Zero deforestation yet to go mainstream Deforestation for woodpulp production in Sumatra, Indonesia While a number of high profile companies have adopted policies designed to exclude deforestation from their commodity…
Three-month-old Bornean elephant calf next to dead mother. This elephant, and 13 others, were poisoned in 2013 near an oil palm plantation. Photo by: Sabah Wildlife Department Authorities in Sabah…
United Cacao's plantation area near Tamshiyacu, Peru A prominent group of scientists have sounded the alarm over forest clearing by a cacao company in the Peruvian Amazon. In a statement…
Zebra Shark (Stegastoma fasciatum). Photo credit: Jürg Brand The government of Madagascar has established the Indian Ocean island's first shark sanctuary in an area famous for its marine biodiversity, reports…
Tropical forests provide countless goods and services that help sustain human life. Given the rapid conversion of forests to agricultural lands, scientists say it is critical that we prioritize conservation…
These charming bivalves of tropical reefs have myriad purposes, but just how many and to what extent are now more easily knowable The world’s biggest bivalves are the aptly named…
First of its kind audit of world's largest pulp and paper producer yields mixed results Arara Abadi acacia plantation near Pekanbaru, Riau, Sumatra. All photos by Rhett A. Butler. An…
Local farmer in Indonesian New Guinea Countries poised to receive World Bank funds for achieving reductions in deforestation have insufficient safeguards for ensuring that local communities don't lose out in…
Forests like this rainforest in Borneo provide an array of 'ecosystem services' including carbon storage, flood and erosion control, transpiration, climate moderation, and biodiversity, among others. Forest Trends, a non-profit…
A group convened by one of the world's leading scientific institutions has issued a call for greater protection of primary forests and more inclusive approaches to conservation. Last month the…
Local and indigenous communities play an important role managing and protecting forests. Research published in 2014 by World Resources Institute and the Rights and Resources Initiative concluded that community-managed forests…
Activists have petitioned the world's largest sovereign wealth fund to drop its investment in a company they say is linked to large-scale corruption in the Malaysian state of Sarawak. In…
Reef manta rays (Manta alfredi) swim off Nusa Penida in Indonesia. Photo Credit: Paul Hilton/Greenpeace For the first time, Indonesia has sentenced an illegal manta ray trafficker to jail time…
Oil palm plantation in Indonesia IOI Corporation officially committed to what its subsidiary, palm oil trader IOI Loders Croklaan, pledged last November: it will no longer source palm oil linked…
Excavators beside a canal cutting through recently deforested peatland. © Ulet Ifansasti / Greenpeace A year after it pledged a dramatic shift in how it operates in Indonesia's fast dwindling…
Clear-cut logging in Alaska. Photos by Rhett A. Butler. Seven conservation societies have joined a campaign to push the Obama administration to end old-growth forest logging in Alaska's Tongass National…
The Black-and-yellow broadbill (Eurylaimus ochromalus) is found in Myanmar, which is also known as Burma Myanmar is home to at least 1,114 bird species after researchers identified 20 previously undocumented…
Lowland rainforest in West Papua. An Indonesian police official busted for illegal logging in West Papua has been missing from jail for nearly a year after being granted permission to…
Map of REDDX countries. Only a small fraction of the $7.3 billion pledged under the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) program has actually been disbursed, find a new…
Logging roads and damaged forest in Sarawak compared with the largely intact forest of Brunei. In 2011, former chief minister Taib Mahmud famously claimed that 70 percent of Sarawak's forests…
Truck carrying raw logs in Myanmar. Photo courtesy of EIA 155 Chinese citizens have been arrested in Myanmar for illegal logging, reports Agence France-Presse. According to a statement from China's…
Deforestation for soy in the Brazilian Amazon and cerrado. Data from Gibbs et al 2015, photo by Rhett A. Butler. Click image to enlarge. The moratorium on forest conversion established…
Screenshot of Wilmar's transparency dashboard Wilmar, the world's largest palm oil company, has unveiled a tool it says will help eliminate deforestation from its global supply chain. The tool is…
Deforestation in Riau, Sumatra in 2014. Photos by Rhett A. Butler. When Indonesia's former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono declared a moratorium in May 2012 on the issuance of new permits…
Forest loss in five Malaysian states affected by flooding in Dec 2015. Five states hard hit by flooding last month in Malaysia had high rates of forest loss in recent…
Agriculture has surpassed deforestation and land use change as a driver of greenhouse gas emissions, argues a paper published in Global Change Biology. The research, led by Francesco N. Tubiello…
Clip from the SumOfUs Doritos ad. A dispute between environmentalists and PepsiCo over the food company's palm oil sourcing policy is escalating after activists released a video spoofing the Doritos…
Logging road in neighboring Sabah. Legal logging has caused substantial forest loss and degradation in Sarawak over the past 30 years, depleting canopy cover, altering forest structure, exacerbated hunting, and…
Tim Kovar on an Amazon sunset climb. Courtesy of Tim Kovar. The bulk of life in the rainforest is found the leafy layers of the canopy. But little was known…
Google Maps image showing Arajuno Canton Indigenous leaders are calling for the release of six tribesmen implicated in a raid on an oilfield in Eastern Ecuador that left six soldiers…
