Assessment of Incentives for Forest Biodiversity Conservation in Rainforest and Derived Savannah Vegetation Zones of Ekiti State, Nigeria

This paper examined the assessment of incentives for forest biodiversity conservation in rainforest and derived savannah vegetation zones of Ekiti State. Structured questionnaire was use to obtain information on the level of incentive allocation and impact of incentive measures to the people for forest conservation. Data collected were statistically analyzed with Multiple Regression analysis at 0.05 significance level of confidence limit. The results showed that personal factors jointly and independently influence respondents perception on the impact of incentive allocation for forest conservation and sustainability. The beta coefficient showed that the contribution of age to the dependent variable was the only significant variable while gender, marital status, and the level of education were not significant. The level of involvement of government in the conservation of forest is higher than personal and sacred efforts at conserving forest biodiversity. Furthermore, the result showed that there was no significant difference between the incentive allocated in rainforest and incentive allocated in derived savannah for forest conservation and sustainability. Therefore, it is recommend that, government and non-governmental organization should shift attention into the area of incentive allocation to the people for forest conservation and sustainable biodiversity.