Independent Forest Monitoring in the Congo Basin: Taking Stock and Thinking Ahead

Abstract

This paper discusses the key challenges faced by independent forest monitoring (IFM) organizations in the Congo Basin and proposes recommendations for practitioners, policymakers, NGOs, and donors to improve the efficiency of IFM in the region, expand the model geographically, and move it beyond timber.

State of Climate Action 2023

“…Justice and Brainforest, for example, have been conducting independent forest monitoring, as well as investigating and documenting illegal activities, for almost a decade. Not only has this work led to multiple arrests, but also some of these organizations have helped provide legal assistance to communities suffering from the harmful impacts of large-scale forest exploitation (Nyirenda and Mbzibain 2020;Vallée et al 2022). Local communities, too, have led efforts to conserve the country's forests.…”

Traceability and Transparency in Supply Chains for Agricultural and Forest Commodities

“…For instance, independent monitoring observations are compiled on the Open Timber Portal, which serves as a repository of information on forest concessions for the RoC and other Congo Basin countries. 100 The Open Timber Portal brings together information from four sources: official information from the Ministry of Forest (concessions, list of registered companies, concession contracts), information from logging firms that voluntarily upload documents to demonstrate compliance, information from independent forest monitors such as Resource Extraction Monitoring and other civil society organizations (Vallée et al 2022), and remote sensing information from Global Forest Watch. Taken together, the information provided can support sourcing decisions for timber.…”

Timber Traceability: A Diagnostic Tool for Practitioners and Policymakers

“…While mitigating the potential for single incidents of fraud and corruption in the field, centralizing and scaling up verification through remote sensing can create new risks of higher-level corruption if the integrity of the responsible body is affected. However, with more publicly available remote sensing data, this tool can even expose these cases via civil society monitoring and independent forest monitors (Vallee et al 2022).…”