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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/by/sara-saraiva/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Thu, 20 Aug 2026 08:32:58 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>Stories by Sara Saraiva -</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/by/sara-saraiva/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Climate change drove extreme July heat in European seas, study finds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/climate-change-drove-extreme-july-heat-in-european-seas-study-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/climate-change-drove-extreme-july-heat-in-european-seas-study-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Aug 2026 08:31:30 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Naina Rao]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/20082548/image-21-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326760</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Europe]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[algae, Biodiversity, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Coral Reefs, Ecosystems, Environment, Extreme Weather, Global Warming, Heatwave, Impact Of Climate Change, Marine, Ocean Warming, Oceans, Science, Sea Levels, Temperatures, and Weather]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[European coastal waters recorded unprecedented sea surface temperatures in July 2026. A new study has found that human-induced climate change primarily drove the temperature surge, pushing marine ecosystems past their limits. The rapid analysis was conducted by World Weather Attribution (WWA), a global network of researchers who analyze the influence of climate change in extreme [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[European coastal waters recorded unprecedented sea surface temperatures in July 2026. A new study has found that human-induced climate change primarily drove the temperature surge, pushing marine ecosystems past their limits. The rapid analysis was conducted by World Weather Attribution (WWA), a global network of researchers who analyze the influence of climate change in extreme weather events. WWA scientists focused their analysis on the warmest 14-day periods within July. They chose this specific time frame because sea surface temperatures normally peak in late summer (August-September). The authors analyzed July to isolate how early-season ocean heat is changing as the planet warms. Across all four regions studied — the Celtic Sea, the Bay of Biscay and Iberian Peninsula (BIP), and the western and eastern Mediterranean — these sea surface temperatures averaged 2.4° Celsius (4.3° Fahrenheit) warmer than historical July baselines. In individual basins, the Celtic Sea was 1.9°C (3.4°F) above normal, while the Eastern Mediterranean was 2°C (3.6°F) hotter than typical July conditions. The WWA report notes these extreme July temperatures would have been &#8220;virtually impossible&#8221; in a preindustrial climate, which was 1.4°C (2.5°F) cooler, but are “relatively common” in today’s climate. The study&#8217;s rapid attribution analysis reveals that burning fossil fuels directly drove this extreme warmth. In both Mediterranean regions, climate change added about 2°C of direct heat. In the Eastern Mediterranean, climate change accounted for the entirety of the 2°C anomaly. In the Celtic Sea and BIP, climate change directly added 1.1-1.4°C (2-2.5°F). “We find that without human-caused global warming, we would expect&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/climate-change-drove-extreme-july-heat-in-european-seas-study-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/climate-change-drove-extreme-july-heat-in-european-seas-study-finds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326760</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous fishers rethink shark hunting &#038; protect species on Colombia’s coast</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-fishers-rethink-shark-hunting-protect-species-on-colombias-coast/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-fishers-rethink-shark-hunting-protect-species-on-colombias-coast/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Aug 2026 06:00:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Euan Wallace]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19153718/DSC04428-2-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326694</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation, Indigenous-led conservation, Latin America, and Oceans]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Citizen Science, Community Development, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Crime, Ecosystems, Environment, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Research, Science, and Sharks]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[LA GUAJIRA, Colombia — Feet from the ocean, four sharks and a ray lie dead on the wind-battered sand. Above them stands Wilfrido Arends, 46. The blade of a short knife glints in his hand. Carefully, he bends down to cut a small fin from the underside of one shark — an endangered species known [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[LA GUAJIRA, Colombia — Feet from the ocean, four sharks and a ray lie dead on the wind-battered sand. Above them stands Wilfrido Arends, 46. The blade of a short knife glints in his hand. Carefully, he bends down to cut a small fin from the underside of one shark — an endangered species known as a blacknose (Carcharhinus acronotus). He hands the sample to a woman next to him, who places it delicately in a vial. A tape measure is passed over the still glistening back of the dead shark. Each measurement is read out and noted down. Arends, a fisher from Colombia&#8217;s Wayuu Indigenous community, is spearheading shark research and conservation in Punta Gallinas, a Wayuu community where shark meat is part of the traditional diet. Home to around 50 families, the community sits at the northernmost tip of South America. &#8220;If we wipe out our sharks, I think that further down the line we will miss them,&#8221; says Arends, who is known locally as &#8220;Caracas.&#8221; Together with researchers from Colombian shark conservation initiative Proyecto Puyuii, Arends and other Wayuu fishers are documenting shark diversity in the largely unstudied waters of La Guajira. &#8220;There&#8217;s almost no data on anything,&#8221; says Diego Cardeñosa, a marine biologist at Florida International University in the U.S. A member of Proyecto Puyuii, he has been training Wayuu fishers to record the shark species they catch. Wayuu fishers and Puyuii researchers measure the carcass of a caught blacknose shark, an endangered species. Image by&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-fishers-rethink-shark-hunting-protect-species-on-colombias-coast/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-fishers-rethink-shark-hunting-protect-species-on-colombias-coast/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326694</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Nepal pushes for hydropower in protected areas through legal grey area</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/nepal-pushes-for-hydropower-in-protected-areas-through-legal-grey-area/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/nepal-pushes-for-hydropower-in-protected-areas-through-legal-grey-area/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Aug 2026 05:16:08 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rudra Pangeni]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abhaya Raj Joshi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/23104302/%C2%A9-Rocky-Prajapati-DNPWC-WWF-Nepal-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326743</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Global, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Big Cats, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Cats, Conservation, Fish, Freshwater Fish, Mammals, National Parks, Pandas, Pangolins, Protected Areas, Snow Leopards, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU – Nepal’s government has allowed several private hydropower producers to develop projects inside protected areas and the buffer zones surrounding them, contravening a Supreme Court order, a Mongabay investigation reveals. In January 2025, the Supreme Court declared that a 2024 amendment to a key conservation law opening up protected areas to commercial projects was [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU – Nepal’s government has allowed several private hydropower producers to develop projects inside protected areas and the buffer zones surrounding them, contravening a Supreme Court order, a Mongabay investigation reveals. In January 2025, the Supreme Court declared that a 2024 amendment to a key conservation law opening up protected areas to commercial projects was “invalid” as it was against the constitutionally defined state policy of environment-friendly development and the principle of intergenerational equity. As the court is yet to publish the full text of the verdict, the government has interpreted the law and issued permits for development, the investigation aided by a right to information request finds. “To issue permits [for hydropower projects] inside protected areas is a misinterpretation of the court verdict,” said senior lawyer Prakash Mani Sharma Bhusal, one of the petitioners who took the government to court on July 28, 2024, over its decision to open protected areas to infrastructure such as hydropower plants and hotels. Kaligandaki hydropower dam in Nepal. Image by Krish Dulal via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0). The court’s 2025 verdict came in response to a petition filed by lawyers led by Dil Raj Khanal, who argued that the 2024 amendment to the parks and conservation act, which came into effect on July 8, 2024, violated Article 30 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to a clean and healthy environment, and contradicted Nepal’s obligations under international treaties such as the Convention on Biological Diversity. Yet the Supreme Court has still not&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/nepal-pushes-for-hydropower-in-protected-areas-through-legal-grey-area/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/nepal-pushes-for-hydropower-in-protected-areas-through-legal-grey-area/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326743</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Sloth bears help shape India&#8217;s dry forests as unlikely seed dispersers</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/sloth-bears-help-shape-indias-dry-forests-as-unlikely-seed-dispersers/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/sloth-bears-help-shape-indias-dry-forests-as-unlikely-seed-dispersers/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Aug 2026 03:11:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Naina Rao]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/20031045/To-understand-what-bears-were-eating-researchers-surveyed-the-area-between-November-2021-and-July-2022-during-winter-and-summer-seasons.