DRC confirms logging moratorium will stay, easing pressure on Congo Basin forest carbon
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s environment minister has publicly reaffirmed that the country’s long-standing moratorium on the allocation of new industrial logging concessions will not be lifted, a decision with significant implications for forest carbon, biodiversity and the DRC’s positioning in international climate finance.
A coalition of 70 Congolese and international environmental and human rights organisations, including Greenpeace Africa, Rainforest Foundation UK and Actions pour la Promotion et la Protection des Peuples et Espèces Menacés (APEM), welcomed the commitment in a statement issued in Kinshasa on 13 July 2026. The announcement by Marie Nyange Ndambo, Minister of the Environment, Development and New Climate Economy, was made during a special press briefing broadcast on national television on 7 July.
The minister’s statement marks a reversal of momentum after weeks of concern that the government was preparing to open vast areas of the Congo Basin to the timber industry. Earlier in July, the coalition had written an open letter to the prime minister warning that draft legislation to lift the moratorium was at an advanced stage and could open tens of millions of hectares of tropical forest to industrial logging. The letter set out the economic, social and environmental consequences of such a move, and a technical analysis accompanying it argued that the legal conditions required to lift the moratorium, set out in a 2005 presidential decree, have not been fulfilled.
The moratorium has been in place since 2002 and covers the DRC’s portion of the Congo Basin, the world’s second-largest tropical rainforest and one of the most significant terrestrial carbon stores on the planet. The coalition’s analysis highlighted persistent weaknesses in forest governance, risks of land-use conflict, the limited economic contribution of industrial logging and the environmental and social impacts of allocating new concessions. It noted that most existing logging concessions have already been converted into conservation concessions, and that more than half of those remaining have ceased operations.
Joe Eisen, executive director of Rainforest Foundation UK, said the minister’s statement signals that forest protection remains central to the country’s national priorities, and urged the government to translate the political commitment into durable institutional guarantees so that the moratorium and community rights remain lasting pillars of forest governance. Blaise Mudodosi Muhigwa, national coordinator of APEM, said the announcement represents an important victory for the communities that live in and depend on the forests, and called for concrete follow-up measures to strengthen their rights and participation in decision-making.
The decision matters for carbon markets because the integrity of the DRC’s standing forests underpins the country’s climate commitments and its ambitions to attract results-based forest finance and nature-based carbon investment. The coalition argued that rather than expanding an extractive model with limited long-term benefits, the DRC has an opportunity to strengthen community forestry, improve forest governance, secure community land rights and attract greater investment in conservation and sustainable development, consistent with flagship national initiatives such as the Kivu-Kinshasa Green Corridor and ongoing land and forest governance reforms.
The organisations said they will continue to monitor implementation and called on the DRC’s technical and financial partners to keep supporting forest management models based on community forestry, biodiversity conservation, respect for human rights and inclusive local development.
