Gabon’s government and a coalition of donors have signed an agreement aimed at protecting 34 000 square km (13 000 square miles) of the country’s Congo Basin rainforests.<\/p>\n
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Dubbed “Gabon Infini”, the plan will combine $94 million of donor money from the likes of the Global Environment Facility and the Bezos Earth Fund with $86 million of government funding over a 10-year period.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It aims to finance new national parks, tackle elephant poaching and boost eco-tourism using what is known as a “Project Finance for Permanence” model, an approach that binds the disbursement of funding to key government policy changes.<\/p>\n
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The model is gaining popularity. Brazil announced a similar agreement on Monday covering nearly 243 000 square km of the Amazon rainforest, while Kenya and Namibia are also in the process of finalising deals.<\/p>\n
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Gabon represents a crucial ecological anchor within the vast Congo Basin. Almost 90% of its territory is covered by tropical rainforest, home to more than half of the world\u2019s remaining African forest elephants as well as a quarter of surviving western lowland gorillas.<\/p>\n
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The new plan builds on a “debt-for-nature swap” completed just weeks before a military coup in 2023. Under that deal, Gabon refinanced $500 million in loans with a new bond that sets aside some funds for coastal preservation.<\/p>\n
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Concern has again been mounting about the country’s finances. A draft 2026 budget approved in September plans to nearly double government spending next year. Credit rating agencies have warned it will ramp its debt-to-gross domestic product ratio to almost 90%, up from 73% at the end of last year.<\/p>\n
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Former Minister Maurice Ntossui Allogo, who has been overseeing the new conservation plan, said Tuesday’s Letter of Intent agreement marked “a decisive milestone” for Gabon’s conservation drive.<\/p>\n
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Ryan Demmy Bidwell, at non-profit organisation The Nature Conservancy that has worked alongside the government, said the importance of Gabon was that almost 90% of the country is covered by intact forest.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Infini project will lead to new national parks and other protected areas being set up, he added, so that 30% of its rainforests are covered, compared to around 15% currently.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
“We hope that Gabon will serve as a model for others in the Congo basin and elsewhere in Africa,” Bidwell said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
–Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":15571,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[44],"class_list":["post-15570","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Gabon's government and a coalition of donors have signed an agreement","published_date":"2025-11-18 18:32:04","news_description":"Gabon's government and a coalition of donors have signed an agreement","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19753,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15570\/revisions\/19753"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=15570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}