The Congo Basin (french: Bassin du Congo) is the
sedimentary basin of the
Congo River. The Congo Basin is located in
Central Africa
Central Africa is a subregion of the African continent comprising various countries according to different definitions. Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, E ...
, in a region known as west
equator
The equator is a circle of latitude, about in circumference, that divides Earth into the Northern and Southern hemispheres. It is an imaginary line located at 0 degrees latitude, halfway between the North and South poles. The term can al ...
ial Africa. The Congo Basin region is sometimes known simply as the Congo. It contains some of the largest tropical rainforests in the world and is an important source of water used in agriculture and energy generation.
The
rainforest in the Congo Basin is the largest rainforest in Africa and second only to the
Amazon rainforest in size, with 300 million hectares compared to the 800 million hectares in the Amazon.
Because of its size and diversity, many experts have characterized the basin's forest as important for
mitigating climate change because of its role as a
carbon sink. However,
deforestation
Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then land conversion, converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban area, urban ...
and degradation of the ecology by the
impacts of climate change
The effects of climate change impact the physical environment, ecosystems and human societies. The environmental effects of climate change are broad and far-reaching. They affect the water cycle, oceans, sea and land ice (glaciers), sea leve ...
may increase stress on the forest ecosystem, in turn making the hydrology of the basin more variable. A 2012 study found that the
variability in precipitation caused by climate change will negatively affect economic activity in the basin.
Eight sites of the Congo Basin are inscribed on the
World Heritage List, five being also on the
list of World Heritage in Danger (all five located in
Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...
). Fourteen percent of the humid forest is designated as protected.
Description
Congo is a traditional name for the equatorial Middle Africa that lies between the
Gulf of Guinea
The Gulf of Guinea is the northeasternmost part of the tropical Atlantic Ocean from Cape Lopez in Gabon, north and west to Cape Palmas in Liberia. The intersection of the Equator and Prime Meridian (zero degrees latitude and longitude) is in the ...
and the
African Great Lakes
The African Great Lakes ( sw, Maziwa Makuu; rw, Ibiyaga bigari) are a series of lakes constituting the part of the Rift Valley lakes in and around the East African Rift. They include Lake Victoria, the second-largest fresh water lake in the ...
. The basin begins in the highlands of the
East African Rift
The East African Rift (EAR) or East African Rift System (EARS) is an active continental rift zone in East Africa. The EAR began developing around the onset of the Miocene, 22–25 million years ago. In the past it was considered to be part of a ...
system with input from the
Chambeshi
The Chambeshi (or Chambezi) River of northeastern Zambia is the most remote River source, headstream of the Congo River (in length) and therefore it is considered the source of the Congo River. (However, by volume of water, the Lualaba River provi ...
, the
Uele and
Ubangi rivers in the upper reaches and the
Lualaba River draining wetlands in the middle reaches. Because of the young age and active uplift of the
East African Rift
The East African Rift (EAR) or East African Rift System (EARS) is an active continental rift zone in East Africa. The EAR began developing around the onset of the Miocene, 22–25 million years ago. In the past it was considered to be part of a ...
at the
headwaters, the river's yearly sediment load is very large, but the drainage basin occupies large areas of low relief throughout much of its area.
It is delineated largely by
swells including the Bie, Mayumbe, Adamlia,
Nil-Congo, East African, and Zambian Swells.
The basin ends where the river empties into the Gulf of Guinea on the Atlantic Ocean. The basin is a total of 3.7 million square kilometers and is home to some of the largest undisturbed stands of
tropical rainforest
Tropical rainforests are rainforests that occur in areas of tropical rainforest climate in which there is no dry season – all months have an average precipitation of at least 60 mm – and may also be referred to as ''lowland equatori ...
on the planet, in addition to large wetlands.
Countries wholly or partially in the Congo region:
*
Angola
, national_anthem = "Angola Avante"()
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capital = Luanda
, religion =
, religion_year = 2020
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, coordina ...
*
Gabon
Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the north ...
