Kinshasa, 23 September, 2021 – As international donors prepare to announce a purported 1 USD billion forest protection agreement with the Democratic Republic of Congo, the DRC government is planning to lift a moratorium on new logging concessions that threatens some of the last intact tropical forest on earth.
In a letter to the donor countries, more than 40 international and Congolese NGOs urge that future funding for forest protection in the DRC must be conditional upon renewal of the moratorium that has stood since 2002.
Lifting the ban would put at risk an area of rainforest the size of France, resulting in land grabs, social conflict and the exacerbation of the climate and biodiversity crises.
“We are standing on the precipice of an historic failure to protect one of the world’s great rainforests – and possibly the last still serving as a carbon sink. Any expansion – rather than a scaling back of industrial logging – will inevitably result in an unstoppable ‘cascade of deforestation’, threatening millions of hectares of forest and the communities that depend on it.” warned Joe Eisen, Executive Director of Rainforest Foundation UK.
With less than six weeks to go before crucial international climate negotiations in Glasgow, dozens of environmental and human rights organisations, including Rainforest Foundation UK, Greenpeace Africa, and the national Indigenous Peoples network, DGPA, are appealing to donor governments to intervene.
The demand that any new agreement with the DRC government be conditional on a binding commitment to extend the moratorium is detailed in a letter sent today to the ministers of development, environment and foreign affairs in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, South Korea, and the UK, as well as the European Commission. These are all members of CAFI (Central African Forest Initiative), which is negotiating the forest protection agreement with the DRC government.
“Industrial logging puts Indigenous Peoples and local communities at risk of displacement and swathes of biodiversity under existential threat. If donor governments give unconditional support to logging, that will endanger the forest on an apocalyptic scale. It would remove the last shreds of credibility from COP26,” said Irene Wabiwa, International Project Leader for the Congo Basin forest in Greenpeace Africa.
The NGOs’ letter comes after the council of ministers, presided over by DRC president Félix Tshisekedi, adopted the Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Environment Eve Bazaiba’s proposal to lift the moratorium in July.
ENDS
Notes to editors:
For more information and interviews or for photos and footage of the Congo basin rainforest:
Tal Harris,
international communications coordinator at Greenpeace Africa
[email protected]
Jak Wagnon,
Head of Communications at Rainforest Foundation UK
[email protected]
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Discussion
Together, we must restore nature back to its untamed state
Thank you for your comment. Indeed💯! this must be a collective effort from all of us.
Hello, am happy to have read about your noble initiatives and would be very happy to partner with Greenpeace here in Kenya. Congratulations.
Thank you for being so supportive.
Removing the corrupt money monger leaders is one of the solution!
Absolutely 💯, greed and corruption are the major factors.Kindly take action here https://act.gp/3E5U1RP
Good agreement
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Establishing community forest in our communities and empower all members in communities to take care of established forest volunteerly.
Indeed, thank you for sharing with us.
La nature est menacée par les activités anthropiques. Tant des bouleversements pour le Climat qui change. Faisons un effort de limiter la température de réchauffement planétaire à 1,5°C. C'est l'affaire de tous ! Il ya aussi la pollution de l'eau, de l'air et de l'environnement sous toutes formes. L'heure est grave ! Ir. Enar BALEMBOLO TONDA. Acteur durable.
Merci de partager avec nous. En effet, il est de notre responsabilité à tous de mieux prendre soin de notre fragile planète.
Forests play a vital role in ecological and socioeconomic balance from wildlife to natural habitats and so forth.Let us all take care of the natural resources and keep the enviroment clean for healthy lives and food security.
Indeed 💯! Hence we must protect them.
Please help Africa please help um
About"this"no:comment
Thank you for your comment. Please share with us why you say this? We like to hear your response.
Humanity as top priority , before businesses,Congo natural forest should be conserved for future prosperity & to tackle climate change,
Agreed 💯, we need to protect our natural resources at all costs from greed.
There is too much greed in the world today. We need to change our attitudes more to helping and caring. Be the one to be counted for the good you do & not for the bad you contribute to.
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I think that greed is unfortunately the engine of the vast majority of humanity. Having more and more, having a bigger house, a bigger car, new appliances, etc. Throwing away what still works but is no longer the latest technology... Destroy without worry, as long as it gives money to win
Thank you for sharing with us. Indeed, we need to reduce our household consumption.
Greed will be the end of us, stop destroying out nature we don't need more than we have taken out of mother nature!!
Thank you for your comment. Indeed! Greed and corruption are the major leading factors for this destruction.
I'm humbled at your efforts of making the world a better place for all and also by protecting the less fortunate in the community.
La RDC possède d'autres possibilités plus faciles et utiles qui peuvent développé notre pays, enocurence les secteurs d'agriculture qui pourra améliorer la condition sociale de la population par la main d'oeuvre locale. Arrêté de chercher de problème contre la nature pour l'intérêt d'une frange des individus et je dis non à ce projet d'exploitation des blocs petroliers.
Merci de votre soutien. Nous sommes d'accord sur le fait qu'il existe de nombreux moyens de croissance économique durable pour le peuple de la RDC.
We need to protect our planet , not destroy it.
Indeed 💯!
