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Image Description
Congo Rainforest: The Heart of Africa
The title is in large, heavy serif font. The subtitle is bold, in a casual sans serif. This is the font used throughout, in smaller sizes and varying weights.
The partial, light gray silhouette of the Amazon rainforest is on the left, showing it’s the largest rainforest at 2,030,897 square miles of forest cover.
To the right of that is the green silhouette of the Congo Rainforest, nestled in its place in a light yellow silhouette of Africa. It is the second largest rainforest, at 647,107 square miles.
To the right of that is the partial, light gray silhouette of island of New Guinea plus some smaller surrounding islands. The Australasian rainforest is the third largest, at 248,650 square miles.
Under the southern tip of Africa runs a light blue river, left to right across the image. In it is the text, “The Congo River is 2,920 miles long and gets to a depth of 720 feet.” There’s a dark spot behind “720 feet,” indicating a deeper part of the river.
Life in the Rainforest
There’s a green silhouette of a Congolese person standing, arms by their side. The white text inside says “Indigenous Peoples include: Mbuti, Baka, Batwa.”
Under that is a simplified timeline from 47,976 BCE to 2024 CE with the accompanying text, “150 ethnic groups over 50,000 years.”
To the right of all this are more green silhouette with accompanying statistics: Monkey head, 400 mammal species. Fish, 700 fish species. Bird, 1,000 bird species. Chameleon, 10,000 other species. Leaf, 10,000 plant species. Under plants: 30% are unique to this region.
There’s another river, this time narrow on the left and wide on the right. The varied width of Congo River is from 600 feet to 62,000 feet.
Carbon Storage & Forest Cover
Green silhouette of the Congo Rainforest with the white text, “29 billion tons CO2 stored. There’s an orange equal sign to the right. To the right of that, a black oil drum with orange flames. The drum says “Co2 from 3 years of fossil fuel burning.
One more rainforest silhouette, with lighter green extending beyond it to represent lost tree cover. White text says 52,124 square miles of forest cover lost 2002-2019. Due to: logging (with orange logging truck icon), agriculture (orange tractor icon), mining (orange pick axe icon), poaching (orange shotgun icon), and urban expansion (orange skyline icon).
There’s a black arrow to the left of the whole silhouette pointing down to a calendar open to January. It says 2,896 square miles per year.
Critically Endangered Species Include:
(Each is accompanied by a light yellow silhouette, all are on an orange background.)
African Forest Elephant. Lendu Plateau Clawed Frog. Eastern Gorilla. Kingyongia mulyai (skinny chameleon with long tail). African Slender-Snouted Crocodile. Rhampholeon hattinghi (thicker chameleon with short tail). Lendu Crombec (a small bird). Mount Kahuzi Climbing Mouse.
What Can We Do?
(The first letter in each line is large and in the title font. They spell out “Trees.”)
Teach others.
Restore damaged ecosystems.
Eco-friendly living.
Establish protected parks.
Support eco-friendly companies.
There’s an illustration of an Afrormosia tree on the right, with green leaves high up on the branches, and a skinny black trunk.
There’s a skinny river as a divider, no text.
Sources
https://www.globalforestwatch.org/map/
https://www.iucnredlist.org/search?permalink=6b97ca41-8519-42e8-9e58-098c35035a42
https://www.worldwildlife.org/places/congo-basin
https://rainforests.mongabay.com
https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/the-worlds-great-rainforests/
https://worldrainforests.com/10-how-to-save-rainforests.html
https://www.worldatlas.com/rivers/the-congo-river-the-world-s-deepest-river.html