Raising awareness about the value and sustainable management of rivers and promoting sustainable agriculture

Climate change and the misuse of natural resources have a negative impact on the lifestyles of local peoples and communities that depend on natural resources. The Walikale Territory is one of the entities of North Kivu Province in the DRC that is rich in forest and river ecosystems. Indeed, work with local communities has revealed that rivers and fishery resources are endangered in the region due to several factors, namely: Artisanal and industrial mining, inappropriate agricultural practices destroying river beds, the use of chemical methods and products in local fishing techniques, armed conflict and population displacement, and local people’s ignorance of legislation on fishing and river management.

The scarcity of fishery resources observed in rivers has an impact on malnutrition rates in several villages in the Walikale territory, even though in past decades these rivers were considered a community breadbasket and a potential source of animal protein, one of the means of combating malnutrition. The project currently being implemented by the FNH on the sustainable management of the Matamba River, with financial support from GGF, is based on this issue of river management in the region.