*
Burundi
Burundi (, ), officially the Republic of Burundi ( rn, Repuburika y’Uburundi ; Swahili: ''Jamuhuri ya Burundi''; French: ''République du Burundi'' ), is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley at the junction between the African Gr ...
*
Cameroon
Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west- central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; th ...
*
Central African Republic
The Central African Republic (CAR; ; , RCA; , or , ) is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Chad to the north, Sudan to the northeast, South Sudan to the southeast, the DR Congo to the south, the Republic of the C ...
*
Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...
*
Republic of the Congo
*
Rwanda
*
Tanzania
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands ...
*
Zambia
Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central, Southern and East Africa, although it is typically referred to as being in Southern Africa at its most central point. Its neighbours are ...
History
The first inhabitants of the Congo Basin area were believed to be
pygmies, and at that time, the dense forests and wet climate kept the population of the region low, with the prevention of
hunter-gatherer society, whose remnants of their culture survive to the present day. Eventually
Bantu peoples
The Bantu peoples, or Bantu, are an ethnolinguistic grouping of approximately 400 distinct ethnic groups who speak Bantu languages. They are native to 24 countries spread over a vast area from Central Africa to Southeast Africa and into Southe ...
migrated there and founded the
Kingdom of Kongo.
Belgium
Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...
, and
Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, In recognized minority languages of Portugal:
:* mwl, República Pertuesa is a country located on the Iberian Peninsula, in Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Macaronesian ...
later established
colonial control
Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose their relig ...
over the entire region by the late 19th century. The General Act of the
Berlin Conference of 1885 gave a precise definition to the "conventional basin" of the Congo, which included the entire actual basin plus some other areas. The General Act bound its signatories to neutrality within the conventional basin, but this was not respected during the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...
.
The
World Resources Institute
The World Resources Institute (WRI) is a global research non-profit organization established in 1982 with funding from the MacArthur Foundation under the leadership of James Gustave Speth. WRI's activities are focused on seven areas: food, fo ...
estimated that 80 million people live in and around the Congo Basin.
Climate
The climate is consistent, with two rainy seasons including very high rainfalls, and high temperature throughout the year.
The forests of the Congo Basin affect rainfall across the North Atlantic. In other words, these forests are crucial to the future of climate stability, a bulwark against
runaway climate change.
Flora and fauna
The Congo forest is home to the
okapi,
African forest elephant,
pygmy hippopotamus,
bongo (antelope)
The bongo (''Tragelaphus eurycerus'') is a herbivorous, mostly nocturnal forest ungulate. Bongos are characterised by a striking reddish-brown coat, black and white markings, white-yellow stripes and long slightly spiralled horns. They are th ...
,
chimpanzee,
bonobo
The bonobo (; ''Pan paniscus''), also historically called the pygmy chimpanzee and less often the dwarf chimpanzee or gracile chimpanzee, is an endangered great ape and one of the two species making up the genus '' Pan,'' the other being the co ...
and the
Congo peafowl. The basin is home to the endangered
western lowland gorilla
The western lowland gorilla (''Gorilla gorilla gorilla'') is one of two Critically Endangered subspecies of the western gorilla (''Gorilla gorilla'') that lives in montane, primary and secondary forest and lowland swampland in central Afr ...
. In 2010, the United Nations Environment Programme warned that gorillas could be extinct from the greater Congo Basin in a matter of 15 years.
File:Gorilla gorilla04.jpg, Western lowland gorilla
The western lowland gorilla (''Gorilla gorilla gorilla'') is one of two Critically Endangered subspecies of the western gorilla (''Gorilla gorilla'') that lives in montane, primary and secondary forest and lowland swampland in central Afr ...
File:Loxodontacyclotis.jpg, African forest elephant
The Congo Basin is the largest forest in Africa. More than 10,000 plant species can be found in and around the forest.
The humid forests cover 1.6 million km².
The Congo Basin is an important source of
African teak, used for building furniture and flooring. An estimated 40 million people depend on these woodlands, surviving on traditional livelihoods.
