“Ask the question of the ecological debt towards Africa”

It is customary to speak of Africa as the cradle of humanity. Along with the Congo Basin, it could also be an essential part of the solution to global warming, provided that its ecological importance is truly taken into account. Forest massif of 3.7 million square kilometers, it is the site of the Congo River, the 2^e of the world after the Amazon, but also and above all of a peat bog that stored 10,000 years for 30 million tons of carbon. To build her documentary dedicated to her, the filmmaker Yamina Benguigui spoke to local actors very aware of the ecological issues at play around the Congo Basin and relied on the discoveries and comments of the Congolese professor in tropical ecology Suspense Warned Ifo, and his English counterpart Simon Lewis. Together, they allow us to realize the capital importance of the Congo Basin in the global ecosystem. For Africa Point, Yamina Benguigui looks back on the genesis of this documentary which, in the words of its producer Philippe Dupuis-Mendel, “is part of in a history where ancestral knowledge joins the contemporary research of scientists to make us understand the extent of the danger in a planetary ecological fight which concerns us all ”.

Why and when did you find it necessary to make a documentary like “The Last Lung of the World » ?

Yamina Benguigui: I have been involved in the fight for the defense of human rights for a long time, as an activist, politician and filmmaker. This fight only makes sense if humanity can continue to live on Earth: today, fighting against global warming and for the preservation of the environment means defending the most precious of these rights: the right to live in dignity, equitably and sustainably on our planet.

The Congo Basin being the second lung of the world after the Amazon which is in flames, making this film has become obvious, as my contribution to this fight. I wanted to make African voices heard, those of scientists, those of environmentalists, those of activists, few documentaries having given them the floor.

I decided to put Averty Ifo, professor and researcher, who teaches tropical and forest ecology at the Marien N’Gouabi University in Brazzaville, at the center of my film Suspense. He participated with his English counterpart Simon Lewis in the discovery of the largest peat bog in the world which is located in the two Congo: Congo Brazzaville and the DRC. This peat bog, larger than England, over 10,000 years old, sequesters more than 30 billion tonnes of CO₂, or the equivalent of 3 years of global emissions of carbon monoxide, the main greenhouse gas emitted mainly by Western industrialized countries, while Africa emits only 4% of the annual volume. The discovery was made on the Congo Brazzaville side and that’s where I decided to plant my camera.

My movie, The Last Lung of the World, is a cry of alarm and a cry of hope. Warning cry because if the balance of the bog is to be upset, it will become an ecological time bomb that could cause temperatures to rise by more than 3 degrees. A cry of hope, because the people living along the river are very aware of the dangers of climate change.

have you selected populations first? isre line in the Congo Basin ?

They are the pioneers of African ecology. They have both an intimate and ancestral knowledge of nature and an acute awareness of the risks that global warming poses to their immediate environment: silting up of rivers, depletion of fishery resources, deforestation, water pollution, increased temperatures …

I have met men and women committed to the preservation of their environment, engaged in organic farming, engaged in the sustainable exploitation of fields and forests, men and women whose faces and faces we did not know. voice… I filmed these guards of the Congo River, these sentinels of the forest and the peat bog who fight on their own scale against global warming. They are mobilizing to protect their natural heritage on which the future of all humanity depends. As Simon Lewis says: « Africans have the fate of the planet in their hands, without them, without their action here and now, it is difficult to imagine a viable future. ”

is the collaboration between Suspense Averty Ifo and Simon Lewis, who revealed the famous turmoilisre de 145 000 km², therefore greater than l‘England, she said of the maniisre whose issue of global warming must be taken up by scientists ?

Today I am delighted with the collaboration of Congolese and English scientists. The discovery of this bog shows us that the climate issue must call for synergy between African and Western scientists. They also have a role to play with governments and international organizations. Many countries are weakened by terrorist groups that thrive in regions where climate change is destroying livelihoods causing extreme poverty, such as the drying up of Lake Chad.

On March 31, the UN Security Council adopted a resolution on the Lake Chad region. This recognizes the role of climate change on the instability of the region and the need to adequately assess the management of these risks. It is urgent to ask the question of the ecological debt towards Africa, which must preserve the primary forest of the Congo basin. It is this forest which transforms and stores in trees and in peat bogs the greenhouse gases emitted by western industrialized countries. Africa must protect it so that these countries can continue to breathe.

It is therefore necessary to decolonize the imagination of an ecology which would only be an affair of “Whites” which is regulated “between Whites”. In the fight against global warming, Africa must have a place to live up to its responsibilities and discuss on an equal footing with other continents. I hope that my film will participate in this change of perspective.

Such a film has an undeniable virtue of‘ecological alert. Beyond the screenings that are planned in the Canal + group circuit, is there a broadcast plan planned in‘other circuits that I will qualify as educational ?

Cinema has always had an educational vocation for me, a role in raising awareness and mobilizing. If there is one movement that brings together young people around the globe today, it is that of ecology and the preservation of the environment. The Last Lung of the World shows how much young Congolese are mobilized in associations, but also in universities, to fight against global warming. They are the models of today and tomorrow… their voices carry the voice of Africa on all continents. When the cinemas can reopen, the film will be released in about ten cities in Africa with, I hope, many sessions dedicated to young people and schools. The Last Lung of the World has been selected and presented in many festivals and I am happy and honored to have received the Sustainable Development Prize and the Documentary Prize at the Montreal “Vues d’Afrique” Festival and the Grand Prix du film de science at the International Festival of the Toulouse environmental film.

What comment would you like to share about the‘importance of‘Africa in the fight against climate change and what recommendation are you tempted to give for a better awareness of this phenomenon?isdo on the continent and elsewhere?

In all modesty, my intention is to continue making documentaries on ecology and sustainable development in Africa by integrating the dimension of human rights without which any struggle would be in vain. Women and education will be at the center of my next films because the education of young girls and access to education for women are the only means of compensating for the long-lasting effects caused by the secular inequalities between women and men. We must go beyond formal legal equality and allow women to achieve substantive equality: de facto equality is as fundamental as legal equality.