-Photo-Credit-Utkarsh-Prajapati-2048x1343-1-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326741</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, India, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Ecology, Ecosystem Services, Endangered Species, Environment, Food, Forests, Mammals, Mountains, Research, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Sloth bears play a critical role in structuring India’s dry deciduous forests by dispersing viable seeds and influencing plant regeneration, reports contributor Sneha Mahale for Mongabay India. &#8220;Dry deciduous forests&#8217; plant compositions are a function of sloth bear presence, movement, and dietary habits,&#8221; study co-author K.S. Gopi Sundar, an independent scientist, told Mongabay India. For [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Sloth bears play a critical role in structuring India’s dry deciduous forests by dispersing viable seeds and influencing plant regeneration, reports contributor Sneha Mahale for Mongabay India. &#8220;Dry deciduous forests&#8217; plant compositions are a function of sloth bear presence, movement, and dietary habits,&#8221; study co-author K.S. Gopi Sundar, an independent scientist, told Mongabay India. For the study,  the researchers surveyed the mountainous south-central Aravalli range in the western state of Rajasthan between November 2021 and July 2022. They analyzed 180 droppings or scats of sloth bears (Melursus ursinus)  and discovered that the bears’ diet shifted from plant-dominated in the winter to animal-dominated in the summer. In winter, ants appeared in more than 80% of the scats, whereas termites dominated summer samples. Among fruits, donkey berry (Grewia flavescens) was the most critical food source in both seasons, while Ziziphus nummularia was favored in winter and the golden shower tree (Cassia fistula) in summer. “The strong shift in diet was of great surprise,” said study co-author Utkarsh Prajapati, a senior project associate at the Wildlife Institute of India. “Previous studies on sloth bears in semi-arid regions have shown that they consume a lot of fruits during the summer.” Study co-author Vijay Kumar Koli  with the Department of Zoology at Mohanlal Sukhadia University, Udaipur, said this seasonal change “showed that bears were highly adaptable, switching to foods that were more available.” To test whether bears help in seed dispersal, the researchers monitored the germination of eight plant species most important in the bears’&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/sloth-bears-help-shape-indias-dry-forests-as-unlikely-seed-dispersers/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/sloth-bears-help-shape-indias-dry-forests-as-unlikely-seed-dispersers/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326741</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Why every endangered species needs a champion: a conversation with conservationist Bill Konstant</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/why-every-endangered-species-needs-a-champion-a-conversation-with-conservationist-bill-konstant/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/why-every-endangered-species-needs-a-champion-a-conversation-with-conservationist-bill-konstant/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Aug 2026 00:09:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rhett Ayers Butler]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19225107/Bill-and-Friend-Abu-Dhabi-121118-NH-0129-Mongabay-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326612</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Ex-situ Conservation, In-situ Conservation, Interviews, Primates, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Russell Mittermeier has a running joke about Bill Konstant. The two have worked together, off and on, for more than four decades, and Mittermeier writes in the foreword to Wrestles With Wolves that Konstant seems to have a tolerance of roughly five years working directly for him before departing for another organization. Konstant has an [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Russell Mittermeier has a running joke about Bill Konstant. The two have worked together, off and on, for more than four decades, and Mittermeier writes in the foreword to Wrestles With Wolves that Konstant seems to have a tolerance of roughly five years working directly for him before departing for another organization. Konstant has an explanation for that pattern. He has never been much interested in becoming a “company man.” Instead, he has compared his role to that of a catalyst in a chemical reaction — something that helps raise the energy of the system but need not remain once the reaction is underway. There have been plenty of reactions. Bill Konstant in the UAE. Photo by Jean-Christophe Vie Konstant has worked for the World Wildlife Fund and Conservation International, built conservation programs at zoos, and helped direct grants to field biologists working on threatened species. Much of his career has centered on primates, although the animals in his 2023 memoir range from golden frogs and rhinos to wolves, elephants and a squirrel his family raised when he was young. The route into professional conservation was less orderly than the résumé makes it look. At Cornell University, Konstant became an undergraduate teaching assistant for ornithologist Tom Cade, founder of the Peregrine Fund, whose work helped restore peregrine falcons after DDT contributed to steep population declines. Later, at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, Konstant took a job caring for and training chimpanzees. Jane Goodall had helped spark&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/why-every-endangered-species-needs-a-champion-a-conversation-with-conservationist-bill-konstant/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/why-every-endangered-species-needs-a-champion-a-conversation-with-conservationist-bill-konstant/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326612</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Dolphin mother and calf observed using shells to catch fish in Australia</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/dolphin-mother-and-calf-observed-using-shells-to-catch-fish-in-australia/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/dolphin-mother-and-calf-observed-using-shells-to-catch-fish-in-australia/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 23:16:32 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Bobby Bascomb]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19230807/dolphin-female-shelling-seashells-catch-fish_UniSC_2m-768x512.avif" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326737</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Baby Animals, Biodiversity, Cetaceans, Charismatic Animals, Dolphins, Mammals, Marine Animals, Marine Mammals, Oceans, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A small population of dolphins in Shark Bay in Western Australia have a documented history of using an unusual tool to help them catch fish: Large, empty snail shells. For the first time, scientists have now observed the same behavior in a different dolphin population on Australia’s east coast. Researchers even filmed a baby dolphin [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A small population of dolphins in Shark Bay in Western Australia have a documented history of using an unusual tool to help them catch fish: Large, empty snail shells. For the first time, scientists have now observed the same behavior in a different dolphin population on Australia’s east coast. Researchers even filmed a baby dolphin and its mother using a shell to capture fish, suggesting the baby may have learned the skill from its mother — this hadn’t been observed before now, they write in a recent study. “The second I saw it [on the east coast], I was like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, this is huge,” study lead author Alexis Levengood, a lecturer of animal ecology at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia, told Mongabay in a video call. In a behavior called “shelling,” bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) can chase fish into large empty sea snail shells, stick their beak inside to trap the fish, and then raise the shell to the water’s surface where the fish slides out into the dolphin’s mouth. “It essentially gives them a competitive edge over other dolphins that aren&#8217;t using this type of tool use because it makes it easier for them to catch harder-to-catch fish,” Levengood said. The behavior was first described in 2011 when researchers found roughly 2% of dolphins in Shark Bay demonstrated the skill. It was believed to be a localized behavior until Levengood confirmed three dolphins in Great Sandy Marine Park, Queensland, using the same&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/dolphin-mother-and-calf-observed-using-shells-to-catch-fish-in-australia/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/dolphin-mother-and-calf-observed-using-shells-to-catch-fish-in-australia/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326737</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Orangutan Day: Here&#8217;s where the three critically endangered species stand</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/orangutan-day-heres-where-the-three-critically-endangered-species-stand/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/orangutan-day-heres-where-the-three-critically-endangered-species-stand/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 20:30:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shanna Hanbury]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19202705/sumatran-orangutan-inaturalistcrop-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326715</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Borneo, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Apes, Biodiversity, Great Apes, Mammals, Orangutans, Primates, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Aug. 19 is World Orangutan Day, a day to honor the three species of Southeast Asian great apes, all of which are classified as critically endangered by the IUCN, the global conservation authority. Orangutans were classified into two species: The Sumatran orangutan (Pongo abelii) found in northern Sumatra, Indonesia, and the Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus), [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Aug. 19 is World Orangutan Day, a day to honor the three species of Southeast Asian great apes, all of which are classified as critically endangered by the IUCN, the global conservation authority. Orangutans were classified into two species: The Sumatran orangutan (Pongo abelii) found in northern Sumatra, Indonesia, and the Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus), endemic to its namesake island. But in 2017, scientists described the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis) as a third, distinct species, also found in northern Sumatra. Here are the major orangutan developments over the past year: Whirlwind year for Tapanuli orangutans In September 2025, researchers confirmed a previously unknown Tapanuli population in a peat swamp forest in the Lumut Maju village forest in North Sumatra. Scientists previously believed the species, estimated at 716 wild individuals, lived only in Batang Toru, about 32 kilometers (20 miles) east of the new population. A Tapanuli orangutan. Image © Bert Harris via iNaturalist (CC BY-NC 4.0). Two months later, Cyclone Senyar triggered tens of thousands of landslides in Batang Toru and killed an estimated 58 Tapanuli orangutans. Habitat destruction for small-scale agriculture and logging accounts for around 70% of direct forest loss. Large-scale industrial projects, including the Batang Toru hydropower plant and the Martabe gold mine, are also encroaching into the orangutans’ range. Newborn Sumatran orangutan’s mother saved from trafficking In July 2026, a formerly trafficked Sumatran orangutan named Bulan gave birth in the wild seven years after being reintroduced. Her infant was the 10th confirmed birth from reintroduced orangutans&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/orangutan-day-heres-where-the-three-critically-endangered-species-stand/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/orangutan-day-heres-where-the-three-critically-endangered-species-stand/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326715</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Egypt’s deserts show why ecological knowledge matters in conservation (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/egypts-deserts-show-why-ecological-knowledge-matters-in-conservation-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/egypts-deserts-show-why-ecological-knowledge-matters-in-conservation-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 15:13:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Marwan Mahmoud Kamal Hamdoun]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19142501/Red_Sea_coastal_landscape-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326676</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Egypt, Global, and North Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Commentary, Conservation, Culture, Deserts, Ecosystems, Ecotourism, Education, Environment, Tourism, Traditional Knowledge, and Travel]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Egypt&#8217;s deserts are often introduced to the world as empty: Wide horizons, silence, heat, sand and stone. In tourism brochures