Analysis: How Vietnam came to embrace a new vision of the Mekong Delta’s future
On any list of places menaced by climate change, Vietnam's broad and fertile Mekong Delta ranks near the top. And yet, as I wrote for Mongabay four years ago, rising…
Articles by Philip Jacobson
Which version? Confusion over environmental fallout of Indonesia deregulation law
Multiple versions of a sweeping deregulation law passed in Indonesia last week contain substantial differences affecting the nation’s plantation sector, despite assurances from lawmakers that any changes to the text…
New Indonesian law may make it harder to punish firms for haze-causing fires
Update: A new version of the deregulation law containing substantial changes began to circulate on Oct. 12. Mongabay covered it here. A wide-ranging deregulation bill passed in Indonesia this week…
Video: Meet Indonesia’s go-to expert witness against haze-causing plantation firms
Helping the Indonesian government prosecute companies accused of environmental crimes is a risky job. Last year, Bambang Hero Saharjo, the Indonesian environment ministry’s chief expert witness against plantation companies accused…
Airbus to marshal its satellites against deforestation
One of the world’s largest aerospace companies is enlisting its satellites in the fight to save forests. That’s the aim of Starling, a new service developed by Airbus Defence and…
Revealed: Australian miner used arbitration threat to upend Indonesian environmental law
A BuzzFeed News investigation has shined new light on the extent to which a secretive international legal system has enabled global mining companies to muscle their way into Indonesia’s last…
How is Indonesian president Jokowi doing on environmental issues?
This is an update to our "Tracking Jokowi" project. Last year's summary: 9 months in, how has Indonesian president Jokowi fared on the environment? In 2014, Joko Widodo became Indonesia’s…
Norway’s wealth fund expels POSCO, Daewoo Int’l over palm oil holdings
Norway’s central bank is divesting the country’s $870 billion pension fund of its holdings in four Asian multinationals over rainforest destruction for palm oil in Southeast Asia, the bank announced…
Special series
Forest Trackers
- Bolivia’s El Curichi Las Garzas protected area taken over by land-grabbers
- Authorities struggle to protect Bolivian national park from drug-fueled deforestation
- Poverty and plantations: Nigerian reserve struggles against the odds
- Logging, road construction continue to fuel forest loss in Papua New Guinea
Oceans
- Fewer fish and more rules lead to illegal catches, Italian fishers say
- Fishing by dodgy fleets hurts economies, jobs in developing countries: Report
- Warming seas push India’s fishers into distant, and more dangerous, waters
- No protection from bottom trawling for seamount chain in northern Pacific
Amazon Conservation
- Deforestation haunts top Peruvian reserve and its Indigenous communities
- Amid record-high fires across the Amazon, Brazil loses primary forests
- A web of front people conceals environmental offenders in the Amazon
- Brazil boosts protection of Amazon mangroves with new reserves in Pará state
Land rights and extractives
- Women weave a culture of resistance and agroecology in Ecuador’s Intag Valley
- Hyundai ends aluminum deal with Adaro Minerals following K-pop protest
- Brazil’s illegal gold trade takes a hammering, but persists underground
- Maluku bone collector unearths troubling consequence of coastal abrasion
Endangered Environmentalists
- Indonesian activists face jail over FB posts flagging damage to marine park
- Vietnamese environmentalist sentenced to 3 years in prison for tax evasion
- Son of slain Quilombola leader will still strive for community’s rights
- Video: Five Tembé Indigenous activists shot in Amazonian ‘palm oil war’
Indonesia's Forest Guardians
- Fenced in by Sulawesi national park, Indigenous women make forestry breakout
- In Borneo, the ‘Power of Mama’ fight Indonesia’s wildfires with all-woman crew
- Pioneer agroforester Ermi, 73, rolls back the years in Indonesia’s Gorontalo
- After 20 years and thousands of trees planted, Kalimantan’s veteran forester persists
Conservation Effectiveness
- The conservation sector must communicate better (commentary)
- Thailand tries nature-based water management to adapt to climate change
- Forest restoration to boost biomass doesn’t have to sacrifice tree diversity
- How scientists and a community are bringing a Bornean river corridor back to life
Southeast Asian infrastructure
- Study: Indonesia’s new capital city threatens stable proboscis monkey population
- Indonesia’s new capital ‘won’t sacrifice the environment’: Q&A with Nusantara’s Myrna Asnawati Safitri
- Small farmers in limbo as Cambodia wavers on Tonle Sap conservation rules
- To build its ‘green’ capital city, Indonesia runs a road through a biodiverse forest
