Support for socio-economic development in the Rutshuru hunting area

The Virunga National Park (PNVi), located in the province of North Kivu in the DRC, a Unesco World Heritage site is adjacent, near Lake Edward, to the Rutshuru hunting area. The interior and the periphery of these areas are the subject of armed and land conflicts, due to demographic pressure but also to the changes in protection status which have followed one another for 50 years and which have so far left the neighboring populations in an undefined legal framework (legal limits of the decree creating the PNVi of 1950, legitimate limits recognized by the populations, limits materialized by the agents of the Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature, ICCN).

Some lands are distributed, others are invaded, this continuously; the failure to respect state commitments (compensation for expropriated peasants) and the ICCN police approach keep the population in a state of extreme insecurity. Since 2005, with the support of the Dutch IUCN Committee, SOPR has been assisting communities in advocating with ICCN, making sure they are informed of what is going on and their rights.

The NGO benefited from a PPI which made it possible to map the invasion of an area around the Rutshuru Hunting Area (DCR) and part of the PNVi, and to develop, following consultations, a strategic conflict resolution plan approved by civil society actors, local communities through their representatives, the Congolese Institute for Nature Conservation, the two group leaders and the Rutshuru Territory Administrator who has attested in writing.

The objective of this project is to support local development compatible with the protection of PNVi and to contribute to the resolution of land conflicts and to the improvement of relations between stakeholders in the DCR.