Garamba National Park

Brief Description

The park's immense savannahs, grasslands and woodlands, interspersed with gallery forests along the river banks and the swampy depressions, are home to four large mammals: the elephant, giraffe, hippopotamus and above all the white rhinoceros. Though much larger than the black rhino, it is harmless; only some 30 individuals remain.

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Long Description

The site is located in the north-east of the country, on the Sudanese border. The park's immense savannahs, grasslands and woodlands, interspersed with gallery forests along the riverbanks and swampy depressions, are home to four large mammals: the elephant, giraffe, hippopotamus and above all the white rhinoceros.
A vast undulating plateau broken up by inselbergs (generally of granitic formation) and sizeable marshland depressions, it lies on the watershed between the River Nile and the River Zaire. The largest rivers are the Dungu, Aka and Garamba.
The park's position, between the Guinean and Sudanese biogeographic realms, makes it particularly interesting. Three formations can be distinguished: gallery forest, forest clumps and marshland; aquatic and semi-aquatic associations; and savannahs ranging from dense woodland to virtually treeless grassland. The densely wooded savannah, gallery forests, and papyrus marshes of the north and west give way in the centre to more open tree/bush savannah. Numerous small rivers with valley grasslands and papyrus swamps dissect the grasslands. It is estimated that there are approximately 1,000 vascular plant species, of which some 5% are endemic.
The park contains probably the last viable natural population of square-lipped or northern white rhinoceros. Elephant is a unique population representing an intermediary form between the forest and savannah subspecies. Other mammals include northern savannah giraffe (occurring nowhere else in the country), hippopotamus, buffalo, hartebeest, kob, waterbuck, chimpanzee, olive baboon, colobus, vervet, de Brazzas and four other species of monkey, two species of otter, five species of mongoose, golden cat, leopard, lion, warthog, bush pig, roan antelope and six other antelope species.
Source: UNESCO/CLT/WHC

Historical Description

Instituted by decree on 17 March 1938 as Garamba National Park. Prior to that, an autonomous institution had been in existence since 1925, with the main aim of managing 'Albert National Park'. From 22 August 1969, under Presidential Decree No. 69/72, the National Institute for Nature Conservation had management responsibility. On 22 July 1975, the Institut Zairois pour la Conservation de la Nature, a public institution with legal status under the authority of the state Commission for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Tourism, was responsible for the management of the park. It was inscribed on the Unesco World Heritage list in 1980.