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Search		   Strengthening the National Biodiversity Strategy in Congo Brazzaville

  
Simon Potts Ioannis Vogiatzakis and Nicolas Vereecken

Local partners in Congo:
  • Environment - Ministère de l’Economie Forestière et de l’Environnement (MEFE)
  • Scientific Research, Groupe d’Etude et de Recherche sur la Diversité Biologique (GERDIB)
  • Scientific Research, Centre d’etudes sur les Resources Vegetales (CERVE)
  • ONG Environmental Research, Groupe de Recherche sur l’Ecologie Forestière et l’Environnement (GREFE)
Congo Brazzaville is recognised as having some of the highest biodiversity in Central Africa, yet most of the country remains unexplored, and infrastructure to assess and conserve this resource is poor. Therefore there is a clear need to engage fully with national institutions to develop skills and infrastructure to allow effective assessment of existing biodiversity, set conservation priorities, and establish biodiversity resources (collections and databases) to build up the National Biodiversity Strategy.

Satellite view of the study region
The core project will survey the Mayombe Mountains in NW Congo, which is some of the least-disturbed forest in West and Central Africa. The purpose being to train local staff to participate in surveys, collect plant and insect material to populate national collections, identify and database material to provide a resource for future work, and build a framework to apply to other un-surveyed regions of Congo. This project aims to move beyond a straightforward plant inventory of a local area, and instead build significant national capacity with the intention of providing a longer-term strengthening of the National Biodiversity Strategy.

Objectives

Expedition vehicle for the projectTo work with Congolese nationals to strengthen the National Biodiversity Strategy by:
  • Re-establishing the National Herbarium as a working biodiversity resource
  • Establishing a National Entomological collection
  • Developing basic research and training facilities to provide long-term in country expertise
  • Undertaking an integrated assessment of the biodiversity status of the Mayombe Mountains region
  • Developing a sustainable framework for assessing biodiversity in previously unexplored areas of Congo using national resources.
Project duration

1 September 2006 – 31 August 2009



Partners

In Congo:
  • Ministère de l’Economie Forestière et de l’Environnement (Ministry of Economy, Forestry and Environment)
  • Groupe d’Etude et de Recherche sur la Diversité Biologique (GERDIB)
  • Centre d’etudes sur les Resources Végétales (CERVE)
  • ONG Environmental Research, Groupe de Recherche surl’Ecologie Forestière et l’Environnement (GREFE)

In UK:
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