In the center of the African continent, an immense and vital forest currently thrives. As the world’s second-largest tropical rainforest, the Congo Basin covers six countries and around 500 million acres–an area one-fourth the size of the contiguous U.S. It is a haven for both human and natural diversity, hosting more than 150 different ethnic groups and one-fifth of all Earth’s species. It directly supports the livelihoods of the 60 million people who live in or near forest areas and feeds 40 million people who live in adjacent cities. And, as the planet’s largest remaining carbon sink, it is essential for efforts to prevent the worst impacts of the climate crisis.
It is also, increasingly, at risk, as two recent reports warn. One, a first-of-its-kind regional assessment from the Forest Declaration Assessment, found that deforestation in the Congo had increased by nearly 5% in 2021. Another, from Rainforest Foundation UK and EarthInsight, details the threats posed by planned oil and gas extraction in the region.
“The Congo Basin Forest is at a crossroads,” lead author of the first report and senior consultant at Climate Focus Marion Ferrat says in a press release shared with Treehugger. “Deforestation has been low compared to other tropical regions, but we are seeing an upward trend of fragmentation and forest loss since 2020. If this trend continues, we risk losing the largest remaining intact forest in the tropics along with its immense and irreplaceable value for biodiversity, climate, and people.”
The End of ‘Passive Protection’?
When compared to the world’s other two most prominent tropical forests—the Amazon in South America and the forests of Southeast Asia—the Congo has faced the least encroachment by human activity so far. While Southeast Asia’s forests are now a net carbon source and the Amazon is on the brink, the Congo still sucks up 600 million more metric tonnes of carbon dioxide than it releases every year, which means it counteracts about a third of U.S. transportation emissions.
Its importance both to the planet and its human and non-human residents is one reason Forest Declaration Assessment focused its first-ever regional assessment on the Congo, The Forest Declaration Assessment–coordinated by climate-policy advisory company Climate Focus–tracks the world’s progress towards global forest declarations, such as the Glasgow Leaders’ Declaration on Forests and Land Use, in which more than 140 nations promised to stop and then reverse deforestation by 2030.
The findings of this regional assessment are concerning. Up until now, Climate Focus consultant Sanggeet Mithra Manirajah tells Treehugger, the Congo has been “passively protected, through a combination of low population density in rural areas, political instability, lack of infrastructure and transport, and high risks associated with private investment.”
However, there are signs that this is changing. From 2015 to 2020, deforestation was on the wane in the region, though it still lost 2.2 million hectares of forest and saw 1.5 million hectares degraded. However, during 2021, deforestation in the Congo Basin increased by 30,000 hectares, or 4.9% compared to 2018 to 2020 rates, jumping to 636,000 hectares lost.
“Regional Assessment 2022.” Forest Declaration.
“Continued monitoring will be needed to assess whether this trend will continue,” Manirajah says.
All six Congo countries—Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Gabon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and the Republic of the Congo—have signed the Glasgow Declaration. Yet to truly pause and reverse deforestation by 2030, the rate of forest loss would have to decline by 10% per year between 2020 and 2030. Only Gabon and the Republic of the Congo have deforestation rates in keeping with that target.
The leading cause of forest loss and degradation in the Congo remains small-scale subsistence agriculture combined with the creation of new roads and settlements. Another driver of forest loss that increased in 2021 was artisanal forestry–or forestry activities on an individual as opposed to an industrial scale.
However, where deforestation occurs also matters.
“While subsistence agriculture by small-scale farmers in rural areas was the main driver of deforestation and degradation in the Congo Basin between 2015-20, subsistence agriculture mostly impacts secondary and fragmented forests,” Manirajah explains. “The presence of industrial activities is more prominent in core forests and opens previously inaccessible intact or remote forest areas to other forest-risk activities, such as the establishment of settlements, roads, and agriculture.”
A recent study by FAO in the region found that 80% of deforestation takes place within three kilometers (approximately two miles) of a road or settlement, and 11% of deforestation between 2015 and 2020 occurred in forests that had first been broken up by human activity.
“These commercial activities in intact core forests have a greater impact on carbon stocks and biodiversity in the long-term than agricultural conversion of fragmented and secondary forests,” Manirajah says. “The impact of these activities, therefore, needs to be closely monitored and mitigated.”