This data is from the first round of a unique, cross-country panel survey conducted in Congo, Dem. Rep. by the Secure Livelihoods Research Consortium (SLRC). The Overseas Development Institute (ODI) is the lead organisation of SLRC. SLRC partners who participated in the survey were: the Centre for Poverty Analysis (CEPA) in Sri Lanka, Feinstein International Center (FIC, Tufts University), the Sustainable Development Policy Institute(SDPI) in Pakistan, Humanitarian Aid and Reconstruction, based at Wageningen University (WUR) in the Netherlands, the Nepal Centre for Contemporary Research (NCCR), and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This survey generated the first round of data on people's livelihoods, their access to and experience of basic services, and their views of governance actors. SLRC will attempt to re-interview the same respondents in 2015 to find out how the livelihoods and governance perceptions of people shift (or not) over time, and which factors may have contributed towards that change.