Robert Muggah

About

Robert Muggah is an expert on security, cities, climate action and digital transformation. He is Chief Innovation Officer for the Igarapé Institute, an independent 'think and do tank' that he co-founded, which is focused on the areas of public, climate and digital security and its consequences for democracy.

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Firefighters battle a wildfire spreading through a forested area near Concepcion, Chile, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Javier Torres, File)

Tipping points and ecosystem collapse are the real geopolitical risk (commentary)

Robert Muggah 9 Feb 2026

Two members of the Prey Preah Roka Community Network – a grassroots activism group made up of communities around the wildlife sanctuary - document an illegally logged tree in the wildlife sanctuary. The grassroots group regularly patrol the wildlife sanctuary, documenting any illegal logging they come across by marking GPS coordinates, as well as taking a note of the species and diameter of the trees. Image by: Andy Ball / Mongabay.

Environmental crime prevention is moving into the diplomatic mainstream (commentary)

Robert Muggah 8 Jan 2026

Although operations like Green Shield are useful, experts say that they are not the solution for combatting illicit activities in the Amazon in the long run, as activities such as illegal mining continue to expand. Image courtesy of the UAE Ministry of Interior.

Formalizing small-scale gold mining can reduce environmental impacts & crime (commentary)

Robert Muggah 7 Aug 2025

Banner image: A truck carries logs cut from the Amazon Rainforest in the state of Rondônia. Image courtesy of Vicente Sampaio/Imaflora.

The world needs a new UN protocol to fight environmental crime (commentary)

Robert Muggah 15 May 2025

Cacao production in the Amazon (source FAPESP)

Scaling up the Amazon’s many bioeconomies requires investment in nature, prosperity, and inclusion (commentary)

Katherine Aguirre, Peter Smith, Robert Muggah 8 Aug 2024

Recent deforestation for oil palm in the Amazon rainforest

Governments are ramping up actions to fight environmental crime across the Amazon, but is it working? (commentary)

Robert Muggah 27 May 2024

Artistic rendering of a forest shaped like a brain. AI-generated.

To reverse deforestation and protect biodiversity, build a bioeconomy in the Amazon (commentary)

Robert Muggah 23 Feb 2024

A biodiversity index created by Bioverse using machine learning to detect species and then spatially categorize them. Image courtesy of Bioverse.

Can digital twins help save the Amazon? (commentary)

Carlo Ratti, Robert Muggah 2 Nov 2023

Overflight of illegal mining within the Yanomani Indigenous territory, Roraima, Brazil, April 2021. Image by Christian Braga for Greenpeace.

Can a new regional pact protect the Amazon from environmental crime? (commentary)

Carolina Andrade, Melina Risso, Robert Muggah 28 Mar 2023

Rainstorm over Turkana, Kenya. Photo by Rhett A. Butler

Climate change could force 1.2 billion to move by 2050. Is the world even remotely ready?

Robert Muggah 9 Dec 2022

Peru’s Amazon rainforest is threatened by an ecosystem of environment crime (commentary)

Carolina Andrade, Robert Muggah 4 Jul 2022

Gold mining in the Amazon. Photo credit: Rhett A. Butler

Brazil’s illegal gold rush is fueling corruption, violent crime and deforestation

Robert Muggah 14 Jan 2022

News and Inspiration from Nature's Frontline.

Collage of a red-bellied toad and a bridge broken by flood

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Examining coffee plants in the fields of a CoopeTarrazú grower.

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