Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaïre)

Forest cover statistics (often highly misleading) indicate that the DRC has the largest forest area in Africa. However, the remoteness and terrain of the country's remaining forests are major disincentives to the evolution of industrial logging.

Annual production has rarely exceeded 250,000 cubic metres even when the DRC (then Zaire) was at its most politically stable and when road and rail links from Kinshasa to the coast were well maintained. During 2006, the roundwood equivalent volume exported is reported to have exceeded production [Annexe 3 and Annexe 4].

One might wonder, therefore, what is the underlying agenda of the World Bank and others which promote the impression that c20 times this amount should be the target of forest policy in the DRC (and that there is no need to take into account the views - or solicit the support - of forest people and civil society).

Such a high target for production will tend to inflate the value of forest concessions. It is not unusual, particularly in parts of South East Asia, for concessionaires to procure concessions more in order to raise money (using the concession as colateral) than to engage in (sustainable) logging.

Further, lack of financial transparency in the DRC will facilitate opportunities for concessionnaires to launder money, particularly at the time they procure their concessions.

The opportunity to insist that large concessions are only let to entities having sufficient commitment and competence both to comply with the law and to manage their concessions sustainably (and a moratorium on the issue of logging concessions) appears to have been ignored in the haste to relaunch the country's timber industry (which collapsed during the resource-wars of recent years).

The legality of almost 21million hectares of concessions are currently being assessed.[Annexe 1] Those issued most near to the cut-off date are of course most likely to be opportunistic / suspect - COCAF, OLAM and Yang Shushan. The latter might contribute less than it should to the Treasury if it has been issued as a quid pro quo for a contract to provide electrification services (electrical engineers are not known for their expertise in sustainable forest management), or, as is conceivable, if it (/he) represents Sinopec, one of China's powerful petrochemical groups (which are said to facilitate China's imports of logs). The IFC has been obliged to withdraw its support from OLAM on account of OLAM's operations in DRC.

Afrormosia Pericopsis elata - listed in CITES Appendix II (to help assure long term trade) - accounts for much of the timber exported from eastern DRC (but less than the CITES quota). Much is likely to be illegal - it has probably not been credibly certified by the DRC's CITES Management Authority (due to the absence of national government in the region).

The EU and World Bank are supporting the rehabilitation of the road (but not the safer and more environmentally sound railway) between Kinshasa and the coast. Once complete the - in effect - new route would remove a major impediment to the expansion of the logging industry and consequently have a substantial social and environmental impact in forest areas upstream of Kinshasa. This appears not to be taken into account by those who fund the rehabilitation work (and who therefore subsidise the DRC's timber industry - which will probably be one of the (sic) heaviest users of this road).