Community Forests in DRC

The project, which is funded by the UK Department for International Development (DfID), is testing community forestry in DRC, applying lessons learnt from previous approaches pioneered in forested regions both within Africa and globally.

The Community Forests project works at local, provincial and national levels. At the local level, we’re working directly with communities to set up pilot sites. At the provincial and national levels, we’re working to strengthen administrative capacity and to build consensus between government, civil society, donors and other relevant stakeholders through a gradual and controlled approach to community forestry in DRC.

Some of our achievements include:

Community forest pilot sites set up in Equateur and North Kivu provinces, which will be closely monitored and documented for lesson learning and sharing of experiences
Ongoing support for national and provincial Roundtables, which recently produced a landmark National Strategy for Community Forestry, adopted by the DRC government in May 2018
Currently building the capacity of administrative staff at the national, provincial and territorial levels
Training and support to Congolese civil society organisations, developing their capacity to carry out research, conduct field investigations and provide valuable input to government on relevant policies