Historical Changes and Future Trajectories of Deforestation in the Ituri-Epulu-Aru Landscape (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Joël Masimo Kabuanga,
Onésime Mubenga Kankonda,
Mehdi Saqalli,
Nicolas Maestripieri,
Thomas Mumuni Bilintoh,
Jean-Pierre Mate Mweru,
Aimé Balimbaki Liama,
Radar Nishuli,
Landing Mané
Affiliations
Joël Masimo Kabuanga
Département d’Aménagement des Écosystèmes, Faculté de Gestion des Ressources Naturelles Renouvelables, Université de Kisangani, Kisangani P.O. Box 2012, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Onésime Mubenga Kankonda
Département d’Aménagement des Écosystèmes, Faculté de Gestion des Ressources Naturelles Renouvelables, Université de Kisangani, Kisangani P.O. Box 2012, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Mehdi Saqalli
CNRS (UMR 5602 GEODE) Maison de la Recherche de l’Université du Mirail, 5, Allées A. Machado, CEDEX 1, 31058 Toulouse, France
Nicolas Maestripieri
TerraNIS, 12 Avenue de l’Europe, 31520 Ramonville, France
Thomas Mumuni Bilintoh
School of Geography, Clark University, Worcester, MA 01610, USA
Jean-Pierre Mate Mweru
Ecole Post-Régionale d’Aménagement et de Gestion Intégrés des Forêts et des Territoires Tropicaux (ERAIFT), Université de Kinshasa, Kinshasa P.O. Box 15.373, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Aimé Balimbaki Liama
Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature (ICCN), 13 Avenue des Cliniques, Kinshasa P.O. Box 868 Kin1, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Radar Nishuli
Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature (ICCN), 13 Avenue des Cliniques, Kinshasa P.O. Box 868 Kin1, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Landing Mané
Satellite Observatory of the Forests of Central Africa, 14, Sergent Moke—Q/Socimat, Concession Safricas, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Ituri-Epulu-Aru landscape (IEAL) is experiencing deforestation and forest degradation. This deforestation is at the root of many environmental disturbances in a region characterized by endemism in biodiversity. The importance of this article is to provide useful information for those who wish to discuss a model that can be replicated for other territories affected by deforestation and changes in natural and anthropogenic forest structure. This article focuses on the triangulation of spatialized prospective scenarios in order to identify future trajectories based on the knowledge of historical dynamics through the diachronic analysis of three satellite images (2003–2010–2014–2016). The scenarios were designed in a supervised model implemented in the DINAMICA EGO platform. The three scenarios: business as-usual (BAU), rapid economic growth (REG) and sustainable management of the environment (SME), extrapolating current trends, show that by 2061 this landscape will always be dominated forests (+84%). Old-growth forests occupy 74.2% of the landscape area in the BAU scenario, 81.4% in the SEM scenario and 61.2% in the REG scenario. The SEM scenario gives hope that restoration and preservation of biodiversity priority habitats is still possible if policy makers become aware of it.
