Kivu-Kinshasa Green Corridor: Supporting Earth’s Largest Protected Tropical Forest Reserve through sustainable development and forest-positive supply chains

Pledge by

Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature (ICCN)

Building peace and green prosperity in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), through public-private partnership, sustainable business models and sustainable management of a 540,000 km2 green corridor along the Congo Basin from Virunga to Kinshasa – including the conservation of more than 100,000 km2 of pristine tropical forest and 60,000 km2 of peatland

Type
Conserving, Restoring & Growing, Enabling
This pledge will take place from
2025 to 2030

Pledge overview

Background
The Congo Basin is currently the largest functioning tropical forest carbon sink in the world, and home to 10,000 unique species – a third of which are found nowhere else on the planet. It is also providing livelihoods to 60 million people, who depend on forest resources for food, energy, and jobs. Yet the Congo Basin faces myriad and growing threats, as conflict and poverty exacerbate pressure on forest resources.

The Congolese government is committed to preserving its forests and its extraordinary wildlife, to do so however, local communities within the Basin need a sustainable alternative to the extraction of natural resources, conflict and deforestation. The Government has previously worked with Virunga Foundation to pioneer a transformative dual model of sustainable development and conservation – Virunga Alliance – in and around Virunga National Park, which is transforming an ecosystem into a sustainable economic engine for local communities. Building an alternative clean economy through the provision of affordable renewable energy, and supporting and enabling sustainable agriculture, this model provides economic opportunities for local communities and stifles the ability of armed groups to prosper from the illegal trafficking of natural resources – increasing prosperity, safeguarding nature and decreasing conflict.

The Congo Basin Green Corridor
The Congolese Government has enabled the creation of the Congo Basin Green Corridor by providing the legal grounds for the sustainable management of 540,000 km² of land along the Congo basin, including more than 100,000 km² of primary natural forest to be conserved.

Crucially this initiative (and the Virunga Alliance before it) are trying to create a new way of doing conservation: using business and economic development as a key enabler of conservation, rather than relying solely on regulation and restrictions. By providing a better, more sustainable alternative for livelihoods and supply chains, the forest and wetland ecosystems can be preserved in the long term. However, achieving this model requires commitment from multiple stakeholders: the Congolese State, local communities, but also the private sector – local and international – and the investment and finance community. All have a role to play in this model.

The strength of this initiative lies in a genuine partnership between the DRC government, civil society, and the private sector. The Government will launch a public private partnership (PPP) to provide the basis for the expansion of the Virunga Alliance model into the Corridor. The PPP will provide reserve management services, community engagement, and increased security for businesses and communities within the reserve – planting the seeds for improved livelihoods, avoided forest loss and increased stability along the Congo Basin. By placing local communities at the centre of landscape planning, and providing jobs and opportunities for economic empowerment of rural communities, the corridor will ensure long-term conservation of the region’s natural capital, thereby addressing the risks of both forest degradation and conflict.

The Green Corridor aims to be a truly multi-stakeholder initiative, needing to mobilise private sector, philanthropy, government and local communities in order to create and maintain the greatest terrestrial tropical forest reserve on earth - please consult the graph here for details on stakeholders.

Whilst the Congolese Government have fulfilled their part of the pledge by creating the reserve and enshrining it into law, for this ambitious initiative to work, we will need to support sustainable development of key economic sectors in and around the reserve:
1. Development of renewable energy generation and transmission infrastructure along the corridor – the basis for improved livelihoods and business opportunities
2. Expansion of sustainable agricultural practices and agricultural transformation and integration with local demand (staple foods, food security) and international markets for high-value sustainable commodities such as cocoa and coffee
3. The creation of low-impact, sustainable logistics corridors for the transport of goods – roads through pristine forests are the first step in forest loss, creating a river-based transportation solution will play a significant role in avoiding deforestation and bringing economic benefit to communities
4. Funding more broadly for these projects and activities, but also for non-revenue-making activities such as community engagement, and monitoring and reporting.
5. The development of a high-quality, high-integrity carbon credits programme in line with the Congolese Carbon market regulation which is already deeply focused on community inclusion.

