Équateur, Democratic Republic of Congo

Primary forests in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Of the DRC’s 2.35 million km², more than half is forest. It accounts for 35% of the above ground carbon in woody biomass in sub-Saharan Africa.

Economic growth, poverty alleviation and food security are the national priorities. Farming, generates just 40% but employs 70% of the workforce.

The majority of farming in the DRC is shifting (slash and burn) agriculture; the principal driver of primary forest loss and key management challenge within industrial land concessions.

Ambiguous land rights, weak governance institutions and limited organisational capacity, create critical impediments to mobilizing technical and market-based solutions to achieve sustainable landscape management and livelihoods improvements.

These forests provide essential ecosystem services for the whole region. They provide essential water regulation services that maintain the Congo River, which is a source of food, water and other social, cultural an economic services for an estimated 77 million people. The forests also provide valuable non-timber forest products for the local populations and they could be the basis of a green economy.

From a global perspective, the forests of the DRC result in the country being a significant net absorber of carbon. The forests were estimated to remove 337 MtCO₂e/year (million tonnes of CO2 equivalents per year) between 2001 and 2020, while the DRC emits only around 3-4 Mt CO₂/year, 0.01% of the world’s total.

The DRC has a historically relatively low deforestation level when compared to other tropical forested nations. However, given the large area of forest, the total area of deforestation is large in actual terms. Between 2001 to 2020, the Democratic Republic of the Congo lost 15.9 Mha of tree cover, equivalent to a 8.0% decrease in tree cover and and 9.71 Gt of CO₂e emissions. Increased development and political stability is very likely to increase threats to the forest, while the forests themselves could be the basis of a green economy.

Primary forest area	Approximately 145 million hectares, 67% of the national territory and second largest national tropical forest in the world.
Keystone faunal species	Mountain gorilla, bonobo, African forest elephant, leopard, bongo, giant forest hog.
Supporting indigenous groups / local people	Gathering firewood, building materials and non-timber forest products, making charcoal and hunting.
Threats	Demands by the people for their basic economic development and security, growing human populations, forest fragmentation.

Despite well-conceived and aligned policies on biodiversity conservation, forest management, climate change and sustainable economic growth, enabling landscape-level conservation and sustainable management of primary forests in the DRC is difficult.

The DRC has a legacy of chronic insecurity, internal displacement and weak governance, which has an impact on the long-term integrity and management of its forests. More than 26m ha of forest is in protected areas but trees and wildlife in these regions remain under continued threat from hunting, mining and encroachment.

Outside of protected areas, the biggest threat to the DRC’s forests is from small-scale subsistence activities and slash and burn agriculture, both of which are closely tied to relieving local poverty. Forests are used for gathering fuelwood, building materials and non-timber forest products, making charcoal and hunting.

Many forests, although remote, have already become 'empty forests' - largely devoid of large animals as a result of unsustainable hunting. Slash and burn agriculture, meanwhile, typically results in a permanent loss of primary forest: once land is cleared for cultivation it is usually only returned to a secondary forest state through a fallowing system that allows the ground to rest for 7–15 years; it is seldom allowed to return to mature natural forest cover.

Government devolution

In recent years both biodiversity and sustainable development policies in the DRC have become increasingly devolved toward local enforcement of jurisdictional and community resource rights. This change to community-based forestry and conservation is encouraging, as shifting cultivation – the predominant driver of deforestation – is determined by the poverty conditions of rural households, which in turn directly influence and are affected by the political and institutional structures of forest governance.

However, the success of this approach hinges on local community empowerment and participation, not just as passive beneficiaries of policy but also as active leaders. The recent adoption of the DRC community forest law, which establishes the concept of “local community forests”, is an important step in the right direction, but not without challenges in terms of harnessing benefits for local communities.

Education on sustainable development

Education on sustainable development practices, at scale, could dramatically accelerate the engagement of local communities in effective forest governance, and resolve the country’s technical and organizational capacity crisis.

However, a rare empirical assessment in 2018 highlighted the gap between accepted knowledge on best practices in sustainable development and student knowledge in the DRC.

Teaching staff face numerous challenges in rectifying knowledge gaps and capacity deficits, including their own, due to lack of financial, material and information resources.The challenge now is to mobilise resources for education training and capacity building.

Without a steady stream of well-trained, tertiary-educated, vocationally orientated graduates, the capacity to implement complex rural development programmes in the DRC will remain weak. There have recently been significant commitments to increase levels of funding for rural development; however, there are presently not enough adequately trained individuals to manage these funds productively.

Sustainable development practices will therefore not become operational norms unless there is a serious overhaul of the broader tertiary education system, both in terms of theoretical approaches, such as curriculum design, and practice, including tertiary education management and access to information resources and networks.

National policy

Over the last decade, the organisation and discipline of the policy, regulatory and management frameworks for primary forest protection and management have received much attention in the DRC, and these continue to be actively developed. Critical changes in national conceptions of the role of local communities have aligned sustainable development with forest conservation and stretched the concept of conservation beyond the confines of traditional protected areas.

However, net zero deforestation by 2030 will not be attainable unless we systematically and rapidly address the capacity deficits of training institutions. Without support, they will be unable to meet the demands of current and future sustainable development objectives and the need for well-trained environmental professionals who can promote community-based forestry and conservation.

Up-scaling action

Projet Équateur will generate a paradigm shift in public-private partnerships for primary forest landscape conservation and management, where industrial land concession operators invest in community enterprises alongside public funds that provide funding for training and strengthening institutions.

Community evaluation of forest governance in the DRC

15/12/2022

The DRC has over 100 million hectares of forest and has significant potential to benefit from these forests through REDD+ if they are managed effectively. The research shows that building the right capacity, consulting and accessing the needs of the community, and building long-term projects and partnerships are key success factors for improving forest governance.

Assessing community readiness for REDD+ projects in the DRC

28/10/2022

Payment for ecosystem service (PES) schemes are programmes that compensate forest communities for refraining from undertaking extractive uses, such as mining, intensive logging, and clearing. PES schemes can be important policy tools in meeting climate targets but effective deployment demands an understanding of local deforestation drivers and host communities’ preferences.

Comparing community needs and REDD+ for capacity building and forest protection

15/06/2022

Capacity building activities done through REDD+ schemes can meet the many technical needs but there are likely a number of systemic capacity needs that are unlikely to be addressed through existing processes. Missing are education and training in governance and management, as well as fundamental education in sustainability. Failure to address these needs risks undermining any implementation of REDD+.

Équateur Province, Democratic Republic of Congo

Woodwell Climate Research Center

What's at stake

Congo River basin forests

Why is the DRC's forest so important?

Threats

Solutions and responses