Salonga National Park Support
Bonobos are found in the Democratic Republic of Congo. |
The Salonga National Park is the largest tropical forest park in the world, covering approximately 36,000 square kilometers of lowland rain-forest and savanna-forest mosaic, divided into a southern and a northern sector, both of about equal size. Salonga has been heralded among world experts as one of the most ecologically important areas in central Africa for biodiversity. It is an intact wilderness eco-region harboring unique wildlife such as the forest elephant, many monkey and antelope species, and the bonobo. Preservation of the bonobos in the Salonga and elsewhere in Congo, therefore, results in the protection of a broad range of rare, endemic or threatened species. The park is the only federally protected area for the bonobo, and was created in 1970 specifically to safeguard the species, but ironically it had never been determined whether a sustainable population was living there. Should our survey efforts reveal significant viable bonobo populations in the Salonga, the park would be the largest area of protection for the species. For the last two decades, the Salonga has suffered from lack of support and trained personnel. Park guards frequently have gone for long periods without pay, and well-armed poachers often obtain entry to Salonga unchallenged. Since 1996 the Zoological Society of Milwaukee (ZSM), in partnership with DRC’s federal wildlife and protected-area agency (ICCN), has worked to fill the void in both bonobo conservation and support for the Salonga.
Salonga National Park. |
Saving Salonga National Park
The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) recognizes five of DRC’s national parks, including Salonga National Park, as World Heritage Sites, which are noted for their biodiversity and unique flora and fauna. Tragically, without major intervention, the national parks of DRC face complete degradation as a direct result of the war. The loss of DRC’s parks represents the probable extinction of species cherished worldwide, including, but not limited to: the mountain gorilla, eastern lowland gorilla, okapi, northern white rhinoceros, forest elephant and the bonobo. In addition to being an ecological disaster, the decline of the national parks is a vital blow to the regional economy; up to the mid-1990s national parks in eastern DRC earned over $500,000 annually from tourism.
Salonga National Park guards. |
In an effort to preserve the biodiversity of DRC’s World Heritage Sites-in-Danger, the United Nations Foundation (UNF), working through UNESCO, has granted monetary support to motivate, train and minimally equip field staff at each site, including the Salonga National Park. ZSM is integrally involved as a Core Group Member of the UNF/UNESCO supported project entitled:
Biodiversity Conservation in Regions of Armed Conflict: Protecting World Natural Heritage in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is within the framework of the UNF/UNESCO project that ZSM developed an emergency aid program to improve park guard effectiveness and enhance resource protection within the Salonga. Current activities include:
Emergency Aid to Salonga National Park: The UNESCO project provides park guards with motivational payments (salaries, food and medicines). UNESCO contracted with ZSM to deliver and administer payments to the Salonga National Park, on behalf of ICCN and the UNF/UNESCO project. Via the ZSM, the UNESCO project has provided salary payments for the Salonga’s 150 park guards annually from 2001through 2004. The ZSM is responsible for paying the park guards at each park station and verifying their work performance.
Access to the Salonga, however, is difficult and costly. There is no banking or transport infrastructure in this region that provides a simple means for fund transfers. As a result, a team led by ZSM/ICCN and security personnel must travel from Kinshasa to various remote park headquarters (most of the way accessible only by foot and dugout canoe) to deliver salaries and supplies. To assist with payment deliveries, the USAID-Kinshasa Mission awarded ZSM a grant to cover the cost of security, transporting funds, and implementing the UNESCO payment program.
A cable was stretched across the Yenge River as part of an anti-poaching partol set up to limit access to the park via river, the most common method of entering the park. |
Anti-Poaching Patrols: During the last two decades the Salonga National Park has received little or no financial support and functions primarily as a park on paper, offering little resistance to widespread commercial poaching of bonobos, forest elephants, and other species. With the war and influx of automatic weapons, increased poaching has become the greatest threat to the park's existence. Well-armed gangs of poachers travel up and down major river systems that serve as primary access routes into the park. In November 2000, ZSM established a river patrol on the Yenge River, in the Northern Sector of the park. Local guards were outfitted with uniforms and basic field equipment. A cable barrier was placed across the Yenge River to halt illegal boat traffic into the park. Within one week of erecting the cable, ICCN reported confiscating approximately 12 shotguns and one canoe load of bushmeat (including 15 monkeys). The Yenge patrol is a model for creating other river patrols, and ZSM is currently working under the auspices of the Congo Basin Forest Partnership to establish additional river patrols in the park to deter poachers.
Smoked monkeys that were poached in Salonga. |
Park Guard Training: The guards of Salonga have been periodically disarmed during years of civil unrest and war, and law enforcement has dropped to negligible levels. In December 2003, ICCN and ZSM conducted a training workshop focusing on wildlife laws, law enforcement, biological concepts of conservation, and community integration into law enforcement. The workshop marked the first formal training for the guards of Salonga, and was supported solely by ZSM. The objective of the training was to prepare the Salonga guards for more advanced training in the future (by UNESCO and other organizations) and to receive arms from the military (there are fewer than 30 arms available to the 142 guards of Salonga). Fifty-four guards and six conservateurs from the park attended the six-week course taught by local military. (Support from J. Kern/T. Slawson, World Wildlife Fund - U.S.).
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Bonobo and Congo Biodiversity Initiative
Congo Headquarters
Bonobo and Large Mammal Survey
Salonga National Park Support
Conservation Education
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