Forestry in the Congo. Basin of the Congo which has 70% of Africa's plant cover. The Congo Rainforest in Central Africa makes up a large portion of Africa's biodiversity with over 600 tree species and 10,000 animal species. Despite the country’s high endowment with natural resources, 90% of the 60 million Congolese inhabitants is poor, whereas the majority of them lives in rural areas. 70% of DRC’s inhabitants depend on the forest for their daily livelihoods.

Valorizing wild edible plants (WEP), and non-timber forest products (NTFP) in general, which constitute a particular niche of the poorest, will thus contribute to poverty alleviation and increased nutrition security in a DRC context. Although the potential of NTFPs to contribute to poverty alleviation is recognized in the country’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (DSCRP 2006, 2011), both documents deplore the huge gap of knowledge in this sector. Despite their enormous intrinsic biodiversity, the Congolese forests are the least documented in Africa, not only in terms of their potential for industrial timber exploitation, but also in terms of socio-economic and cultural value to the local populations (firewood, medicine, shelter, tools, game, caterpillars, mushrooms, honey, WEPs, dyes, cultural and spiritual values, etc.). In order to underpin political decisions and to find innovative ways for managing DRC’s precious natural resources, there is an urgent need to revitalize forestry and agricultural research in the country.

Forest Nursery.

The AWDF wants to avoid the alienation and destruction of the rainforest & guarantee food security by promoting agro-forestry and food forestry reforestation projects. Because of the greed of China (Anno 2014) for forest exploitation and mead by the fact that since 1960 there was rarely replanted. The AWDF decided to start a nursery for Wild Edible Plants (WEP), Non-Timber Forest Products (NTFP) and Tropical Hardwood. More than 300 plants and tree species of the Congo qualify for multiplication. And thus scientists have begun collecting seeds and planting materials to start a nursery.