Kinshasa/ Nairobi, 17
September 2007 - A United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP) high level facts finding
mission arrives in Kinshasa today for a
visit focusing on conservation efforts in
protected areas, institutional capacity
building, pollution control, mitigating
impact of human activities on environment
and natural resources especially in fragile
ecosystems of the Democratic Republic of
Congo (DRC) and ways of improving collaboration
with the UN system in this country.
This scoping mission is meant to enhance
UNEP's knowledge and understanding of the
current environmental situation in the DRC
with special reference to understand the
needs for post conflict assessment and intervention;
appraise available support/assistance in
the DRC in order to elaborate an improved
collaborative programme with the DRC.
The UNEP mission will be in the DRC from
17 to 22 September 2007 during which they
will hold meetings with the relevant authorities
and some stakeholders, such as heads of
the major institutions within government,
the public and private sectors as well as
the NGOs.
This team is a second UNEP technical operation
being fielded by the Executive Director,
Achim Steiner in the Democratic Republic
of Congo following the recent call of Mr.
Didace Pembe Bokiaga, the Minister of the
Environment of the DRC to UNEP Headquarters
in Nairobi. The aim is to further UNEP participation
in the development of activities that will
assist the Congolese partners in better
understanding the environmental challenges
facing them; developing programmes that
will increasingly benefit their people as
well as nature within and even beyond their
borders.
UNEP has taken concrete steps to address
the environmental situation in the DRC.
A joint mission was organised with UNESCO
to the Virunga National Park in August 2007,
with the view to investigate the escalating
situation in the Virunga National Park,
which resulted recently in the death of
a park ranger and injuries to others, as
well as the death of a number of mountain
gorillas, the rarest of the great apes.
The mission also aimed to identify possible
platforms for collaboration between UNEP
and other United Nations bodies and relevant
organisations and partners, to assist the
government in ensuring best management practices
in Protected Areas.
The current exploratory operation comes
as a result of some specific recommendations
made after the joint UNESCO-UNEP mission
in the Virunga. Key issues to explore therefore
include improving the current involvement
of UNEP in environmental activities in the
DRC and the UN system operations, enhancing
partnership in tackling some of the major
environmental challenges facing DRC; mitigating
impact of (conflicts and post conflicts,
development, humanitarian, social) activities
on environment and natural resources management;
the review of the conservation situation
in the Virunga National Park as well as
ways to prevent the loss of valuable biodiversity
in the future with support from the UN and
the international community.
The UNEP mission will also explore ways
to assist the DRC in developing a strategy
for Sanitation and Pollution and in assessing
the impact of mining on the environment
in the mining areas in the 2 Kasais and
the Katanga regions, and setting clear measures
to be followed by mining companies.
Note to editors
The Virunga National Park is home to 50%
of the mountain gorilla population and to
numerous other endemic and endangered species.
Environmental degradation in the Great
Lakes Region has become a major issue of
concern among the countries in the region,
particularly in the Democratic Republic
of Congo (DRC) as well as to the international
community and to the United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP). This was heightened by
the recent killings of gorillas in the Virunga
National Park. The Park is occupied by the
Congolese Army, dissident members of the
army, Rwandan refugees, Nkunda forces and
various Mai Mai rebel groups. The resources
of the park are being used for the sustenance
and source of livelihood for some of the
various groups in the Park and communities
in the vicinity of the Park. The complex
issues at the Virunga National Park, home
of a rich and abundant biological diversity
of fauna and flora, have been further complicated
by the unrest in the eastern part of the
Congo.
There is need for continued technical assistance
to strengthen the capacity of the countries
of the African region to harness and access
knowledge to support the management of their
natural resources especially in the Great
Lakes Region and the Congo Basin which comprise
the second largest world forest ecosystems
after the Amazons, with more than 60% of
the biological diversity of the continent.
Nick Nuttall, UNEP Spokesperson, Office
of the Executive Director