Actions in this pledge

  • Conserving trees and forest landscapes

    Supporting actions
    Permanent conservation
    Secure a forest through acquisition or legal agreement to avoid planned or unplanned deforestation or degradation, and/or ensure permanent conservation of land
    Conservation support activities
    Support the operating costs and activities of existing conservation areas, including advocacy for conservation policy
    Additional details

    Objectives in 2025
    - The Law for the creation of the reserve signed in January
    - The creation of a PPP for the management of the reserve

    Objectives by 2030
    - Effective protection of an area covering at least 100,000km2, within the Green Corridor, of primary forests (approximately 5% of the surface area of DRC)
    - Connecting, ecologically and logistically, the new protected area to the network of protected areas such as Virunga National Park, Mont Hoyo Integral Reserve, Okapi Wildlife Reserve, Yangambi Biosphere Reserve, Lac Tumba Nature Reserve, Salonga National Park, Bombo Lumene Wildlife Reserve, Lomako Nature Reserve, etc.

    Monitoring and measurement
    - Forest cover change monitored through analysis of satellite imagery at landscape level
    - Non-forest related activities will be tracked and monitored against key goals and impact metrics (e.g., job creation - direct and indirect, renewable energy capacity installed, biodiversity density in key areas) by Virunga’s dedicated monitoring and evaluation team, led by internationally recognized researchers.

    Conserving

    Land area
    At least 100,000km2 for conservation
  • Restoring and growing trees and forest landscapes

    Supporting actions
    Assisted natural regeneration
    Actions that support natural regeneration without tree planting, such as Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration, forest soil remediation, exotic species control, disease prevention, and wildfire protection
    Reforestation
    Re-establishment of forest through planting and/or deliberate seeding on land classified as forest, that has been degraded or where trees are unlikely to regenerate naturally
    Agroforestry
    Activities that establish and manage the integration of trees into agricultural landscapes, silvopastoral systems, farming in forests and along forest margins and tree-crop production
    Additional details

    Land and ecosystem restoration
    - 540,000 km2 under sustainable management (including at least 100,000km2 for conservation of primary forests) of which there are significant degraded areas which can be restored through the aid of carbon markets
    - Improved, forest-friendly agricultural practices through capacity building with local farmers and links with international sustainable commodity value chains
    - Implementation of agroforestry systems and reduction in LUC due to agricultural expansion

    Restoring & Growing

  • Enabling activities for trees and forest landscapes

    Supporting actions
    Nursery and seedling development
    Establish tree nurseries, including actions such as identification and collection of seeds and/or growing seedlings
    Sustainable forest management
    Activities that support the stewardship and use of forests (including by local communities and indigenous peoples), to maintain their biological diversity, productivity, and regeneration capacity, as well as their potential to fulfil relevant ecological economic and social functions
    Market development for sustainable forest products
    Activities that create markets and demand for ecologically and socially responsible timber and non-timber forest and agroforestry products, e.g. capacity-building for the harvesting and processing of agroforestry products, forest certification standards, etc.
    Education and capacity building
    Forest / tree species conservation and restoration education programmes, targeted educational and behaviour change campaigns, training and capacity building, including promotion of local and traditional knowledge and practices
    Community mobilisation
    Community mobilisation and engagement activities for conservation, restoration and reforestation, including enabling systems of community governance, etc.
    Youth engagement
    Engagement of young people and/or youth networks to catalyse a restoration generation
    Data collection, management and technological tools
    Activities that provide data and/or technological tools to support conservation and restoration (e.g. monitoring etc.)
    Financial innovation
    Activities that create additional financial opportunities and incentives for conservation, restoration and reforestation (e.g. blended financing vehicles, etc.)
    Other enabling activities
    Development of sustainable businesses such as renewable energy, low carbon logistics, recycling businesses, agricultural transformation (cocoa, coffee, oil palm)
    Additional details

    The Corridor will expand the Virunga Alliance which is centered on community welfare and economic development opportunities as the key enabler of nature conservation – the latter cannot happen without the former.

