Global warming is now recognized as one of the major threats to the survival of species and the integrity of ecosystems worldwide. It modifies the geographical distributions of species, which in return affects the trends of climatic variations. This study was initiated to evaluate the impact of climatic variations on the distribution of the dominant plant species in the chimpanzee’s diet of Tai National Park. The bioclimatic and botanical data were collected and used to model the distribution, based on the maximum Maxent entropy principle using the Maxent 3.3.3k and ArcGIS 10.4.1 programs. With an excellent rate (from 0.86 to 0.97), rainfall and temperature are the most important variables in the distribution of these plants species in Côte d'Ivoire. The analysis shows a high probability of presence of the main species in the diet of chimpanzees throughout the southern band of the country (forest zone). This result shows that the Taï National Park is an area of high probability of presence of plant species whose fruits are consumed by chimpanzees. Therefore, the Park offers climatic conditions conducive to the conservation of Chimpanzees.
Keywords: Global Warming, Tree species diversity, Maxent, Tropical forest.