major 
plateau in this area, part of which is protected by the Brownsberg Nature Park (11,800 ha). 
The 2002 Guayana Shield Priority-Setting Workshop determined that these three plateaus are 
all important for biodiversity but that we lack essential biodiversity data, particularly for Lely 
and Nassau (Huber and Foster 2003). The plateaus provide many watershed services for local 
and coastal communities, as well as important sources of employment (principally small-scale 
gold mining), food, medicine and building materials for local communities. Lely and Nassau 
are still relatively intact owing to low human population density, which presents many unique 
opportunities for conservation over a relatively large landscape area. However, they all face a 
number of current and potential threats, including logging, hunting/poaching and small-scale 
(gold) and large-scale (bauxite and gold) mining

Area of interest: Suriname

Year: 2005