The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has accused western countries of prevailing on it to stop oil and gas exploration in the Congo basin rainforest, while they continue to search for fossil fuels in their own countries.
The Congo basin, more than half of which is located in DRC, remains the last rainforest on Earth that sucks in more carbon than it releases and is second only to the Amazon in size.
Recall that the DRC had announced in July that oil and gas permits in parts of the rainforest would be auctioned off, with the blocks up for sale including areas in Virunga national park, as well as critically endangered gorilla habitats and the world’s largest tropical peatlands, which store the equivalent of three years of the world’s fossil fuel emissions.
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According to reports, the auction has prompted behind-the-scenes efforts to avert oil and gas exploration in DRC’s vital ecosystems, with conservationists proposing alternative livelihood projects or even considering bidding for the licences.
However, DRC officials have defended the auction ahead of Cop27, where climate justice is expected to be a key issue. They strongly argue that the auction is important for the economic development of one of the poorest countries on Earth. Also, they have highlighted those countries such as the UK, Norway and the US are urging them not to drill while continuing to explore new fossil fuels themselves.
This month, DRC’s environment minister, Eve Bazaiba reportedly rejected a suggestion by the US climate envoy, John Kerry, to drop some of the fossil fuel auctions at a pre-Cop27 meeting in Kinshasa.
“Nobody can put pressure on us,” Bazaiba was quoted as saying. “No convention in the world, not even the Paris Agreement, forbids a country from emitting CO2 for development reasons. This is not a working group in which colonialist controls a colony … If we think it could destroy the environment, we will leave it.”
Recall that the DRC president, Félix Tshisekedi, had told an FT Africa event last week that the time has come for the world to realise that the Congo basin forest was a global asset and must help his country protect it.
“We have never said we are going to put the planet in danger … Nobody is helping us,” he said.
Available reports show that a group of donor countries that make up the Central African Forest Initiative – including the UK, Norway, and Germany – are working with the DRC government to identify conservation projects to benefit from a $500m (£431m) deal signed at Cop26 in Glasgow last year by Boris Johnson.
Although no money has been released, DRC is said to have made progress in meeting the agreement, which among other things, includes objectives to protect high-value forests and peatlands.
The environment minister in Gabon, which is an oil producer and Congo basin country with a largely intact rainforest, Lee White was quoted as saying that fossil exploration in DRC would not necessarily mean that vital ecosystems would be destroyed.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