they become dramatic scenery. In archaeological writing they can appear as corridors around monuments. In some conservation documents they are fragile spaces that need technical management from outside. But these descriptions miss something essential. Deserts [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Egypt&#8217;s deserts are often introduced to the world as empty: Wide horizons, silence, heat, sand and stone. In tourism brochures they become dramatic scenery. In archaeological writing they can appear as corridors around monuments. In some conservation documents they are fragile spaces that need technical management from outside. But these descriptions miss something essential. Deserts are not empty. They are living landscapes, ecological archives and knowledge systems. For local desert communities, the landscape is not a blank background. It is read through water, plants, tracks, grazing routes, winds, seasonal movement, stories, risks and memories. A valley, a spring, a coastal plain or a mountain pass can hold information about how people and non-human life have adapted to scarcity. This kind of local ecological knowledge is not a decorative addition to conservation. It can help researchers and managers understand how landscapes are used, remembered and explained. In Egypt, this point matters urgently. The country is known globally for its ancient monuments, but its protected areas and biosphere reserves also contain another kind of heritage: Fossil valleys, desert plants, coral-linked coastal systems, migration routes, geological formations and human knowledge shaped by arid environments. If these landscapes are treated only as scenery, or as scientific sites separated from people, conservation loses part of its evidence base and much of its public meaning. At Wadi Al-Hitan in Fayoum, Egypt, visitors often arrive to see fossil whales, but the wider landscape tells a larger story: Ancient seas, changing climates, desert erosion and the long history&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/egypts-deserts-show-why-ecological-knowledge-matters-in-conservation-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/egypts-deserts-show-why-ecological-knowledge-matters-in-conservation-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326676</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New Zealand opens marine reserves with groundbreaking Māori co-management model</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 14:48:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18170638/2-Members-of-the-Kai-Tahu-marine-ranger-team-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326516</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Conservation leadership, Culture, Environment, Governance, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Hope and optimism, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Law, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, Protected Areas, and Solutions]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — At a U.N. meeting in 2015, Aotearoa New Zealand’s then Prime Minister John Key made a major announcement that drew praise from international conservation groups: His administration would turn a swath of waters far larger than the country’s land mass into a marine protected area (MPA). The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — At a U.N. meeting in 2015, Aotearoa New Zealand’s then Prime Minister John Key made a major announcement that drew praise from international conservation groups: His administration would turn a swath of waters far larger than the country’s land mass into a marine protected area (MPA). The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary, planned for New Zealand’s northern waters, would have been one of the largest fully no-take MPAs in the world, but the sanctuary violated Māori fishing rights enshrined decades earlier. Key’s government had done relatively little to consult with Māori groups about the proposal, many of whom resisted the plan, calling for more recognition of their authority and their role in ocean governance. The sanctuary plan fell through. Yet, even as Key’s top-down exercise drew criticism, a more bottom-up approach to marine governance was underway in the country’s far southeast. There, Māori leaders helped develop a network of small MPAs, five of which became official on July 1, 2026, after more than a decade of grassroots and governmental work. A key aim is to protect seabed habitats, offshore canyons, rocky reefs, tidal lagoons and kelp forests. The network, called Te Au Roa o Te Rakihouia, is co-managed by the regional Māori tribe Kāi Tahu (Ngāi Tahu in standard Māori), and the Department of Conservation. The reserves are the first in the country to be co-managed by Indigenous people and the government using shared decision-making and a joint marine ranger team. The network name refers to the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326516</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Philippine Supreme Court rules monitoring commercial fishing vessels is unconstitutional</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/philippine-supreme-court-rules-monitoring-commercial-fishing-vessels-is-unconstitutional/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/philippine-supreme-court-rules-monitoring-commercial-fishing-vessels-is-unconstitutional/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 14:33:28 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19104201/4447483754_4a51b2e873_o-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326635</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Philippines, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Law, and Oceans]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Philippine Supreme Court has struck down a regulation requiring commercial fishing vessels to continuously transmit their locations and submit electronic catch reports, a decision small-scale fishers say could make it harder to protect coastal grounds already strained by overfishing and competition from larger operators. The high court upheld a lower-court decision that invalidated Fisheries [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Philippine Supreme Court has struck down a regulation requiring commercial fishing vessels to continuously transmit their locations and submit electronic catch reports, a decision small-scale fishers say could make it harder to protect coastal grounds already strained by overfishing and competition from larger operators. The high court upheld a lower-court decision that invalidated Fisheries Administrative Order No. 266 (FAO 266), which required all Philippine-flagged commercial fishing vessels to install tracking systems and electronically report catches and other operational information. The court issued its decision on Jan. 21, 2026, and announced it publicly on Aug. 3, 2026. The Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) filed a motion for reconsideration of the court’s decision on Aug. 14. Without continuous tracking, fishers say authorities may struggle to detect commercial vessels entering municipal waters — the coastal zone generally extending 15 kilometers (9 miles) from shore and reserved primarily for small-scale local fishers. “If some vessels could still enter municipal waters even when monitoring devices were installed, it could become even worse now that the Supreme Court has declared the requirement unconstitutional,” Pablo Rosales, president of Pangisda Pilipinas, a national fisherfolk alliance, told Mongabay by phone. Some fishers and scientists also raised concerns that greater commercial fishing pressure could further reduce the number of fish available to coastal communities. A skipjack purse seine fishery operation underway on the deck of a Philippine fish carrier/supply boat. Image © Alex Hofford / Greenpeace. Tracking commercial fishing FAO 266 formed part of&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/philippine-supreme-court-rules-monitoring-commercial-fishing-vessels-is-unconstitutional/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/philippine-supreme-court-rules-monitoring-commercial-fishing-vessels-is-unconstitutional/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326635</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cougars cut deadly vehicle-deer collisions in the US by up to 76%, study shows</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/cougars-cut-deadly-vehicle-deer-collisions-in-the-u-s-by-up-to-76-study-shows/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/cougars-cut-deadly-vehicle-deer-collisions-in-the-u-s-by-up-to-76-study-shows/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 13:06:54 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Starre Vartan]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sharon Guynup]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18174235/1-cougar-on-road-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326556</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[North America and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animal Behavior, Animals, Big Cats, Biodiversity, Cats, Environment, Mammals, Predators, Research, Roadkill, Roads, Top Predators, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[If you’re a black-tailed deer on the Olympic Peninsula in the U.S. state of Washington, you’re always surrounded by friends and family. You are free-range, with abundant food to forage in familiar woods and meadows. But you’re also vigilant because you’re a prey species and your ideal habitat is also home to your top predators: [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[If you’re a black-tailed deer on the Olympic Peninsula in the U.S. state of Washington, you’re always surrounded by friends and family. You are free-range, with abundant food to forage in familiar woods and meadows. But you’re also vigilant because you’re a prey species and your ideal habitat is also home to your top predators: Cascade mountain wolves (Canis lupus fuscus), cougars (Puma concolor) and black bears (Ursus americanus). Avoiding the animals that will hunt you and your fawns is an integral part of how you move across the landscape. Cougars, padding on giant, soundless paws, are to be especially feared, as you are their favorite meal. As such, cougars directly impact where you go to find food, water and rest, and when you do it, according to a new study in the journal Current Biology.  The study reinforces the idea that the presence of cougars, also known as pumas, mountain lions and some 40 other names in English, alters how their prey uses the landscape. In doing so, they keep humans safer by pushing the region’s black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus columbianus) away from roads and potential collisions with vehicles. Nationwide, there are 1.6-2.1 million accidents involving deer every year in the U.S., killing 200-440 people and costing about $10 billion a year, according to data cited in a 2025 study. The cats aren’t patrolling the highways and chasing deer away from traffic, of course. “The deer know where they&#8217;re most likely to be at risk of an encounter with a&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/cougars-cut-deadly-vehicle-deer-collisions-in-the-u-s-by-up-to-76-study-shows/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326556</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Brazil marks borders for isolated Indigenous group in the Amazon after decades</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/brazil-marks-borders-for-isolated-indigenous-group-in-the-amazon-after-decades/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/brazil-marks-borders-for-isolated-indigenous-group-in-the-amazon-after-decades/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 11:44:35 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shanna Hanbury]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Bobbybascomb]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19112657/image_processing20260506-2-8iqz9z-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326661</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Culture, Governance, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Law, Protected Areas, and Uncontacted Tribes]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Agents of Brazil’s Indigenous agency, FUNAI, spent 60 days in June and July 2026 physically marking the borders of the Rio Pardo Kawahiva Indigenous Territory. The 411,000-hectare (1 million-acre) area in the Amazon biome of Mato Grosso state is home to the Kawahiva, an isolated Indigenous group. The government agency confirmed the presence of the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Agents of Brazil’s Indigenous agency, FUNAI, spent 60 days in June and July 2026 physically marking the borders of the Rio Pardo Kawahiva Indigenous Territory. The 411,000-hectare (1 million-acre) area in the Amazon biome of Mato Grosso state is home to the Kawahiva, an isolated Indigenous group. The government agency confirmed the presence of the Indigenous group in 1999 and began demarcating its territory in 2001. “The uncontacted Kawahiva have been under threat in their own forest home for decades, while simply trying to exercise their right to live as they choose without contact,” Caroline Pearce, director of the UK-based NGO Survival International, said in a statement. Still image of a Kawahiva individual taken by federal agents in August 2013. Image courtesy of FUNAI. The territory has been invaded by land-grabbers and loggers, causing deforestation. Historically, the Kawahiva territory was intermittently protected via temporary land protection orders, which faced opposition from logging companies. To officially demarcate the territory, FUNAI agents opened a path around the land and installed roughly 140 signs at strategic locations, FUNAI agents told Mongabay.  “Here in our region, all owners of plots of land do this,” Jair Candor, coordinator of the FUNAI unit that safeguards the Kawahiva, told Mongabay in an audio message. “The limits of land are marked by opening a path around that territory, whether it belongs to the white man or to an Indigenous person.”   The last of more than 100 signs was placed on July 3, 2026. Image courtesy of Kenedy&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/brazil-marks-borders-for-isolated-indigenous-group-in-the-amazon-after-decades/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326661</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New leadership initiative carries on legacy of late Indonesian environmental activist</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-leadership-initiative-carries-on-legacy-of-late-indonesian-environmental-activist/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-leadership-initiative-carries-on-legacy-of-late-indonesian-environmental-activist/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 10:26:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19101300/IMG20260814192437-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326637</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Climate Justice, Conflict, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, NGOs, Social Justice, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — It had been 648 days since Nur Hidayati, an Indonesian environmental activist fondly known as Yaya or Mbak Yaya, died of cancer. Rukka Sombolinggi, secretary-general of Indonesia’s largest Indigenous organization, AMAN, had counted every one of those days. “ It makes me sad,” she said at the launch of the Yaya Leadership Initiative [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — It had been 648 days since Nur Hidayati, an Indonesian environmental activist fondly known as Yaya or Mbak Yaya, died of cancer. Rukka Sombolinggi, secretary-general of Indonesia’s largest Indigenous organization, AMAN, had counted every one of those days. “ It makes me sad,” she said at the launch of the Yaya Leadership Initiative in Jakarta on Aug. 14, which would have been Yaya’s 53th birthday. But seeing the initiative launched in Yaya’s name gave Rukka another way to think about the loss. “Although she has gone, there are legacies, ideas and actions she left behind that we can still benefit from,” she said. The initiative, known as the YLI, brings together environmental, Indigenous, agrarian, fisher, human rights, and other movements to develop a new generation of community leaders — particularly from the ranks of women, young people, Indigenous peoples, and grassroots changemakers. Facilitated by the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), the country’s biggest green NGO, alongside organizations including the Indigenous alliance AMAN, the Consortium for Agrarian Reform (KPA), and the Indonesian Union of Traditional Fisherfolk (KNTI), the YLI aims to build the capacity, networks, and support systems of people working for social and environmental justice. The initiative is built around four principles that Yaya championed throughout her career: solidarity, equality, environmentalism, and diversity. But its proponents say the YLI is more than just an effort to preserve the memory of one of Indonesia’s most prominent environmental leaders. They say it’s an attempt to carry forward a particular&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-leadership-initiative-carries-on-legacy-of-late-indonesian-environmental-activist/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326637</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Spotted by AI: seahorses and shark fins</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/spotted-by-ai-seahorses-and-shark-fins/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/spotted-by-ai-seahorses-and-shark-fins/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 10:13:36 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Abhishyant Kidangoor]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sam Lee]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19101535/Mongabay_Thumbnail_XRay_Web.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326638</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Illegal Trade, Technology, Trade, Wildlife, and Wildlife Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[While elephant ivory, rhino horns and pangolin scales get a lot of attention when it comes to illegal wildlife trade, marine wildlife are widely targeted as well. A new AI-driven tool detects marine wildlife in luggages and bags at airports. The tool can detect sea cucumbers, sea horses and shark fins, with more species to [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[While elephant ivory, rhino horns and pangolin scales get a lot of attention when it comes to illegal wildlife trade, marine wildlife are widely targeted as well. A new AI-driven tool detects marine wildlife in luggages and bags at airports. The tool can detect sea cucumbers, sea horses and shark fins, with more species to be added to the tool. While human inspection is still needed to verify the findings, the researchers hope the tool will serve as a second set of eyes to keep track of the trade. Watch this video to learn more.This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/spotted-by-ai-seahorses-and-shark-fins/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326638</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Why carbon markets alone won&#8217;t save Southeast Asia&#8217;s concessions forests</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/why-carbon-markets-alone-wont-save-southeast-asias-concessions-forests/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/why-carbon-markets-alone-wont-save-southeast-asias-concessions-forests/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 05:25:05 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Naina Rao]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/19052242/Oil-palm-and-rubber-plantations-dominate-landscapes-across-many-parts-of-Southeast-Asia-as-photographed-here-in-Thailand.-Image-by-Carolyn-Cowan-Mongabay-scaled-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326630</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Biodiversity, Business, Carbon Credits, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Market, Carbon Sequestration, Conservation, Conservation Finance, Deforestation, Ecosystems, Finance, Forest Carbon, Forestry, Forests, Funding, Mitigation, Rainforests, Research, Secondary Forests, Solutions, Sustainable Forest Management, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[New research suggests a “massive and untapped” opportunity for conservation within commercial concessions in Southeast Asia, reports Mongabay’s Carolyn Cowan. Using satellite data, researchers identified roughly 42 million hectares (104 million acres) of intact forest still standing inside logging, timber, rubber and oil palm concessions across Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The study suggests that [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[New research suggests a “massive and untapped” opportunity for conservation within commercial concessions in Southeast Asia, reports Mongabay’s Carolyn Cowan. Using satellite data, researchers identified roughly 42 million hectares (104 million acres) of intact forest still standing inside logging, timber, rubber and oil palm concessions across Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The study suggests that clearing these forests — an area larger than the whole of Malaysia — could release 1.2 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions over the next 30 years. Incentivizing concession holders to protect these forests instead of converting them for commodity production presents a big opportunity for conservation, the study says. “A substantial portion of Southeast Asia&#8217;s remaining forest lies within concession landscapes,” study lead author Annabel Lim, a Ph.D. student at the National University of Singapore, said in an interview with Mongabay. “Meeting climate and biodiversity goals will, therefore, require engaging the concession owners as potential conservation partners”. However, the study notes that relying strictly on carbon markets to incentivize concession holders to choose conservation is economically unviable at current carbon prices. Currently, carbon credits issued for avoided deforestation in Southeast Asia, trade at just $5 to $12 per metric ton, according to the World Bank’s 2026 State and Trends of Carbon Pricing report. To make conservation financially competitive with agricultural or logging, the researchers calculated that carbon prices would need to reach between $33 and $1,677 per metric ton of carbon dioxide. Yiwen Zeng, a conservation scientist at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and senior&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/why-carbon-markets-alone-wont-save-southeast-asias-concessions-forests/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/why-carbon-markets-alone-wont-save-southeast-asias-concessions-forests/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326630</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Tapirs, bats and nests: How plastic infiltrates Amazonian wildlife</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/tapirs-bats-and-nests-how-plastic-infiltrates-amazonian-wildlife/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/tapirs-bats-and-nests-how-plastic-infiltrates-amazonian-wildlife/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 21:12:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Tiago da Mota e Silva]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Xavier Bartaburu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18210249/tapir-in-suriname-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326600</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Bats, Biodiversity, Birds, Conservation, Fish, Freshwater Fish, Health, Mammals, Microplastics, Plastic, Pollution, Protected Areas, Water Pollution, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[At the mouth of the Amazon River, birds are already building blue nests out of discarded plastic.