Articles by Erik Hoffner

Experimental rocketry may be causing irreparable harm to one of the most biodiverse and special places in the United States. On April 20, the first fully integrated test of SpaceX’s…

The darker corners of YouTube document state-sanctioned conservation efforts with video compilations of feral pig hunting. Legal, lethal control of this exotic invasive species is on full display as citizens…

Multilateral environmental agreements like the United Nations’ Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) call for collective leadership by national governments to address the global challenge of biodiversity loss. Their response options…

The concept of a “pristine wilderness” is a flawed one, researchers argue, but this pervasive idea — one where human absence is required in order to preserve land — occupies…

When I lived on the remote island of Beqa, in Fiji, I watched as foreign-based NGOs entered villages and told Fijians how to live their lives, saying things like “no…

Our food systems are under enormous strain. As the climate crisis deepens – as highlighted by the recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – extreme weather events…

SHAMSHY, Kyrgyzstan — “I was only 9 when I first saw a snow leopard with my father. He was a ranger bringing injured animals found in the mountains to the…

Bats save countries like the United States billions of dollars in pest control every year. They keep rainforests lush and crops growing. Bats even allow us to enjoy our favorite…

The idea that ‘land is life’ has been at the core of what I do since I began my journey in grassroots conservation. I was born in the Loliondo district…

Whether you live in Big Sky country, have enjoyed its natural wonders as a tourist, or marveled at the iconic imagery of Yellowstone National Park’s bears and wolves from afar…

Rio Tinto’s sprawling Qit Minerals Madagascar (QMM) mining operation is situated in one of the poorest regions of the fifth poorest country in the world. It lies in an area…

Nearly twice the size of Africa, the North Pacific seems to be endless. But somewhere in that vast ocean, 30 eastern North Pacific right whales (Eubalaena japonica) live their lives,…

The Congo Basin contains the world’s second-largest rainforest at a staggering 178 million hectares (just under 440 million acres). It is also one of the biggest carbon sinks on the…

The COP15 agreement and its pledge to preserve 30% of the world’s biodiversity by 2030 (30x30) may have sounded like a resounding success for conservation around the world. However, according…

As a field biologist, Keith Perchemlides has often watched flames dance around tiny ponds that mark the remains of a vast wetland that once covered a large part of southwestern…

Namibia’s internationally acclaimed Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) Program, whereby the government ostensibly allows rural and Indigenous communities the opportunity to manage and profit from their own natural resources, has…

The South American nation of Guyana, whose economy traditionally has relied on tourism, agriculture, and fishing, has begun business with oil giant ExxonMobil to make a massive offshore oil drilling…

Today I’m a waterlogged Californian, but soon I’ll be baked dry as a bone. The intensity of extreme drought and rainfall has "sharply" increased over the past 20 years, according…

Paul Van Damme and Fortuna Vargas Mejía met 28 years ago in Puerto Villarroel, a village in the Bolivian department of Cochabamba. Van Damme was a Belgian marine biologist who…

This month, Muslims across the world welcomed the month of Ramadan – a blessed month during which they fast and strive towards nurturing God-consciousness both spiritually and through acts of…

"In Indonesia, now, wherever you look there is corruption," the country’s Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security, Mohammad Mahfud Mahmodin (Mahfud MD), said in Kompas recently. His statement strengthens data on…

For most of us, it seems quite obvious that doing harm leads to consequences. It’s only fair after all – if your actions hurt someone, you get held to account…

This week on the podcast, Mongabay’s newest staff writer Abhishyant Kidangoor, with experience covering health, climate change, and the environment in South Asia, joins to discuss his new focus on…

Monarch butterflies could go extinct, much to the dismay of environmentalists in the U.S. and Mexico. Monarch butterfly populations in Mexico have dropped 22% in the last year, according to…

David Suzuki was one of the first voices to call for action to curb climate change, but he is probably best known as a broadcaster and prolific author of 52…

Illegal deforestation, wildcat mining, drug trafficking, and lethal violence: Name your scourge and the Amazon Basin seldom disappoints. But as an unusual compact between police officers, prosecutors, environmental protectors, and…

The vulnerabilities in our global food system have never been more apparent than they are right now, during a moment some have described as a “poly-crisis.” Between international conflict in…

FERRISBURGH, Vermont — The home that farmer Erik Andrus built with his wife, Erica, sits on a slight rise above a stretch of fields that have been subjected to a…

Overproduction of cash crops, vast monocultures of chemical-dependent grains and massive animal agriculture operations are putting major stress not just on U.S. farmland — where they’re contributing to soil erosion,…

Sudan, a 45-year-old rhino believed to be the world’s last surviving male northern white rhino (Ceratotherium simum cottoni), died five years ago at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya on…