How dash for African oil and gas could wipe out Congo basin tropical forests

Third of Congo basin's tropical forests are under threat from fossil fuel investments, undermining climate action, report warns

The area of land given over to oil and gas extraction in Africa is set to quadruple, threatening to wipe out a third of the dense tropical forests in the Congo basin and accelerate the climate breakdown, a report warns.

Almost 10% of the African continent is already covered by oil and gas production fields, but this could expand to almost 38% if proposals for new projects get the go-ahead - unleashing a huge carbon bomb into the atmosphere that would severely undermine global climate action, according to mapping and analysis by Rainforest Foundation UK and Earth Insight.