While there is little danger that mpingo will become extinct, it is very vulnerable to commercial and local extinction. It is still a common tree, with populations in many protected areas such as the Selous Game Reserve and Mikumi National Park. However, there is growing concern among musical instrument manufacturers particularly, that the supply of high quality wood is limited and may become exhausted if exploitation of the species continues uncontrolled. The population in Kenya is now very low indeed, and some estimate that there will be no harvestable wood left in Tanzania in as little as twenty years time, with disastrous consequences for the local economy.
Most musicians insist on instruments made from solid pieces of mpingo. However trees with very deeply fluted and gullied boles, branch knots, or holes or rotting regions within their heartwood (all common occurrences) are unsuitable for supplying the woodwind trade. Only a few trees are large and straight enough to yield a piece of heartwood of sufficient quality for the production of a clarinet, for example, although carvers tend to incorporate the natural twists and turns of the wood into their works.
In the light of the increasing exploitation of mpingo and the concern regarding its long term supply, an international workshop on the subject was held in November 1995 in Maputo, Mozambique, sponsored by Fauna and Flora International (FFI). Here it was pointed out that in order for a clear management plan to be formed with a view to the long term conservation of mpingo, much more data (qualitative and quantitative) on the species is needed than was then available. For despite its high exploitation by man, there has been little academic study of the species, and there are large gaps in current knowledge. There was a move to propose mpingo for inclusion in Appendix II of CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species). Such listing would mean the requirement for permits for the export of mpingo wood, issued by the Tanzanian authorities, and reports by the state on the amount of trade in mpingo for submission to the CITES secretariat. However, a proposal which was due to be made at the 1994 conference of the parties of CITES was withdrawn. At the Maputo workshop it was decided that insufficient data is available on mpingo upon which to base a CITES proposal. Furthermore the consensus was against another proposal in the near future, and instead to utilise other methods of conservation. Research into the ecology and exploitation and of the species was highlighted as a top priority.
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