New Agreement Yields Hope for Preserving World's Second-Largest Rainforest

In advance of the Paris climate talks, European and African countries announced an initiative to stem the rising tide of forest destruction in Central Africa, one of the world’s last large expanses of rainforest.  Norway is the first country to pledge funds to the Central African Forest Initiative (CAFI) — up to $47 million dollars per year through 2020 — to support the program.  The agreement calls for the six participating Central African countries — Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of Congo — to devise national investment plans that will tackle complex factors leading to deforestation, and it prioritizes long-term solutions over short-term, one-time actions.

Central Africa is home to the world's second-largest tropical forest, but the region is increasingly under threat, mostly from small-scale slash-and-burn agriculture.  Its preservation is key to global efforts to slow climate change, scientists say.  The forest is also a source of income and food for impoverished people across the region and home to diverse animal and plant life.

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