CICASP | Center for International Collaboration and Advanced Studies in Primatology

March 2016 – Inuyama, Japan. Raymond Lumbuenamo gave a talk at the 5th International Symposium on Primatology and Wildlife Science on habitat fragmentation and effective community involvement in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

"Conservation without livelihoods is conversation"

Raymond Lumbuenamo is a conservationist, an economist and an expert in remote sensing, and until recently (2005-2015) he was Director of the World Wildlife Fund DRC. He is currently Professor at the University of Kinshasa's UNESCO School of Integrated Management of Forests and Land, and remains a consultant for WWF DRC. He was in Japan in early 2016 setting up a joint project with Kyoto University focusing on devloping eco-tourism based on observing bonobos in Malebo, which will be run largely by local communities.

With a frank way of speaking and an authoritative perspective, Raymond Lumbuenamo reflects on the issue of conservation in DRC, and on some of the ‘fights’ he has been involved in, for example with the British oil company SOCO digging for oil in the Virungas.

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Photo credit: Raymond Lumbuenamo / WWF