Kokolopori
Falls Church’s sister community, Kokolopori, is located deep in the heart of the Central African rainforest. In Falls Church, Virginia, the partnership is being led by city resident, Dr. Ingrid Schulze, and in Kokolopori, by Albert Lotana Lokasola, former Secretary-General of the DRC Red Cross and president of Vie Sauvage, BCI’s Kokolopori-based partner organization.
Situated on the Equator, Kokolopori is a remote hamlet of 25 villages without electricity, running water or automobiles. Unified under a traditional tribal government, it is located on a road adjoining the 1800 square mile community-managed Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve (more than four times the size of Fairfax County, Virginia). For the results of the socioeconomic survey of Kokolopori, click here.
About 8,000 people live in Kokolopori; most are members of the Mongandu tribe. The people are culturally rich but materially very poor. Their greatest tangible resource is their traditional rainforest land, which is one of the richest known bonobo habitats, and hosts many other rare animal species including the Salongo monkey, leopards, forest elephants and other large mammals, and many species of birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish and insects.
The indigenous people of Kokolopori and communities like it are rainforest stewards for all of humanity. The Mongandu people still have a strong bond to the land, and they are doing everything they can to save their traditional lands and wildlife--but they need international support.
In 2003, the DRC emerged from eight devastating years of war. Its great forests are now at a crossroads, increasingly threatened by industrial scale logging and commercial bushmeat hunting, which often accompanies logging. Timber production is being seen as an engine of development for the DRC, and communities like Kokolopori are in its path. Lacking infrastructure and resources, some indigenous people have also started to rely more and more on unsustainable bushmeat hunting and clearing of primary forests for agriculture.
Logging and hunting by outsiders also threaten the bonobos native to these forests. While the Mongandu people of Kokolopori do not hunt bonobos because they consider them relatives of humans from the distant past, other tribes in the area do not respect these traditional taboos. BCI/Vie Sauvage survey teams have discovered hunting camps near the Kokolopori Reserve, with land cleared for agriculture to support the hunters. Thus, while reserves are critical reservoirs for bonobos and other endangered species in the region, education and alternative livelihood and protein sources must also be introduced for conservation to be successful.
Thus far, Kokolopori’s remoteness and its traditional cultural values have helped protect its old growth forests and biodiversity. However, this remoteness has also limited the ability of local communities to bring goods to market and obtain medical care or higher education. This has left residents vulnerable to chronic poverty and disease. These issues were exacerbated by the Congo War, which ended in 2003, leaving nearly four million people in the DRC dead, mostly of starvation and disease. [More]
Kokolopori was not on the front lines of the war. However, the rivers, which serve as highways in much of the Congo, were largely closed to boat traffic during parts of the war, leaving areas like Kokolopori even more isolated than before. Cocoa, coffee and palm oil plantations that had previously provided some employment closed down and fell into ruin, leaving people in the region almost completely on their own. Regeneration of commerce has been slow. BCI and other Congolese and international organizations recently collaborated to restart the Ketsy, a river barge that formerly traveled between the capital, Kinshasa, and Befori, the port closest to Kokolopori.
Communication with Kokolopori is difficult. Mail must be hand-carried, as there is no mail service in the entire country. The only electricity in Kokolopori comes from generators or solar panels at the Kokolopori conservation/research centers. HF radio and satellite phone provide the only connections to the outside world. Even Djolu, the nearest town (about 50 miles away) and the home of Djolu Technical College, the only institute of higher learning in this remote area, has no public electricity or Internet access. [Click here to read about Djolu Technical College]
Transportation is also difficult. With only 300 miles of roads in a country the size of Western Europe, the DRC’s rivers serve as liquid highways. From the provincial capital of Equateur Province, Mbandaka, it takes eight days to reach Kokolopori by motorized pirogue (dugout canoe). Alternative approaches to Kokolopori are by bushplane from Kinshasa to Djolu ($13,000 roundtrip for a chartered plane), or by motorcycle and pirogue from Kisangani, the nearest city, which is 300 miles away.
It will take great commitment from the DRC’s new government and the international community to rebuild and modernize the country’s infrastructure. However, with the recent democratic elections—the first in 45 years--there are great hopes for a change in the DRC’s political climate.
Through friendship, cultural exchange and community development projects like those embodied in the Falls Church-Kokolopori partnership, we are affirming our hopes for the future of the DRC and are expressing our commitment to a more peaceful and just future.
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The sister city partnership “is a timely opportunity for us to gain greater appreciation for global citizenship, diversity in culture, and environmental values. It presents a mutual and positive learning experience for both of our communities,” according to Dan Gardner, former mayor of Falls Church City, after signing the resolution approving the partnership.
Albert Lokasola and Vie Sauvage trackers
in the Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve
Kokolopori - Falls Church Sister City Partnership