    Through the creation of the Congo Basin Green Corridor, the DRC is aiming to facilitate over USD 1 Billion in philanthropic and private investment by 2030 to support:

    1. Energy: Delivery of 200MW of renewable energy across the corridor by 2030: 45MW of renewable energy capacity has already been installed and is operational in the Kivu region, a further 150MW would need to be installed and distributed along the corridor to form the basis of the Corridor’s green economy, with the first project in Kisangani in 2025-26

    2. Transport: Creation of a sustainable logistical corridor along the Congo River for the transport of goods and people by 2030 – with the first river-barge project in 2026

    3. Agriculture & food supply chains: Establishment of sustainable, traceable value chains for key crops (staple and high-value) by 2030 in partnership with local and international corporate partners
    - 50,000 tonnes of food/year by 2025,
    - 1 million tonnes by 2030 to be produced across the corridor
    - Development of local processing facilities for strategic commodities: 1 million tonnes to be processed into ethical, deforestation-free, legal, and non-violent value chains by 2030, with 60,000 tonnes of cocoa processing capacity in 2026

    4. Creation of 500,000 jobs by 2030, including direct jobs created through investments in projects, and indirect through the creation of a stable, safe, sustainable ecosystem for SMEs and corporates to operate in

    5. Reintegration of 5,000 ex combatants into formal employment

    6. Reduced and avoided CO2 emission thanks to transport decarbonisation and charcoal consumption reduction.

    Monitoring will be carried out using activity-specific metrics and KPIs against activity-specific targets and timelines, such as: MW renewable energy installed and distributed, km of transmission lines built and connected, transformation capacity installed and utilised for a particular ag commodity, jobs created etc.

    Enabling

Our ecologically and socially responsible approach

The Green Corridor will scale up conservation and restoration models developed in Virunga National Park, Africa’s oldest national park. Forest protection will be ensured through multi-stakeholder partnerships, combining law enforcement, peace-building, and economic empowerment of local communities to scale-up a new model of economic development based on nature. All agricultural activities within the reserve will be certified for sustainability, fair trade and deforestation-free by third parties – a practice established by the Virunga Alliance in Eastern DRC which will be replicated along the Green Corridor.

Avoiding forest loss and fragmentation is a key driver of the initiative and will be one of the key metrics measured and monitored throughout the lifetime of the Reserve.

Our results tracking

This will be carried out by Virunga’s dedicated monitoring and evaluation team, led by internationally recognized researchers.

Ecological metrics will be monitored through use of satellite imagery, such as Global Forest Watch or dedicated services, and surveys to track forest cover change and carbon sequestration at landscape level.

Business-level outcomes such as electricity generation and agricultural production and transformation will be measured and monitored through direct measurement and data provided by the companies and corporates involved in the relevant value chains. These data-sharing requirements will be built into local financing mechanisms.

Social metrics will be monitored through regular surveys carried out with implementation partners, as well as interviews with local communities on the ground.

Ecological metrics

Ha under conservation, Ha under restoration, Change in forest cover, Monitoring of forest cover change at landscape level

Social metrics

Jobs created (including farmers and ecopreneurs supported), Investment in value chain projects, Number of people connected to electricity, MW of generation capacity installed, generated and distributed, Tonnes of agricultural product produced and transformed, Tonnes of agricultural product transported

Our system of accreditation

All agricultural activities within the reserve will be free from deforestation, free from conflict and fair-trade. Virunga Foundation’s existing operations are already certified Fair Trade, and the team is further working with KPMG to set up a dedicated verification and certification scheme for conflict and deforestation in the country.

Our partners

1. Virunga Foundation
2. Prospective partners: partners are needed from across philanthropy, investment and the private sector to provide investment (financial and in-kind through business building or supply chains) into the corridor and enable key sustainable development and forest protection activities.

Our locations

The Green Corridor will cover an area of 540,000 km2 linking Virunga National Park in the East to Kinshasa in the West, along the Congo River, and encompass more than 285,000km2 of pristine forest - part of which is currently protected in separate reserves and parks.

See map here for more details.