Ecology and protection
At a global level, Congo's forests act as the planet's second lung, counterpart to the rapidly dwindling Amazon. They are a huge "
carbon sink", trapping carbon that could otherwise remain carbon dioxide. The Congo Basin holds roughly 8% of the world's forest-based carbon. If these woodlands are deforested, the carbon they trap will be released into the atmosphere. Predictions for future unabated deforestation estimate that by 2050 activities in the
DRC will release roughly the same amount of carbon dioxide as the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
has emitted over the last 60 years. A 2013 study by British scientists showed that deforestation in the Congo Basin rainforest was slowing down. In 2017, British scientists discovered that
peatlands in the
Cuvette Centrale The Cuvette Centrale ( French: "Central Basin") is a region of forests and wetlands in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Some definitions consider the region to extend into the Republic of the Congo as well. The Cuvette Centrale lies in the cent ...
, which cover a total of 145,500 sq km, contain 30 billion tonnes of carbon, or 20 years of U.S. fossil fuel emissions.
The Global Forest Atlas estimated that the logging industry covers from 44 to 66 million hectares of forest.
A study published in 2019 in ''
Nature Sustainability'' showed that 54,000 miles of roads for forest concessions were built between 2003 and 2018, reaching a total of 143,500 miles. A moratorium on logging in the Congo forest was agreed between the
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Inte ...
and the Democratic Republic of the Congo in May 2002. The World Bank agreed to provide $90 million of development aid to Democratic Republic of the Congo with the provision that the government did not issue any new concessions granting logging companies rights to exploit the forest. The deal also prohibited the renewal of existing concessions.
The government has written a new forestry code that requires companies to invest in local development and follow a sustainable, 25-year cycle of rotational logging. When a company is granted a concession from the central government to log in Congo, it must sign an agreement with the local chiefs and hereditary land owners, who give permission for it to extract the trees in return for development packages. In theory, the companies must pay the government nearly $18 million rent per year for these concessions, of which 40% should be returned to provincial governments for investment in social development of the local population in the logged areas.
In its current form, the
Kyoto Protocol
The Kyoto Protocol was an international treaty which extended the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that commits state parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, based on the scientific consensus that (par ...
does not reward so-called "avoided deforestation"—initiatives that protect forest from being cut down. But many climate scientists and policymakers hope that negotiations for Kyoto's successor will include such measures. If this were the case, there could be a financial incentive for protecting forests. L’Île Mbiye, an island in the
Lualaba River in
Kisangani
Kisangani (formerly Stanleyville or Stanleystad) is the capital of Tshopo province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is the fifth most populous urban area in the country, with an estimated population of 1,312,000 in 2021, and the la ...
, is part of a project about forest ecosystem conservation, conducted by
Stellenbosch University. Democratic Republic of the Congo is also looking to expand the area of forest under protection, for which it hopes to secure compensation through
emerging markets for forest carbon. The main Congolese environmental organization working to save the forests is an
NGO called OCEAN, which serves as the link between international outfits like
Greenpeace
Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by Irving Stowe and Dorothy Stowe, immigrant environmental activists from the United States. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth ...
and local community groups in the concessions.
National parks
*
Lobéké National Park
*
Lomami National Park
*
Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park
*
Ntokou-Pikounda National Park
Ntokou-Pikounda National Park is a protected area in the Congo Basin of the Republic of the Congo. The park is known as the "Green Abyss" from J. Michael Fay's MegaTransect. The park was created primarily to protect an estimated population of 1 ...
*
Odzala-Kokoua National Park
*
Salonga National Park
*
Virunga National Park
References
External links
Pygmies.org: African Pygmies website— ''first inhabitants of the Congo Basin rainforests''.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Congo Basin
01
Congo River
Drainage basins of Africa
Sedimentary basins of Africa
Regions of Africa
Congolian forests
Landforms of Angola
Landforms of Cameroon
Geography of Central Africa
Landforms of Burundi
Landforms of Rwanda
Landforms of Tanzania
Landforms of the Central African Republic
Landforms of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Landforms of the Republic of the Congo
Landforms of Zambia
Basins of Africa