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This is the third and final article in a special series on microplastics in the Amazon. Read the first story here and the second story here. MANAUS, Brazil — Traveling by boat up the Negro River from Amazonas state capital Manaus, it takes eight to nine hours to cover the 100 kilometers (62 miles) to Anavilhanas National Park. This protected area preserves one of the world’s largest freshwater archipelagos, comprising more than 400 islands and 60 lakes. They include Prato Lake, which is about 3.5 kilometers (about 2 miles) long and 1.5 kilometers (nearly 1 mile) wide. Yet, even here, in a protected area far from urban pressures, microplastics were found in the digestive tracts of fish. A recent study found an average concentration of 0.25 particles per liter of microplastics in the waters of Prato Lake. The particles were also present in the fish analyzed, regardless of their feeding habits, averaging 3.3 particles per individual. In total, about eight out of every 10 fish contained microplastics, despite living in a preserved area far from urban centers. “As a result of the entire connectivity dynamic that exists between aquatic environments in the Amazon, plastic is found even in the most remote places,” said co-author of the study Adalberto Val, a biologist from the National Institute of Amazonian Research (INPA). Plastic’s likely journey begins long before it reaches the lake. Most of the particles found in the fish consisted of filaments of polyamide, also known as nylon, alongside fragments of materials&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/tapirs-bats-and-nests-how-plastic-infiltrates-amazonian-wildlife/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/tapirs-bats-and-nests-how-plastic-infiltrates-amazonian-wildlife/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326600</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘Remembering Wildlife&#8217; shines a spotlight on the species we risk losing forever</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/podcast/2026/08/remembering-wildlife-shines-a-spotlight-on-the-species-we-risk-losing-forever/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/podcast/2026/08/remembering-wildlife-shines-a-spotlight-on-the-species-we-risk-losing-forever/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 20:05:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mike DiGirolamo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mikedigirolamo]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17061447/Federico_Veronesi_Masai_giraffe-e1787008659747-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=podcasts&#038;p=326469</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa and Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Arts, Biodiversity, Books, Charismatic Animals, Conservation, Culture, Giraffes, Interviews, Mammals, Media, Megafauna, Photos, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[British wildlife photographer Margot Raggett says she created the book Remembering Elephants after she heard David Attenborough say, “The question is, are we happy to suppose that our grandchildren may never be able to see an elephant except in a picture book?&#8221; Her effort was to provoke this question in others and to give the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[British wildlife photographer Margot Raggett says she created the book Remembering Elephants after she heard David Attenborough say, “The question is, are we happy to suppose that our grandchildren may never be able to see an elephant except in a picture book?&#8221; Her effort was to provoke this question in others and to give the proceeds from its sale to conservation organizations. In a sense, the book went viral and generated a following, prompting Raggett to continue the book series and her nonprofit, Remembering Wildlife. “Sometimes people get upset with me and say ‘They&#8217;re still around,’ but I want people to stop and think,” Raggett says. In this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, she discusses her journey into photography, the intention behind memorializing still-living species, and details of her 11th book, Remembering Giraffes, which will be published Oct. 12. Raggett has gathered work from some of the world&#8217;s most renowned wildlife photographers. To date, Remembering Wildlife has raised more than $1.6 million for 85 conservation organizations in 35 countries. Publishing the first book was not without its challenges. Not knowing as many photographers at the time, Raggett had to actively solicit photographers for their work. Just as she closed out the Kickstarter campaign to fund the book, Raggett was diagnosed with breast cancer, a moment that she says anchored her to the work. “During the next three months of my treatment … during my radiotherapy, I would work on the elephant book in the morning and then go and have&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/podcast/2026/08/remembering-wildlife-shines-a-spotlight-on-the-species-we-risk-losing-forever/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/podcast/2026/08/remembering-wildlife-shines-a-spotlight-on-the-species-we-risk-losing-forever/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326469</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Elders, conservationists race to record fading sacred ties to Philippines’ endemic birds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 19:55:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18111008/Mindoro-boobook-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326488</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Philippines, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Citizen Science, Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Education, Endangered Species, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GALERA, Philippines — The forest settles into a gentle rhythm as the trail climbs into the Iraya Mangyan ancestral domain in Puerto Galera town, on the Philippines’ Mindoro Island. Only birdsong breaks the silence as towering trees sway overhead. A clear stream tumbles across the trail over smooth rocks. Ahead walks 43-year-old Lenito Pampilo. Every [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GALERA, Philippines — The forest settles into a gentle rhythm as the trail climbs into the Iraya Mangyan ancestral domain in Puerto Galera town, on the Philippines’ Mindoro Island. Only birdsong breaks the silence as towering trees sway overhead. A clear stream tumbles across the trail over smooth rocks. Ahead walks 43-year-old Lenito Pampilo. Every few steps, he stops — not because the climb is difficult, but because the forest is speaking, he says. He points to an unseen bird in the canopy. Another answers from farther uphill. For him, each call carries meaning. “Our elders taught us these birds,” he tells Mongabay. Pampilo, an Iraya community leader and ecotrail guide, has spent much of his life in these mountains. His knowledge goes beyond recognizing species. “Some birds signal changing weather, warn of danger or carry messages between the living and spirit worlds,” he says. “Trees, streams and ridges also hold stories passed from one generation to the next.” For the Iraya, the forest is a largely unwritten living archive. Lenito Pampilo, an Iraya community leader and ecotrail guide, has spent much of his life in the mountains located in the Iraya Mangyan ancestral lands. Image by Keith Anthony Fabro. For the Iraya, the forest is a largely unwritten living archive. Image courtesy of Center for Conservation Innovations PH Inc. As elders age and fewer young people learn beside them, the Center for Conservation Innovations Philippines (CCIPH) is helping Iraya knowledge holders document wildlife, medicinal plants and culturally important places&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326488</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>On the Great Barrier Reef, management by Traditional Owners is growing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-the-great-barrier-reef-management-by-traditional-owners-is-growing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-the-great-barrier-reef-management-by-traditional-owners-is-growing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 18:35:11 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Cat Williams]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18180055/a.-141891-2-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326533</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation and Oceans]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia and Oceania]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Climate Change, Conservation, Conservation Solutions, Culture, Ecosystems, Environment, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Ocean Warming, Oceans, Protected Areas, Solutions, and Traditional Knowledge]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PERTH, Australia — “There’s this beautiful underwater garden out there,” says Mercy Singleton, referring to the vast network of colorful corals that make up the Great Barrier Reef off eastern Australia’s Queensland coast. “We’d like to see it safe and recovering.” Singleton is Yirrganydji and director of Research and Engagement Services at Dawul Wuru Aboriginal Corporation. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PERTH, Australia — “There’s this beautiful underwater garden out there,” says Mercy Singleton, referring to the vast network of colorful corals that make up the Great Barrier Reef off eastern Australia’s Queensland coast. “We’d like to see it safe and recovering.” Singleton is Yirrganydji and director of Research and Engagement Services at Dawul Wuru Aboriginal Corporation. Her people are one of 18 Traditional Owner groups helping steward the Great Barrier Reef, for them their Sea Country — with Traditional Use of Marine Resources Agreements (TUMRAs) in hand. These community-based plans for joint management of the Reef are part of a suite of conservation efforts at the iconic World Heritage Site that include Traditional Owners in management. While there are still gaps in the full inclusion of Indigenous communities in the stewardship of their traditional waters, big strides are being made, say Indigenous governance organizations and scientists. A recent decision by the World Heritage Committee has taken notice.  “The last 30 years have seen massive changes in how the Great Barrier Reef is managed, particularly for Traditional Owners,” says Allan Dale, professor of tropical regional development at James Cook University. “There&#8217;s been this great increase in the governing capability and the ability of those Traditional Owner groups to achieve their aspirations,” he tells Mongabay. “There&#8217;s been a real huge growth in the sort of capability of land and sea reservations and there&#8217;s an increasing number of rangers and leaders and planners and workers in that space.” Dr. Mercy Singleton, director of Research&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-the-great-barrier-reef-management-by-traditional-owners-is-growing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-the-great-barrier-reef-management-by-traditional-owners-is-growing/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326533</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>A looming rock collapse threatens a Swiss village as thawing permafrost destabilizes the Alps</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/a-looming-rock-collapse-threatens-a-swiss-village-as-thawing-permafrost-destabilizes-the-alps/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/a-looming-rock-collapse-threatens-a-swiss-village-as-thawing-permafrost-destabilizes-the-alps/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 17:12:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Associated Press]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18170831/AP26225333234129-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326552</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Europe, Global, and Switzerland]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Climate, Climate Change, Disasters, Ecosystems, Environment, Global Environmental Crisis, Impact Of Climate Change, Landslides, and Mountains]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KANDERSTEG, Switzerland (AP) — An unstable mountain rock formation looming above the Swiss village of Kandersteg threatens a landslide that could rival the disaster that destroyed nearby Blatten last year, a collapse scientists linked to thawing permafrost and glacier dynamics. The 1,300 residents of Kandersteg, in Switzerland’s Bern canton, live amid a quintessential Alpine landscape of sharp [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KANDERSTEG, Switzerland (AP) — An unstable mountain rock formation looming above the Swiss village of Kandersteg threatens a landslide that could rival the disaster that destroyed