Nouabalé-Ndoki Project
Created in 1993, the Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park covers an area of just over 4,000 km2 and is home to important populations of forest elephants, western lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, and many other endangered mammals. It also boasts over 300 bird species and 1,000 plant and tree species, including a rich diversity of old growth endangered mahoganies. It is located in the Congo sector of the Sangha Trinational Zone, and provides integral protection to wildlife through a collaborative management program between the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the Congolese Ministry of Forest Economy and the Environment (MEFE). The NNNP is a rare example of an intact forest wilderness, completely uninhabited by human settlers and with extremely low human population densities in the surrounding area.
The National Park was created by legal decree in December 1993, and over the past 10 years, Park activities have focused on developing and implementing effective systems and strategies for protection, research and monitoring and administration, with substantial capacity building programs in all three domains. The focus is very much on adaptive management with structures and personnel in place in order to respond quickly and effectively to emergent threats in the landscape.
The result of these efforts has seen the Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park rise to the status of flagship project for the WCS Africa Program and a biodiversity conservation success for the MEFE, WCS-Congo and the region as a whole; the Park remains an intact forest ecosystem free of human disturbance or exploitation, with significant populations of large mammals.