Global demand for timber is threatening Congo rainforests

By Virunga Community Programs

When the term “endangered species” is mentioned, most people always think of the large animals. The Rhinos, mountain gorillas, elephants, okapis among others will easily spring in the mind. And this is rightly so, because they are the ones that receive the lion’s share of attention in many international conservation meetings and the media.

However, the trees are endangered too. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, logging and exportation of timber to the international market is raising heat among conservationists.

A case study is the demand for Afromosia that has become an endangered species. This is a beautiful tree that’s found across central and western part of Africa. The highly prized tropical hardwood can also be found on several high-end furniture and fittings across the world.

But such high demand for the tree comes at a price. If this is maintained-and many of them are illegally felled-then the tree will become overexploited and will be threatened with extinction.

From press reports, officials in Democratic Republic of Congo are colluding with foreign logging firms to support illegal logging, harming local communities and risking the destruction of the world’s second largest forest.

According to Jonny Hogg article "Wild West" timber trade threatens Congo forests: report,” appearing in the Reuters, “derelict ports in Congo’s riverside capital Kinshasa are piled high with logs ready to be shipped out to China and Europe as part of the lucrative timber trade.

Much of the timber has been harvested using permits signed by the ministry of environment in direct contravention of Congolese law.

The study was carried out by advocacy group Global Witness.

Congo’s forest is part of the Congo Basin that spans six countries in the central Africa region covering about 500 million hectares, over 130 million of which is in the Congo. It contains thousands of species and a quarter of the world’s remaining tropical forest.

And Greenpeace, in a 2015 press release titled “DR Congo’s logging companies and international timber traders continue to profit from impunity” said logging violations, disenfranchised local communities, the cutting of endangered tree species without valid authorisation, destruction of threatened Bonobo habitat and worldwide export of suspect timber. These are just some of the effects of the chaos being wreaked at home and abroad by one of the major industrial logging companies in Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC).

According to Virunga Community Programs, the illegal and destructive logging of endangered species like Bonobo and afromorsia together with the international companies’ failure to deliver on sustainable development and social obligations continue to threaten Congolese forests and should be urgently addressed.

“The operations of these international logging companies is symptomatic of the general organized chaos which is the country’s logging industry where corruption and weak governance undermine forest protection,” says the Virunga Community Programs.

The DRC is at the center of among the most extensive and vital surviving tracts of tropical rainforest in the world, the Congo Basin rainforest, second only to the Amazon in size and home to threatened wildlife such as the forest elephant and the bonobo, one of humanity’s closest relatives.

Virunga Community Programs support initiatives that promote planting of trees and condemn their wanton destruction.

At Virunga Community Programs, we believe it’s now time for the DRC authorities together with timber-importing countries whose demand is promoting and fuelling this manmade disaster to note that their response before has not been enough, and they ought to take decisive actions to stop those companies that continue to despoil the rainforests of the Congo basin for their insatiable thirst for timber.