Evolution, Neotectonics and Quarternary Environmental Change in Southern Cameroon

Founded in 1966, the internationally recognized and acclaimed Series ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ publishes interdisciplinary scientific papers on landscape evolution and on former environments of the African continent. Beginning with topics such as changes in climate and vegetation cover, the papers expand horizons and interconnections to various types of environmental dynamics from the Cainozoic up to the present; moreover, the aspect of human influence since the Late Quaternary is related to many of the areas studied.

Volume 31 presents four comprehensive papers on long- and short-term processes of landscape evolution (geological history, neotectonics and proxy Quaternary alluvia), as well as a recent regional perspective on environmental problems in Southern Cameroon. The book acts as a showcase for successful North-South cooperation and capacity building for empowering African Universities. It is problem oriented and applied, and illustrates how scientific and interdisciplinary cooperation can work. In the framework of the German Research Foundation’s (DFG, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) funded "Rain Forest Savanna Contact" project (2003-2009) two abbreviated English versions of PhD theses are here published, one by J. Eisenberg on neotectonics and the other by M. Sangen on river sediments in rain forest-savanna transitional zones. Complementary articles are an introduction on geological history, by B. Kankeu et al. and a paper on environmental risks by M. Tchindjang et al., together these complete the results of this joint German-Cameroonian research project.

This book will be of interest to all concerned with ecosystems dynamics, tropical forests, savannas and related development problems of Third World countries, especially regional planners, ecologists, botanists, earth scientists and students of the Quaternary (e.g. LGM and Holocene ecosystem dynamics, Global Change). It will be valuable for advanced undergraduates and postgraduates as a reference for new research articles on the topic of long-term geologic-tectonic and Quaternary landscape evolution in an up-to-now not well explored marginal area of the Western Congo basin.

Since almost 25 years Professor Dr. Jurgen Runge (*1962) has worked as a Physical Geographer and Environmentalist on the evolution of tropical landscapes, former and recent environmental changes and on questions related to tropical and subtropical land use in subsaharan semi-humid and humid regions in Africa. After basic studies in Geography, Geology, Soil Science and Botany at the Universities of Giessen and Gottingen, he regionally specialized on West and Central Africa as an assistant Professor at the University of Paderborn. Since the 1990’s extended field work and scientific expeditions on the Late Pleistocene climate and vegetation in the Congo basin and neighbouring areas were undertaken. In 2000 he was appointed as a full Professor for Physical Geography and Geoecology with regional focus on subsaharan Africa at Frankfurt University. In 2003 he set up the ‘Center for interdisciplinary research on Africa’ (Zentrum fur interdisziplinare Afrikaforschung, ZIAF, www.ziaf.uni-frankfurt.de) In 2005 he tooks over the editorship of ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’. Between 2007 and 2010 he worked as a project manager for the the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) in the topic of sustainability of geological resources and good gouvernance in Central Africa.