Targeted FSC certification to increase conservation impact in the Congo Basin

Readme This data folder contains all datasets used for the publication Targeted FSC certification to increase conservation impact in the Congo Basin’ by Zwerts et al., 2026 and is organized into seven subfolders: 1. Border Data;2. Concessions in Cameroon, the Republic of Congo, and Gabon; 3. Factor Accessibility Data; 4. Factor Biodiversity value Data; 5. Factor Concession size Data; 6. Factor IFL Data; 7. Factor Protected areas Data; 8. Final Data. 1. The Border Data map contains the borders of Cameroon, the Republic of Congo, and Gabon. 2. Concession delineations and attributes per country. 3. The Factor Accessibility Data contains information about accessibility. Higher Accessibility Factor scores indicate greater human access relative to other concessions within the same country. The final accessibility raster shows relative accessibility across the landscape on a normalized scale from 1 to 10, with higher values indicating greater accessibility. It incorporates terrain slope (via Tobler’s hiking function), roads and rivers that facilitate movement, and settlement type, with larger settlements exerting a stronger influence on accessibility patterns. Slope was derived from a 30m digital elevation model (Farr et al., 2007), and roads, rivers, and settlement data were sourced from OpenStreetMap (via the Humanitarian Data Exchange, 2025). 4. The Factor Biodiversity value Data folder contains information on biodiversity priority areas based on Scenario 3 from Grantham et al. (2020). This dataset represents a biodiversity value raster, where higher values indicate areas of higher overall biodiversity importance. The raster is based on large mammal abundances (including great apes and forest elephants) and unique ecosystem types identified in the region. Higher Biodiversity Factor scores indicate greater abundances of large mammals and stronger representation of unique ecosystems compared to other concessions within the same country. 5. Concessions ranked based on concessions size scores. Higher scores represent larger concessions. 6. Intact Forest Landscapes (IFL) delineations. This map contains IFL data for the Congo Basin. In addition, this map includes the IFL scores per country: a higher IFL score indicates that a concession overlaps more with IFLs compared to other concessions within the same country. 7. The Factor Protected Areas data folder contains (1) a layer with protected areas that meet IUCN protected area criteria; (2) a layer with a 10 km buffer zone that was created around each concession; and (3) a layer with the buffer capacity that was calculated as the share of this total buffer area that overlaps with protected areas. Higher values indicate relatively stronger connectivity to protected areas compared to other concessions within the same country. 8. The Final Data folder contains the results of this project, including concession scores for each spatial factor and scenario as detailed in the corresponding publication. Each scenario is based on a different prioritization of five factors, reflecting varying conservation objectives. Scenario one emphasizes biodiversity value, scenario two emphasizes buffering capacity, and scenario three emphasizes Intact Forest Landscapes (IFLs). Within the symbology settings, scenarios and factor layers can be selected for visualization on the map. Data sources: Concessions Data Praamstra, G. J., Schipper, J., and Zwerts, J. A. (2024). The conservation burden of Intact Forest Landscapes (IFLs): A global database of management units and IFLs [Data set]. Zenodo doi: 10.5281/zenodo.10933648 FSC. (2025). FSC Certificates Public Dashboard. https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiN2U3NGMyNWEtZTAxNS00MzVhLWExNmMtOThhZjdiYjQ4MWNkIiwidCI6IjEyNGU2OWRiLWVmNjUtNDk2Yi05NmE5LTVkNTZiZWMxZDI5MSIsImMiOjl9 Accessibility Data Humanitarian Data Exchange. (2025). https://data.humdata.org/ Farr, T. G., Rosen, P. A., Caro, E., Crippen, R., Duren, R., Hensley, S., Kobrick, M., Paller, M., Rodriguez, E., & Roth, L. (2007). The shuttle radar topography mission. Reviews of Geophysics, 45(2). Biodiversity value Data Grantham, H. S., Shapiro, A., Bonfils, D., Gond, V., Goldman, E., Maisels, F., Plumptre, A. J., Rayden, T., Robinson, J. G., Strindberg, S., Stokes, E., Tulloch, A. I. T. T., Watson, J. E. M., Williams, L., & Rickenbach, O. (2020). Spatial priorities for conserving the most intact biodiverse forests within Central Africa. Environmental Research Letters, 15(9), 0940b5. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab9fae IFL Data Intact forest landscapes. (n.d.). https://data.globalforestwatch.org/documents/gfw::intact-forest-landscapes/about Protected area Data Protected areas. (n.d.). https://data.globalforestwatch.org/datasets/medd::protected-areas/explore?showTable=true