Congo : people & forests

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Congo

People & forests

The countries of the Congo River Basin have the last large tropical forest carbon sink on our planet still to this day, where Indigenous and Bantu peoples have lived for centuries. This book, which bears witness of 40 years of exploration paths in Congo-Zaire, is dedicated to them.

Let us go back to the source before the future gets darker ; before consumerist extractions gain control of the last patches of intact nature on the planet ; before the last native peoples of the « uprooted » category are dispersed throughout our world.

Without anticipation on a large scale, the second half of the 21st century will see the great dispersal of hundreds of millions of climate refugees, mainly from Africa, who will first head for Europe.

I will take you to meet them...
Karibu ! Welcome to the village. The way of life, devoid of comforts and pervaded with sobriety, will surprise you... Your smartphones and laptops will be of no use to you...

Come in light apparel...
There is no air-conditioning, no fridge or freezer, here. We will unpack the chikwangues from their arrowroot leaves, taste the liboke with its spicy flavours, and chat outside by the fire inebriated by palm wine or lutuku. We might even dance to the rhythm of the drums.

We will sleep on a straw mat, and, because the forest always calls for rain, a storm will rage, branches will crack, the rain will flog the braids of the fan palms that make up the roof, negotiating its way through the imperfect joints of the makeshift house.

The dark, silent night will close in on itself with the coolness of the forest and the dry clouds, and the smell of wet earth and decaying leaves.

A tom-tom in the distance will sound in the distance as the village awakes.

Turn the page...