Please find attached a new online article in Nature Sustainability that evaluates road expansion in the vast Congo Basin. A press release is also attached.

Dear colleagues,

Please find attached a new online article in Nature Sustainability that evaluates road expansion in the vast Congo Basin.  A press release is also attached.

Some key conclusions:

1. Since 2003, nearly 100,000 kilometers of new roads have been built in the Congo Basin.

2. On average, the rate of forest destruction associated with new roads has quadrupled over time.

3. In the largest Congo nation, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), new roads lead to 2-3 times more deforestation than they do in other Congo nations.

4. The DRC recently sold 1.6 million acres (650,000 hectares) of new logging concessions to Chinese timber corporations.

5. A rapid influx of foreign investment from China and other nations, often focused on exploiting timber, minerals, and fossil fuels, is a critical threat to Congo ecosystems.  Because of widespread corruption, many high-risk projects are being approved in African nations.

6. There is considerable scope to improve sustainability of selective-logging operations by closing disused logging roads.  This sharply reduces deforestation and limits poaching.

7. Except for the DRC, timber concessions in the Congo have less deforestation, and higher rates of road abandonment and forest recovery, than do areas outside concessions.

8. Many wildlife species, such as forest elephants, gorillas, and chimpanzees, are highly vulnerable to current and future road-expansion trends. 

9. Unless limited by better planning and law enforcement, road expansion will lead to major increases in carbon emissions from forest disruption, especially in remote areas of the Congo being opened up by new roads.

Please share this email with others interested in these issues.

Thanks,

Bill

Fritz Kleinschroth, Nadine Laporte, William F. Laurance, Scott Goetz, and Jaboury Ghazoul. 2019. Road expansion and persistence in forests of the Congo Basin. Nature Sustainability,https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-019-0310-6

William F. Laurance, PhD, FAA, FAAAS, FRSQ

Distinguished Research Professor

Australian Laureate & Prince Bernhard Chair in International Nature Conservation (Emeritus)

Director of the Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science (TESS)

Director of ALERT (ALERT-conservation.org)

College of Science and Engineering

James Cook University

Cairns, Queensland 4878, Australia

Phones: +61-7-4038-1518 and +61-7-4232-1819

Email: bill.laurance@jcu.edu.au

Lab websites: http://global-roadmap.org  &  http://laurancelab.org/

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F_Laurance