The Virunga Foundation is a non-governmental organisation working in the field of

nature conservation Nature conservation is the moral philosophy and conservation movement focused on protecting species from extinction, maintaining and restoring habitats, enhancing ecosystem services, and protecting biological diversity. A range of values unde ...

. Registered in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

and funded by the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

, it is focused on protecting the wildlife in

Virunga National Park , iucn_category = II , iucn_ref = , location = Democratic Republic of the Congo , map = Democratic Republic of the Congo , relief = 1 , coordinates = , area = , established = , nearest_city = Goma , photo =Virunga National Park-107997 ...

in partnership with the

Democratic Republic of 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 ...

's ICNN. Its name between 2005 and 2014 was African Conservation Fund.All about the ''Virunga Foundation''
/ref>

International Gorilla Conservation Programme

In 2017, the Virunga Foundation started a conservation project that targets the

mountain gorilla The mountain gorilla (''Gorilla beringei beringei'') is one of the two subspecies of the eastern gorilla. It is listed as endangered by the IUCN as of 2018. There are two populations: One is found in the Virunga volcanic mountains of Central/ ...

(''Gorilla beringei beringei''), in which the

Volcanoes National Park Volcanoes National Park is a national park in northwestern Rwanda. It covers of rainforest and encompasses five of the eight volcanoes in the Virunga Mountains, namely Mount Karisimbi, Karisimbi, Mount Bisoke, Bisoke, Mount Muhabura, Muhabura, M ...

also participated.Virunga: Mountain gorilla sanctuary under threat
/ref>

Controversy

The Virunga Foundation and Virunga National Park have faced criticism that their conservation efforts in the region have led to the "

militarization Militarization, or militarisation, is the process by which a society organizes itself for military conflict and violence. It is related to militarism, which is an ideology that reflects the level of militarization of a state. The process of milit ...

of conservation" and further violence and dispossession faced by local

Indigenous peoples Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

. Communities, such as the

Mbuti The Mbuti people, or Bambuti, are one of several indigenous pygmy groups in the Congo region of Africa. Their languages are Central Sudanic languages and Bantu languages. Subgroups Bambuti are pygmy hunter-gatherers, and are one of the oldest ...

, which previously relied on the lands included in the park for food and shelter have been forced out, or risk being arrested or killed by armed

park ranger A ranger, park ranger, park warden, or forest ranger is a law enforcement person entrusted with protecting and preserving parklands – national, state, provincial, or local parks. Description "Parks" may be broadly defined by some systems in thi ...

References

Nature conservation organisations based in the United Kingdom Nature conservation organizations based in Africa {{Africa-org-stub

International Gorilla Conservation Programme

Controversy

See also

References