The Congo Basin faces growing pressures from logging, mining, oil and gas development, agriculture, infrastructure and urban expansion, compounded by climate change and governance challenges.
The Congo Basin, which stretches over more than 3.4 million square kilometres across Central Africa and is often called the “green heart of Africa”, remains largely under-researched and “chronically underinvested”, a new report says.
The Basin’s forests absorb about 600 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, making it the most carbon-beneficial rainforest on the planet, but that figure has been declining in recent years largely because of deforestation. Its peatlands alone store roughly 30 billion tonnes of carbon, equivalent to several years of global fossil fuel emissions.
This giant tropical rainforest, which covers an area larger than India, regulates rainfall across the continent, stores billions of tonnes of carbon, sustains 130 million people and shelters some of the planet’s richest biodiversity.
The Science Panel for the Congo Basin (SPCB) released the executive summary of its 2025 assessment report at the start of COP30 in Belém, Brazil, the most thorough and rigorous study of the region ever conducted. The report reflects two years of work by 180 scientists, mainly from the area, and captures the Basin’s ecological, social, and economic complexity. The full report is expected in early 2026.
“For the first time, we have managed to unite the majority of scientists from the Congo Basin along with their international colleagues to provide an in-depth analysis of the origins, past, present and future of the critical Congo Basin ecosystems,” said Bonaventure Sonké, co-chair of the panel.
“It is important that this report generates international attention and support for scientific research in the Congo Basin — the Earth’s most important but least studied tropical rainforest.”
The rich and varied biosphere includes rainforests, swamps and grasslands that straddle extensive areas in Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon Republic and the Republic of Congo.
“The Congo Basin is not just the Green Heart of Africa, it is the Green Hope of the planet, a monumental planetary asset that, if managed properly, can help secure all of our futures,” said Lee White, special envoy of the panel. “If we fail to protect the Congo, it is not just the future of Africa as a continent that will be at risk; it is the future of humankind on Earth.”
Beyond storing carbon, the Congo Basin functions as Africa’s continental water-pump. Rain clouds generated over its forests travel thousands of kilometres to fall as rain that flows down the Nile all the way to Egypt and the Mediterranean, and to water the southern fringe of the Sahara Desert, the Sahel. The loss of that rainfall could have dire consequences for the population of the Nile Valley and subsequent population displacement.
The Congo Basin is home to more than 10 000 plant species, roughly a third of which exist nowhere else. Its intact mammal communities include four great apes — bonobos, chimpanzees and eastern and western gorillas — along with critically endangered forest elephants and countless other species.
Rivers and wetlands sustain over 700 species of fish and hundreds of birds, maintaining complex food webs that underpin global biodiversity.
Indigenous peoples and local communities are central to its rich and ancient story of cultural diversity. For more than 650 000 years, humans have managed the Congo Basin sustainably, developing sophisticated practices for hunting, farming and forest stewardship.
These communities continue to act as the primary guardians of biodiversity, yet they receive less than 1% of international climate finance.
The report notes how the Congo Basin has historically received less international forest finance than the Amazon or Southeast Asia.
The SPCB emphasises the need to direct resources and decision-making power to indigenous peoples and local communities, ensuring conservation efforts respect their rights, knowledge and livelihoods.
The report details the long history of human-forest interaction, noting that colonial and post-colonial policies often disrupted local governance and prioritised resource extraction over ecological sustainability.
The Congo Basin faces growing pressures from logging, mining, oil and gas development, agriculture, infrastructure and urban expansion, compounded by climate change and governance challenges. Unsustainable land use and conflicts continue to push ecosystems toward critical thresholds, threatening both biodiversity and livelihoods.
The panel identifies the Congo Basin as a “continental green engine”: a pivotal ecosystem that supports livelihoods, regulates climate and sustains biodiversity across Africa and beyond.
Yet its continued degradation risks undermining regional stability and global climate goals, creating an urgent imperative for sustainable development strategies that balance environmental, social and economic outcomes.
Proper governance, equitable finance and evidence-based policy can turn the Congo Basin into a model for nature-based solutions that provide climate, biodiversity and development benefits simultaneously, the experts said.
The Basin could become a proving ground for inclusive, community-driven conservation backed by international support, demonstrating how forests and people can thrive together.
“We hope this report will enable policymakers and donors to focus more attention on the preservation and sustainable management of the Congo Basin,” said Lydie-Stella Koutika, co-chair of the SPCB.
“The African continent’s ‘green heart’ can lead the way in charting sustainable development pathways.”
Jeffrey Sachs, the president of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network and convener of the panel, said: “Our aim is not merely sustainability (in the environmental sense) but sustainable development, meaning the combination of environmental sustainability with economic well-being and social justice in the region.”
Sustainable management will require strategic investments in science, monitoring and governance; equitable finance mechanisms that prioritise local communities; policies aligned with climate and biodiversity goals, including regulations to prevent illegal logging, land grabs and environmentally destructive projects; and international cooperation, recognising that the Basin provides benefits to the planet as a whole and that those shaping the region’s future share responsibility for its protection.
The Congo Basin stands at a “decisive crossroads”, the report said. It is the world’s second-largest tropical forest system, a vast carbon sink and home to unparalleled biodiversity. Still, it is also a region of rapid population growth, persistent poverty, weak governance and competing demands for development.
“Strengthened governance, equity and justice; reliable finance and sustainable economies, technology and capacity, and ecological stewardship and stability are the four key foundations for the future emergence and stability of the region.”
A business-as-usual path risks accelerated resource depletion, weak governance, and worsening climate impacts.
The report said that illegal logging, mining and agricultural expansion persist, “due to weak enforcement and this continues to undermine ambitious environmental and economic growth policies.
“Industrial agriculture often develops to the detriment of rich natural ecosystems because impact assessments are not done or ignored. Natural resource dependence continues to generate both opportunities and vulnerabilities, and the Basin’s development remains contingent on political stability, institutional capacity and governance, all of which face challenges.”
If extractive trends continue, “it will not be long before the region runs out of resources to extract, leaving the Congo Basin nations and peoples in a state of dire poverty and conflict, while depriving the global community of a critical nature-based solution in a rapidly heating world”.
The Basin embodies both the promise and paradox of sustainable development: governments have articulated firm commitments to ecological integrity, yet implementation lags because of political instability, limited institutional capacity and outdated technologies.
As the report concludes, “there is still time, and already some promising progress,” for the Congo Basin to lead Africa and the world toward a sustainable future.