nearby Blatten last year, a collapse scientists linked to thawing permafrost and glacier dynamics. The 1,300 residents of Kandersteg, in Switzerland’s Bern canton, live amid a quintessential Alpine landscape of sharp peaks, white glaciers, steep green valleys and the distant sound of cowbells. But a catastrophe looms over the quiet village: a mountainside rock formation called Spitze Stei, part of a mountain landscape increasingly affected by thawing permafrost, threatens to collapse into the valley in a massive landslide. “You are aware that it’s happening, but not afraid,” said Brigitte Jüni, an inhabitant of Kandersteg. She said authorities took all the precautions they could. “But then it’s nature. It’s nature and you never know,” Jüni added. As glaciers and permafrost — the frozen soil sediment and rock that acts like a glue holding mountains together — melt due to higher temperatures caused by climate change, the threat of landslides is rising in the Swiss Alps. In May 2025, a huge mass of rock and ice from a glacier thundered down the mountainside in the nearby Loetschental valley, sending plumes of dust skyward and coating with mud nearly all of Blatten, which had been evacuated earlier as a precaution. Markus Stoffel, professor for climate change and natural risks at the University of Geneva, said climate change leads to the melting of both glaciers and permafrost. “In the mountains&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/a-looming-rock-collapse-threatens-a-swiss-village-as-thawing-permafrost-destabilizes-the-alps/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/a-looming-rock-collapse-threatens-a-swiss-village-as-thawing-permafrost-destabilizes-the-alps/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326552</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous food sovereignty is one of the most overlooked conservation strategies (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-food-sovereignty-is-one-of-the-most-overlooked-conservation-strategies-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-food-sovereignty-is-one-of-the-most-overlooked-conservation-strategies-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 16:21:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Brijlal ChaudhariGemma Sethsmith]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/09/23081210/44366384701_940bc33dc5_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326534</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Commentary, Conservation, Food, food security, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Traditional Knowledge, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As governments and conservation organizations search for solutions to the interconnected crises of biodiversity loss, climate change and food insecurity, they are overlooking one of the most effective approaches already working on the ground: Indigenous food sovereignty. Around the world, Indigenous communities manage or hold tenure rights to roughly a quarter of Earth’s land surface, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As governments and conservation organizations search for solutions to the interconnected crises of biodiversity loss, climate change and food insecurity, they are overlooking one of the most effective approaches already working on the ground: Indigenous food sovereignty. Around the world, Indigenous communities manage or hold tenure rights to roughly a quarter of Earth’s land surface, which contains 37% of remaining natural lands worldwide and a third of the planet’s intact forest landscapes. They conserve seeds, maintain diverse farming landscapes, protect forests and rivers and fisheries, and pass ecological knowledge from one generation to the next. Yet these systems are rarely recognized as central to conservation policy, despite their proven contributions to both biodiversity and community resilience. This needs to change. Food sovereignty leader Richard Rojo in his Vanuatu taro garden. Image courtesy of Monica Kidd. The global food system is becoming increasingly uniform. Just three crops — wheat, rice, and maize — provide more than half of the world’s plant-derived calories. Driven by profit, industrial agriculture has transformed vast landscapes into monocultures, contributing to habitat loss, declining soil health, water pollution and the erosion of crop diversity. At the same time, communities everywhere are becoming more vulnerable to climate shocks, market instability and diet-related disease. In contrast, Indigenous food systems are often built on diversity, reciprocity with the land and the way many Indigenous communities perceive wealth. For one of our communities, for example, the Tharu of Nepal, wealth is found in mutual aid, collective reciprocity, and the sacred relations&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-food-sovereignty-is-one-of-the-most-overlooked-conservation-strategies-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326534</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>On an Indonesian island, an ancient ritual evolves to protect an endangered cockatoo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-an-indonesian-island-an-ancient-ritual-evolves-to-protect-an-endangered-cockatoo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-an-indonesian-island-an-ancient-ritual-evolves-to-protect-an-endangered-cockatoo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 14:10:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Hayat Indriyatno]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18135704/KKI_Huaulu_10-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326518</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Maluku, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Animals, Biocultural Diversity, Biodiversity, Birds, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Habitat Loss, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Hunting, Indigenous Peoples, Over-hunting, Parrots, Poaching, Research, Science, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[An Indigenous community on Indonesia’s Seram Island is preserving a centuries-old coming-of-age ritual while helping protect the endangered salmon-crested cockatoo, a new study has found. The study, published in July in the Journal of Ethnobiology, documents how the Huaulu people adapted the sacred Cidaku initiation ceremony in collaboration with conservationists and government authorities. The ritual [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[An Indigenous community on Indonesia’s Seram Island is preserving a centuries-old coming-of-age ritual while helping protect the endangered salmon-crested cockatoo, a new study has found. The study, published in July in the Journal of Ethnobiology, documents how the Huaulu people adapted the sacred Cidaku initiation ceremony in collaboration with conservationists and government authorities. The ritual marks young men’s transition to adulthood and traditionally involved wearing the distinctive crest feathers of the salmon-crested cockatoo (Cacatua moluccensis), a bird found nowhere else on Earth. The Huaulu, one of Seram’s oldest Indigenous communities, regard Seram’s forests as a living realm inhabited by powerful spirits, shaping their approach to conservation. “The use of cockatoo feathers is specifically embedded within this cultural system and is very different from hunting birds for commercial purposes,” study lead author Dwi Agustina, a researcher at Indonesia’s Gadjah Mada University and program coordinator at the Indonesia’s Cockatoo Conservation Association (KKI), told Mongabay in an email. An endangered salmon-crested cockatoo on Seram Island, Indonesia. Image courtesy of Balázs Tisza/Wildlife Messengers. The Cidaku ritual once had ties to head-taking, but after colonial authorities and Christian missionaries suppressed the practice in the early 20th century, the Huaulu adapted the ceremony around hunting wild animals. The salmon-crested cockatoo became one traditional target, with its crest feathers used in the ceremonial puheliam headdress: the white feathers as a symbol of sacred life, peace and community, and the peach-tinged feathers signifying great strength and courage. Over the decades, however, the species has become endangered, largely due&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-an-indonesian-island-an-ancient-ritual-evolves-to-protect-an-endangered-cockatoo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/on-an-indonesian-island-an-ancient-ritual-evolves-to-protect-an-endangered-cockatoo/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326518</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>As an industry and a cooking ingredient, seaweed is gaining ground in Brazil</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/as-an-industry-and-a-cooking-ingredient-seaweed-is-gaining-ground-in-brazil/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/as-an-industry-and-a-cooking-ingredient-seaweed-is-gaining-ground-in-brazil/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 12:26:44 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Letícia Klein]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Xavier Bartaburu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18152140/IMG_2934-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326525</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[algae, Food, Food Industry, food security, Marine, Natural Resources, Nutrition, and Oceans]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[On a Brazilian beach, a family gave seaweed new life.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Aparecida Rosa Ayres often says she has known seaweed since she was in her mother’s womb, thanks to the stories she used to tell her. As a child, her mother used seaweed as doll hair while playing on the beach. Today, the 47-year-old Caiçara woman has given it a new meaning: It is the star ingredient at Rancho Ayres, her restaurant on Paraty’s São Gonçalo Beach. While the seaweed of her mother’s childhood was native to Ilha Grande Bay, the variety Aparecida uses for cooking is Kappaphycus alvarezii, a macroalgae of Philippine origin that she first found in 2013. Eight years later, she took a course offered by the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) and the Paraty municipal government on the potential of seaweed farming for the regional bioeconomy. That course inspired Algas na Mesa Paraty, an initiative that combines what Aparecida calls “seaweed gastronomy” with historical revival at the São Gonçalo and São Gonçalinho beaches. “We are the daughters of the waters; we were born in the maritório [marine territory], so the use of seaweed comes as a form of resistance and permanence to preserve the territory,” Aparecida says. She descends from one of the traditional Caiçara families (traditional population from south/southeast Brazil) displaced from their homes by the beach during the construction of the Rio-Santos federal road (BR-101) between 1969 and 1975. However, the Caiçara continued to use the beaches for work and leisure. There, families built ranchos — facilities that support mariculture, community-based tourism and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/as-an-industry-and-a-cooking-ingredient-seaweed-is-gaining-ground-in-brazil/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326525</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia leads global tally of abuses linked to Chinese transition-mineral investments</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indonesia-leads-global-tally-of-abuses-linked-to-chinese-transition-mineral-investments/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indonesia-leads-global-tally-of-abuses-linked-to-chinese-transition-mineral-investments/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 10:59:25 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/07/01140403/image_processing20240603-2-tg8aa4-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326494</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, North Maluku, Southeast Asia, and Sulawesi]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Batteries, Conflict, Critical Minerals, Electric Cars, Energy, Energy Transition, Health, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Law, Mining, Natural Resources, Pollution, Social Conflict, Transportation, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Indonesia