This Rainforest Is Now Off the “In Danger” List!

After more than two decades of being an endangered site, Salonga Natural Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo is now out of danger thanks to conservation efforts, and further measures are now encouraged to ensure the survival of this natural area.

“Today’s decision demonstrates the importance of governments as well as the oil and gas industry not carrying out extractive activities in World Heritage sites,” says Tim Badman, Director of the World Heritage Programme at the International Union for Conservation of Nature. “Salonga can now celebrate the results of sustained efforts which have helped address the multiple threats affecting the site.”

In 1999, the park was put on the List of World Heritage in Danger due to threats from oil concessions but also impacts from poaching, conflict, and illegal occupation. Upon witnessing the improvement of the natural site’s conservation, UNESCO removed the park from its in-danger sites, not without urging authorities to effectively cancel and ban any extracting activity on the premises. Salonga National Park is Africa’s largest tropical rainforest reserve, and many endangered species – the dwarf chimpanzee, the Congo peacock, the forest elephant, and the African slender-snouted or ‘false’ crocodile – call this area home.