Industrial Logging

Massaha’s fight to protect their ancestral forests in Gabon

8 March 2022

RFUK, Forest Peoples Programme and Greenpeace Africa have today written to the Gabonese Minister of Water, Forests, Oceans, Environment, Climate Change and Land-use Planning, Lee White, to call for an immediate halt to illegal logging in the village of Massaha’s ancestral forests, and to support its claim to establish a community-managed protected area. The community’s … Read more

A Post-COP Conversation

23 November 2021

After a frenetic two weeks for RFUK and our local partners at the climate talks in Glasgow, we reflect on some of the gains, the losses, and the next steps in striving to put tropical forests and their traditional guardians at the heart of the international climate agenda.  A declaration by 137 countries promising to halt and reverse forest loss by 2030 … Read more

100,000 citizens and scientists unite against a lifting of the DRC logging moratorium

29 October 2021

On the eve of the crucial climate summit in Glasgow, more than 100,000 Congolese and international citizens have signed a petition organised by Rainforest Rescue, Greenpeace Africa and the Rainforest Foundation UK calling on the DRC government and its international partners to maintain the national moratorium on new logging concessions. RFUK and our local and … Read more

Leading forest scientists call for a freeze on new logging in the Congo, urge governments to act

28 October 2021

Press Release Kinshasa, 28 October 2021 – Leading African and international scientists join today the growing call for the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to cancel its plans to lift a 20-year ban on new industrial logging concessions. Over 25 scientists sent a letter to international donors warning of social and environmental impacts of an … Read more

44 Congolese and international NGOs join call to stop lifting of the DRC logging moratorium

23 September 2021

The DRC government has announced imminent plans to lift a near 20-year ban on new logging concessions operations in its Congo Basin rainforest – one of the last intact rainforests in the world. With less than six weeks to go before the crucial climate negotiations at COP26, Environmental and Human Rights NGOs are calling on … Read more

Press Release: NGOs warn about lifting DRC logging ban

2 September 2021

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: LOOMING CLIMATE CATASTROPHE IF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY STAYS SILENT ON PLAN TO OPEN UP THE WORLD’S SECOND-LARGEST RAINFOREST TO INDUSTRIAL LOGGING, WARN NGOS In a letter to international climate funders, a group of leading environmental and human rights organisations warn of an impending climate and biodiversity catastrophe following a plan to lift a … Read more

Lifting DRC’s logging moratorium would be a disaster, warn NGOs

14 July 2021

13 July 2021, Kinshasa – Greenpeace Africa, the Rainforest Foundation UK and the Rainforest Foundation Norway are alarmed over a plan announced by the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) Environment Minister Eve Bazaiba to lift a ban on new industrial logging concessions in the world’s second largest tropical forest. The national moratorium, which has stood since 2002 … Read more

Use It AND Lose It – Industrial Logging and its Role in Deforestation in the Democratic Republic of Congo

5 May 2021

New research demonstrates a clear link between the establishment of commercial logging operations and a cascade of deforestation. Investigating forest loss in DRC across 60 logging concessions and eight ‘control’ areas, the findings from this study show that the selective logging of high-value timber species is not a sustainable form of forest management, but rather … Read more

New RFUK Research Shows Link Between ‘Sustainable Forest Management’ and Deforestation in DRC

5 May 2021

A new study published by RFUK establishes a clear link between selective logging and deforestation in the world’s second largest tropical forest. Despite being synonymous with high-level corruption, illegal practices and poor relations with local communities, selective logging of timber from tropical rainforests has long been promoted in the Congo Basin as a form of … Read more

RFUK supports civil society call for the immediate cancellation of three million hectares of illegal logging concessions in DRC

21 February 2021

RFUK, Greenpeace and Congolese civil society groups are calling on the DRC Government to revoke three million hectares of illegal logging concessions or risk wrecking its image on the international climate stage. Last week it emerged that in June 2020 the Environment Minister Claude Nyamugabo had reallocated four logging titles covering 770,000 hectares to Groups … Read more