Lorentz National Park - Human Habitation and Culture

Human Habitation and Culture

The area of the national park has been inhabited for more than 25,000 years. The forests of Lorentz encompass the traditional lands of eight indigenous ethnic groups, including the Asmat, Amungme, Dani, Sempan, and Nduga. Estimates of the current population vary between 6,300 and 10,000.

It is widely acknowledged that conservation management strategies for the park will have to incorporate the needs and aspirations of these peoples if the park is to succeed in protecting biodiversity. Moreover, cultural diversity is another important measure of success for the park.

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