Northern Congo & the Sangha Tri-National Park

Felling of an African mahogany

Selective tree felling

Today, the economy of Northern Congo is driven by industrial-scale logging of a few highly valuable timber species—mainly Entandrophragma spp., commonly known as African mahogany (family Meliaceae). Up till the 1960s, this region had remained a large and unfragmented tract of tropical rain forest, home to a diverse group of hunter-gathers and swidden agriculturalists. In the last three decades, nearly the entire region has been allocated to foreign timber companies, with many concessions only become active in the recent years. This drastic modification of land use has engendered rapid changes in an otherwise remote part of Central Africa.

A woman holding a basket made of palm fibers in front of a hut made of Marantaceae leaves

Forest people of Northern Congo

Since 2001, the INFORMS project has been working in collaboration with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS-Congo), the Congolaise Industrielle des Bois (CIB), and the Congolese Ministry of Forest Economy & Environment (MEFE) to map forest types and assess land-cover changes in Northern Congo.