It's time to understand what we're doing on this planet, what we want to do with our lives, what we really care for. If we people have a value it is in these choices. Think about it
Thank you for sharing with us.
Cuidemos nuestro planeta, de lo contrario pereceros.salvemoslo.
Thank you for your support.
Stop the idiot's
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Nature shall never be at the mercy of politicians. We shall always be at the mercy of nature. We mess up with our natural gifts of our universe and we perish.
Thank you for your comment. Indeed 💯! We need to take better care of our fragile planet.
Save our planet .. stop the destruction please
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Act against the purchasers of the timber and their host countries.
Thank you for your comment. All culprits must be held accountable regardless of their status quo. Take action here>>>> https://act.gp/3E5U1RP
STOP KILLING OUR EARTH, MONEY HUNGRY LEECHES. DON'T YOU REALIZE YOU ARE KILLING YOUR OFFSPRINGS FUTURE.
Thank you for your comment. Indeed, we need to protect our fragile planet.
Why Africa. Capitalism is the cause of all this mess in Africa .If there was no MONEY, we shall be living in peace in this Continent .Money is the root of all evils.
Thank you for your comment. Greed and corruption are the major factors in this mess.
Save Africa . Capitalism is the cause of all this mess in Africa .If there was no MONEY, we shall be living in peace in this Continent .Money is the root of all evils. We are tired of being misplaced now and again because of self enrichment .
Thank you for your support.
Please stop stripping the world from it’s resources. Think of our future.
Thank you for your support. Indeed, we need to protect our fragile planet.
Stop destroying the nature
Everything must be in control that's my comment thank you
Thank you for your comment.
This is so disheartening. We the people of Cross River State in Nigeria are experiencing industrial deforestation at an abysmal rate. The remaining rainforest in Nigeria is almost gone as we speak.
Truly disheartening indeed, we can not let this catastrophe worsen.
A few lines from a poem I recently wrote. My reaction to this constant desecration on earth. "the noise so loud that it echos down to us below the blue who seek for silence from motors that buzz or chew at the edge of trees to bring them down for some new development concrete cast across the once forested floor. Now even the wld grasses are subdued, they struggle to find a crack to break through to reach for air, or sun so their shoots may grow and overcome these layers laid down upon the land, layers under which even earth worms wilt and die for want of food or drink. It is not hard to see that this too could be our fate if we continue thus to bury, build and bust earth's brave attempts to buckle and fold, to say enough. Enough!Let my forests be, let my flowers grow. Then you too at last may know what freedom is. Let silence reign so you may hear once more the cuckoo call or the song of the whale as she passes your shore. With time the delicacy of your hearing restored you may hear the flutter of a dragonflies' wing as she alights upon the floating leaf spread out on the shimmering surface of the mountain pool, may feel the peace this silence brings the only sounds - Nature restored.
Thank you for sharing with us this fantastic poem 🙌.
We have really to urgently get some real hard work to make even a small change to save our animals and the earth.
Thank you for your comment. Agreed, we need to protect our fragile planet and its inhabitants before profits.
Support is all mine
Thank you for being so supportive.
This world has seen enough natural disstruction in the world because of climate change. Have we not woken up to the fact that we are the cause of it all !!!! We must protect and take care of what has not been destroyed and try to give back to nature. This world cannot go on just destroying for the sake of wealth, we are all dependent on one another so let us take more seriously what science tells us and act with real urgency before it is too late.
Thank you for sharing with us. We need to take better care of our fragile planet before profits.
We must work hard and find quickly solutions in order to eradicate all problems and save our forests because our life also rely on forests
Thank you for your comment. We agree action is needed now before the situation is irreversible.
Hi love my country drc congo
Thank you for your comment.
We must stop this nonsense.
Yes, Thank you for your support.
Stop destroying the nature
Thank you for your support.
It up to us to stand as a worldwide nation to protect this animal
Thank you for your support.
Stop der Öhlbohrungen und Konzessionen für Öl Companies im Kongo! Save the wildlife, forrest and land! We need a health environment to survi e climate change! Save the national parks!!
Thank you for your comment. We have a broader platform called VUMA.EARTH for you to voice out your environmental injustices. Click here>>> https://www.vuma.earth/
Africa is bast
Always money before EVERYTHING else!!!
Thank you for your comment. African governments must put the environment and its inhabitants before profits.
I'd like to be a member in this organization pls.
Hello, to be part of our volunteer community, please fill in the application form to get started. Click here >>> https://act.gp/3xscMLg
Nice work
Thank you for your support.
We need to stop this and help communities there.
Thank you for your comment.
Restore the forest
🙌 💚
We have already lost so much biodiversity because of human greed. Not only are wiping out the life forms that have evolved over millenia to co-exist so elegantly, but they have offered us the essential services that have brought us to this point of our own human evolution. Unless we stop destroying the rainforests, and all remaining untouched natural ecosystems, and reverse the damage we have caused urgently, we are signing our children's death warrants. R&D and economic growth can be targeted at assisting nature in restoring healthy ecosystems, rather than our continued madness in destroying them
Thank you for sharing with us. Indeed, greed needs to be stopped to protect our forests. Forests are the earth's most significant carbon sink and need protection.
Hello
Hi, how may we assist you?