recorded more allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals than any other country between 2023 and 2025, a new report says. It identifies the vast majority of problems with the country’s rapidly expanding nickel industry. The report by the Business &#38; Human Rights Resource Centre [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Indonesia recorded more allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals than any other country between 2023 and 2025, a new report says. It identifies the vast majority of problems with the country’s rapidly expanding nickel industry. The report by the Business &amp; Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRC) documented 323 publicly reported allegations across 24 countries during the three-year period, plus three confidential cases involving attacks on human rights defenders. That brings the total to 326 allegations for 2023-2025. The number of recorded allegations has also risen each year, from 51 in 2021 to 148 in 2025, bringing the five-year total to 434. That increase doesn’t necessarily mean the number of abuses themselves have tripled, as changes in reporting, monitoring, and the database can affect the figures. Still, the rising trend comes as investment in the minerals used in electric vehicles, batteries, and renewable energy technologies expands rapidly, raising risks for workers, Indigenous peoples, local communities, and the environment. The report also documented 18 attacks against human rights defenders across all 24 countries between 2023 and 2025, including cases involving judicial harassment, violence, and intimidation. Indonesia Of the 323 allegations analyzed in detail, 96 were in Indonesia, the highest of any country. The Democratic Republic of Congo was second with 52, followed by Myanmar with 36, Serbia with 32, and Zimbabwe with 20. Ninety of the 96 Indonesian allegations involved nickel. Of those, 71 concerned nickel processing, 17 nickel extraction, and two&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indonesia-leads-global-tally-of-abuses-linked-to-chinese-transition-mineral-investments/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indonesia-leads-global-tally-of-abuses-linked-to-chinese-transition-mineral-investments/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326494</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Mobile queen conch hatcheries strive to help the species, engage Caribbean communities</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/mobile-queen-conch-hatcheries-strive-to-help-the-species-engage-caribbean-communities/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/mobile-queen-conch-hatcheries-strive-to-help-the-species-engage-caribbean-communities/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 09:54:48 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[André Habet]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17144351/Henry-Carey-holds-up-shells-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326429</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Caribbean and North America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Molluscs, Oceans, Overfishing, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Queen conch were once so abundant that fishers in many parts of the Caribbean could wade into knee-deep waters and gather armfuls of the pink, whorled shells. Today, however, the giant marine snails are in decline across the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, while some populations have already collapsed. Growing demand for queen [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Queen conch were once so abundant that fishers in many parts of the Caribbean could wade into knee-deep waters and gather armfuls of the pink, whorled shells. Today, however, the giant marine snails are in decline across the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, while some populations have already collapsed. Growing demand for queen conch (Aliger gigas) meat and shells has led to overharvesting; habitat degradation, pollution and warming waters add further threats. Despite a 1992 CITES Appendix II listing to regulate their international trade, seasonal restrictions and bans by several Caribbean countries to address overfishing and juvenile harvesting, and a 2024 designation as a threatened species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, few queen conch survive to adulthood compared to historical baselines. In a bid to slow the species’ decline by helping more conch reach reproductive age, scientists are deploying an innovative set of solar-powered mobile hatcheries to shelter them through their vulnerable early life stages. The Queen Conch Lab (QCL), affiliated with Florida Atlantic University (FAU) in the U.S., partners with local conservation organizations to deploy the hatcheries. The aim is not just to build nurseries that will nurture and protect developing conch, but to create community learning spaces where students and other visitors can gain knowledge about the species’ life cycle and participate in restoration efforts, according to Megan Davis, director of the QCL and a research professor at FAU’s Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute. A researcher holds a juvenile queen conch. Image by Jennifer Doerr, NOAA&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/mobile-queen-conch-hatcheries-strive-to-help-the-species-engage-caribbean-communities/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/mobile-queen-conch-hatcheries-strive-to-help-the-species-engage-caribbean-communities/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326429</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Despite energy crisis, Bangladesh’s factories are slow to adopt solar power: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/despite-energy-crisis-bangladeshs-factories-are-slow-to-adopt-solar-power-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/despite-energy-crisis-bangladeshs-factories-are-slow-to-adopt-solar-power-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 07:37:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Md Asaduz Zaman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abu Siddique]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18072353/solar-power-energy-bangladesh-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326474</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Bangladesh, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Alternative Energy, Business, Developing Countries, Development, Energy, Energy Efficiency, Energy Transition, Environment, Industry, Natural Resources, Renewable Energy, Solar Power, and Sustainable Development]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Bangladesh’s energy system is facing intense pressure from the country’s ongoing fuel crisis and rising electricity bills. Yet thousands of garment factories&#8217; rooftops that could be fitted with solar panels remain largely unused. Renewable energy such as solar could be a potential solution to the escalating crisis, but has been overlooked for many years despite [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Bangladesh’s energy system is facing intense pressure from the country’s ongoing fuel crisis and rising electricity bills. Yet thousands of garment factories&#8217; rooftops that could be fitted with solar panels remain largely unused. Renewable energy such as solar could be a potential solution to the escalating crisis, but has been overlooked for many years despite Bangladesh having sufficient amounts of sunshine. Rather, the country relies almost entirely on grid electricity, which is mostly generated from imported fossil fuels. More than two-thirds or 69% of factories have still not adopted renewable energy technologies (RET), according to a recent study funded by the International Growth Centre (IGC). “Only 31% of factories have adopted RET (predominantly rooftop solar), with very low average capacity,” the study says. “Half of all solar installations do not even contribute to production processes.” This analysis is based on a survey of 661 factories in the cities of Gazipur and Savar, located close to the capital Dhaka, conducted by Atonu Rabbani of Dhaka University and a BRAC University research team and completed in October 2025. Bangladesh’s garment sector has more than 3,320 active factories. Of these, more than are located in Savar and Gazipur. The study focuses on these two industrial hubs using the Mapped in Bangladesh (MiB) database and samples more than 650 factories out of 1,937 in the two cities. A separate study conducted by the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) finds that solar adoption is mostly seen in large and environmentally certified factories (LEED-certified). Large factories&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/despite-energy-crisis-bangladeshs-factories-are-slow-to-adopt-solar-power-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/despite-energy-crisis-bangladeshs-factories-are-slow-to-adopt-solar-power-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326474</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Land crisis and ‘green revolution’ practices trap millions of Malawi’s farmers</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/land-crisis-and-green-revolution-practices-trap-millions-of-malawis-farmers/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/land-crisis-and-green-revolution-practices-trap-millions-of-malawis-farmers/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 07:30:34 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Charles Mpaka]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Terna Gyuse]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17101100/BRIGHT_LastonMchisweWithCabbage2_ThyoloDistrictMalawi_CharlesMpaka-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326364</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Malawi, and Southern Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Commodity agriculture, Community Development, Development, Economics, Environment, Farming, Fertilizers, Food, Food Industry, Food Prices, and Impact Of Climate Change]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[GOLIATI, Malawi — All that’s left to eat in Tapiwa Ligomeka’s one-room home is stored in a small plastic basin in one corner. Two days earlier, her husband came home with 2 kilos of maize meal, about 5 pounds — all he could afford to buy after a day hustling for casual work carrying traders’ [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[GOLIATI, Malawi — All that’s left to eat in Tapiwa Ligomeka’s one-room home is stored in a small plastic basin in one corner. Two days earlier, her husband came home with 2 kilos of maize meal, about 5 pounds — all he could afford to buy after a day hustling for casual work carrying traders’ goods at a nearby market, here in southern Malawi’s Thyolo district. On the day Mongabay visits her home, Ligomeka has just returned to her thatched-roof house in the village of Goliati, clutching a bundle of dry maize and pigeon pea stalks to make a fire later, her 8-month-old baby strapped to her back. It’s coming up to noon on a Sunday; her husband is still out watering his tomato crop near the river. “I’ll wait for him,” says Ligomeka, 18, dropping her bundle by the cold fireplace on the verandah. “This flour cannot make enough nsima for us to eat separately.” Nsima is the Chewa term for Malawi’s staple dish, a stiff porridge made from maize flour and usually eaten with vegetables, legumes, and, for those who can afford it, meat or fish. “It also means there won’t be anything for us to eat this evening,” Ligomeka says, measuring the flour with scoops of her right hand. “Sometimes, that goes on for two days.” She says the couple harvested 178 kg (392 lb) of maize from their small farm in March. They couldn’t afford fertilizer for their plot, which measures less than half an acre,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/land-crisis-and-green-revolution-practices-trap-millions-of-malawis-farmers/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326364</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘Cocoa fever’ in Liberia’s Grand Gedeh is wiping out native