The Director of ERAIFT, Category 2 Centre under the auspices of UNESCO, participates to the IUCN- Africa Protected Areas Congress (APAC) in Kigali from 18 to 23 July. Tuesday, July 19, 2022, he animated a side event entitled "Flux Tower in a Biosphere Reserve : The Yangambi experience" at the UNESCO Congress Pavilion, from 03.00pm to 04.00pm. This successful side event was introduced by Ms Shamila Nair-Bedouelle, Assistant Director-General for Natural Sciences at UNESCO in Paris.

ERAIFT thanks UNESCO for the invitation, the Kingdom of Belgium for funding the Yangambi Science Pole project and the European Union for its support.

Professor. Baudouin Michel, the Director of ERAIFT, participates in the 19^th Meeting of the Parties to the Congo Basin Forest Partnership (CBFP), held in Libreville from 5 to 8 July 2022. The objective of this meeting was to define common and sustainable solutions for the sustainable management of the Congo Basin forest.

Several participants took part, including the Cameroonian Ministry of Forests and Wildlife and current President of the Central African Forest Commission (COMIFAC), Mr. Jules Doret Ndongo, the CBFP Facilitator of the Federal Republic of Germany, Goodwill Ambassador of the COMIFAC Declaration, Honorable Dr. Christian Ruck, Financial donors – European Union, NGOs, and scientific institutions working for the sustainable management of Central African forests.

Reflections and discussions revolved around several themes: land use and development, protection of vital species, biodiversity and the future of protected areas, conditions and prospects for the sustainable use of wood. Thus, Professor Baudouin Michel highlighted the important contribution of ERAIFT to the safeguard of the Congo Basin forest through the training of African executives working in the forestry sector, scientific research, awareness raising and decision support to policy makers. During his second intervention, Professor Michel focused on the internal and external drivers of deforestation in the Congo Basin and presented some strategies established for the effective monitoring of the state of the forests, such as the Yangambi Flux Tower and the deployment of the Fleg Watch in many countries of Central and West Africa.

ERAIFT thanks the organisers for its participation to this international meeting. The same gratitude goes to the European Union and all technical and financial partners for their support.