The Salonga National Park, the largest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), was removed on Monday from the list of World Heritage in Danger, in recognition of the efforts made to preserve it, we learned from of Unesco.
The Committee “decided today to remove Salonga National Park from the list of World Heritage in Danger due to improvements made to its state of conservation,” the organization said in a statement.
Stability of bonobo populations
“Regular monitoring of wildlife shows that bonobo populations remain stable (…) despite past pressures and that the forest elephant population has slowly started to recover,” the statement added.
The Committee “welcomed the clarification (…) which stipulates that the oil concessions straddling the (park) are null and void” and that oil blocks inside the park “will be excluded from future auctions”, explains the press release.
Africa’s largest tropical rainforest reserve
The DRC had formalized its project to exploit oil in the parks of Virunga (northeast), and Salonga (center) in 2018, but since the government has not officially given up. Contacted by AFP, the Congolese Ministry of the Environment did not react immediately.
Created in 1970 by the former dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, the Salonga Park, with an area of 36,000 km2, is considered the largest reserve of tropical rainforest in Africa. It was listed as a World Heritage in Danger in 1984.
Peatlands – wetlands that host a great biodiversity – of the Congo Basin and in particular of the Salonga cover 145,000 km2, an area a little larger than England, and store around thirty billion tons of carbon, according to the NGO. Greenpeace.
Habitat for endangered species
For the Congolese Ministry of the Environment, which “welcomes” this measure, it is “an opportunity to better think about the management of the peatland with a view to quantifying its carbon absorption capacity”, according to a press release.
Bounded by rivers that ensure its isolation, Salonga Park serves as a habitat for many endangered endemic species: the bonobo, the Congo peacock, the forest elephant and the African narrow-nosed crocodile, according to the Unesco.