Sustainable Management of Forests - DRCongo

Expected impacts

The Programme contributes to two impacts: 

1. reduction of emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, through support to land use planning, forest management, promotion of sustainable management practices, Reduced Impact Logging (RIL) practices and improvement of agricultural practices
2. improvement of living standards, through job creation in rural areas and agricultural practices that improve food security and nutrition.

Expected results 

Towards the general goal of improving sector governance, the Programme has five objectives: 

1. Forest policy is developed in a participatory and transparent manner and formally adopted, which enables sustainable management of forest resources by the multiple stakeholders in the sector

• National Forest Advisory Council operational 
• Concertations carried out at the national and provincial levels with representatives of the forest sector stakeholders 
• A national forest policy drafted and published 
• Updated regulatory and normative framework, as well as operational guides on Decentralized territorial entities (DTE)/Community Forest management and Ministerial decrees
• At least two independent audit reports made public
• A validated and implemented plan to combat illegal logging 
• Forest zoning carried out at the level of the PIREDDs 

2. Forests of current forest concessions and rural development zones are managed in accordance with Congolese forestry legislation  

• 100% of management plans validated for valid contracts currently signed, and 100,000 ha of annual logging area exploited in accordance with these management plans
• 90% of the rebates generated by logging made available to communities under social clauses, and US$10 million mobilized from Local Development Funds 
• 10 delineated concessions, whose agricultural practices limit encroachment on the forest area 
• New allocations in accordance with the legislation 

3. Artisanal timber production and processing is developed and sustainable

• In the pilot sites, 50% of the artisanal operators in the sites are trained in better exploitation practices ; 50% of the artisanal operators go through formal processes; 10,000 m3 per year are produced by legally operating operators; and the timber yield from artisanal exploitation increases by 10%.
• Artisanal miners contribute US$25,000 per year to finance social achievements foreseen in the agreements with local communities. 

4. Communities and local authorities are supported for sustainable forest management  

• Eight communities/DTE are implementing sustainable management of their forests
• The forests of six of the pilot communities/DTE have a management document and at least three are implementing it 
• At least 60% of the volumes of permits granted in the forests of the DTE and/or communities involved are exploited 

5. Local and decentralized forest administration have more capacity to monitor and control industrial and artisanal forest operators

• 80% of agents in the pilot areas trained on three themes, such as zoning, forest inventories, RIL practices, rural development zone, social clause agreements, regulatory framework
• Each agent performs 20 inspections annually 

Progress of this programme have also been described in the 2021 semestrial publication of the DRC National REDD+ Fund – read it here (in French). 

Areas of intervention 

The PGDF is of national scale with activities in five provinces with integrated multi-sectoral provincial programs (also called PIREDD) : Mai-Ndombe, Equator and Mongala, Tshopo and Ituri.

Synergies

The PGDF contributes to the Letter of Intent signed in 2016 between the DRC and CAFI by supporting the achievement, under the Forest objective, of milestones 2020 a) and b) and milestones 2018 a) b) c) e) and f), as well milestone 2018 d) under the Governance objective. Two independent verifications of these milestones were undertaken (please read the report available here). 

The PGDF will capitalize on previous support provided by AGEDUFOR, will work in synergy with the PROFEAAC project on a favorable framework for community forestry and the formalization of artisanal exploitation, and will be carried out in close cooperation with integrated multi-sectoral provincial programs (PIREDDD) in five provinces as well as with the sectoral programs on agriculture, land use planning and land tenure.