forests</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/cocoa-fever-in-liberias-grand-gedeh-is-wiping-out-native-forests/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/cocoa-fever-in-liberias-grand-gedeh-is-wiping-out-native-forests/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 07:17:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/15121122/Photo-16-Cocoa-33-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326476</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Liberia, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Agriculture, Agroforestry, Biodiversity, Cacao, Community Forests, Conservation, Crops, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Ecosystems, Environment, Food Vs Forests Debate, Forest Loss, Forests, and Tropical Deforestation]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Until 2020, 99% of Liberia&#8217;s Grand Gedeh county was covered by natural forests. Since then, cacao farms have rapidly encroached on those forests, reports Mongabay’s Ashoka Mukpo. Grand Gedeh in southeastern Liberia borders Côte d’Ivoire, the world’s largest exporter of cacao beans. Much of Côte d’Ivoire’s forests have been cleared for cacao and many of its cacao [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Until 2020, 99% of Liberia&#8217;s Grand Gedeh county was covered by natural forests. Since then, cacao farms have rapidly encroached on those forests, reports Mongabay’s Ashoka Mukpo. Grand Gedeh in southeastern Liberia borders Côte d’Ivoire, the world’s largest exporter of cacao beans. Much of Côte d’Ivoire’s forests have been cleared for cacao and many of its cacao plantations are now ageing and nutrient poor. That’s prompted cacao workers from Côte d’Ivoire to turn their attention to Liberia, where landowners have offered them their land in exchange for a share in cocoa earnings. Data from Global Forest Watch show that in 2025, Grand Gedeh lost more forest than any other Liberian county in a single year since 2002. “In Côte d’Ivoire there are no forests, that’s why I came to Liberia,” said Mohammed, a cacao farm worker near the town of Zleh in Grand Gedeh’s Gbarzon district. Around Zleh, roughly 82% of the community’s 6,900 hectares (17,000 acres) of customary forest land have been given over to cacao, Zleh’s town chief said. Yei Neagor, in charge of the regional headquarters of Liberia’s Forestry Development Authority (FDA) in Zwedru, Grand Gedeh’s capital, told Mongabay that Gbarzon has seen the worst forest loss in the county. “I will be honest to tell you that about 70% of the forest there is gone,” she said. Forests in southeastern Liberia are communally owned, and laws regulate how private individuals can lease them for commercial agriculture. In practice, those laws aren’t being followed, said Ashai Wulu Gaye, chair&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/cocoa-fever-in-liberias-grand-gedeh-is-wiping-out-native-forests/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326476</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Nepal’s newest national parks drive tiger recovery, but emerging concerns threaten progress</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/nepals-newest-national-parks-drive-tiger-recovery-but-emerging-concerns-threaten-progress/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/nepals-newest-national-parks-drive-tiger-recovery-but-emerging-concerns-threaten-progress/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 06:42:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Naina Rao]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18064152/Bardiya-National-Park-is-known-for-its-tigers-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326472</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Big Cats, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Camera Trapping, Habitat Loss, Invasive Species, Leopards, Mammals, National Parks, Parks, Population, Tigers, UNESCO World Heritage Site, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the last four years, Nepal’s wild tiger population has experienced a historic increase. In 2022, the tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) population was numbered at 355 individuals. Now, it has reached an estimated 429 individuals — nearly a four-fold jump from 16 years ago, reports Mongabay’s Abhaya Raj Joshi. Bed Kumar Dhakal, spokesperson for the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the last four years, Nepal’s wild tiger population has experienced a historic increase. In 2022, the tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) population was numbered at 355 individuals. Now, it has reached an estimated 429 individuals — nearly a four-fold jump from 16 years ago, reports Mongabay’s Abhaya Raj Joshi. Bed Kumar Dhakal, spokesperson for the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, said that the department&#8217;s latest tiger monitoring survey results &#8220;reflect the positive outcomes of ongoing efforts in the field of tiger conservation in Nepal, such as habitat conservation and management, poaching control, conservation of prey species, and biological corridor conservation.&#8221; However, a closer look at the latest numbers reveals an uneven recovery. Growth is concentrated almost entirely within the country&#8217;s newest national parks, Banke, Parsa and Shuklaphanta, while Bardiya, the country&#8217;s second-oldest park, experienced a population decline. Shant Raj Jnawali, a researcher and conservationist, said the uneven growth of tiger numbers across Nepal’s parks is due to water availability, spread of weed species and improved connectivity with potential habitats in India, rather than administrative or management changes. “We have seen some areas of Bardiya, especially the banks of the Geruwa River, and Chitwan (west) are facing droughts due to changing river course,” Jnawali said. This dry spell, he added, may be pushing tigers toward parks with better water infrastructure, such as Banke and Parsa, where officials have heavily invested in artificial ponds. Additionally, older parks are suffering from invasive weeds such as bitter vine (Mikania micrantha) and common&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/nepals-newest-national-parks-drive-tiger-recovery-but-emerging-concerns-threaten-progress/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/nepals-newest-national-parks-drive-tiger-recovery-but-emerging-concerns-threaten-progress/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326472</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Texas activist’s claims of Indigenous ancestry face scrutiny</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/texas-activists-claims-of-indigenous-ancestry-face-scrutiny/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/texas-activists-claims-of-indigenous-ancestry-face-scrutiny/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Aug 2026 20:21:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17200313/AP37267075943-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326461</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, North America, Texas, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Culture, Governance, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, and Law]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A recent investigation from Grist, a U.S.-based nonprofit media organization, raises questions about environmental activist Juan Mancias’ Indigenous claim to the land he works to protect in the U.S. state of Texas. In 2017, Mancias traveled to France and helped pressure French banks to withdraw support for oil and gas projects that he said threatened [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A recent investigation from Grist, a U.S.-based nonprofit media organization, raises questions about environmental activist Juan Mancias’ Indigenous claim to the land he works to protect in the U.S. state of Texas. In 2017, Mancias traveled to France and helped pressure French banks to withdraw support for oil and gas projects that he said threatened ancestral Indigenous lands and a rare coastal ecosystem. Since that success, the Carrizo/Comecrudo tribe, which Mancias is the chairman of, has received recognition in the United Nations and financing for environmental work. The Carrizo/Comecrudo tribe isn’t currently recognized by U.S. federal or state governments; Indigenous groups seeking recognition, as Mancias has, must establish a substantially continuous tribal existence as an autonomous entity. Experts believed &#8220;Carrizo&#8221; or &#8220;Comecrudo&#8221; people disappeared from the area after violence, disease or assimilation dramatically reduced their populations. For years, Mancias has said that his grandfather and dozens of tribal families fled their Rio Grande homeland in the 1940s and moved north to the Texas panhandle where they blended in with Mexican farm workers. According to Mancias, they kept their culture alive, secretly speaking their native language and sharing oral histories. Mancias says he lives by two guiding principles from his grandparents. His grandmother told him, “Know your people, know who you are,” while his grandfather told him, “Go get our land back,” according to news reports. However, Grist found inconsistencies in Mancias’ account that raise questions about the accuracy of his family history. For example, he has repeatedly cited an alleged&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/texas-activists-claims-of-indigenous-ancestry-face-scrutiny/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326461</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Lake Powell hits record low, threatening key water and electricity supply for millions</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/lake-powell-hits-record-low-threatening-key-water-and-electricity-supply-for-millions/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/lake-powell-hits-record-low-threatening-key-water-and-electricity-supply-for-millions/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Aug 2026 19:41:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Associated Press]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17193454/AP26202644055978-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?post_type=short-article&#038;p=326458</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, North America, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Disasters, Drought, Ecosystems, Environment, Extreme Weather, Freshwater, Global Environmental Crisis, Impact Of Climate Change, and Lakes]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The water level at Lake Powell, the United States’ second-largest reservoir, has fallen to a record low, heightening concerns about the ongoing crisis in the Colorado River system. The alarming milestone at Lake Powell, reached Saturday, comes about a week after the river’s other major reservoir, Lake Mead, also hit a historic low. Plummeting water levels [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The water level at Lake Powell, the United States’ second-largest reservoir, has fallen to a record low, heightening concerns about the ongoing crisis in the Colorado River system. The alarming milestone at Lake Powell, reached Saturday, comes about a week after the river’s other major reservoir, Lake Mead, also hit a historic low. Plummeting water levels pose a major threat to the Colorado River Basin, which is a key resource for wildlife, hydropower and more than 40 million people in seven U.S. states. The historic lows come as the federal government and states that rely on the river — California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming and Colorado — struggle to reach agreement on a long-term management plan for the dwindling resource. Persistent overuse combined with a record-dry winter and rising temperatures have been depleting both Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Lake Powell’s elevation dropped to 3,519.91 feet (1072.9 meters) above sea level on Saturday, dropping just slightly below a previous record set in April 2023, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. The lake is more than 20 feet (6.10 meters) lower than it was at the start of the year, USBR data shows. The reservoir is now about 30 feet (9.1 meters) away from the point at which turbines would stop producing hydroelectric power. Federal officials warned in April that a “major intervention” would be necessary to avoid reaching that threshold by the end of this year. USBR in July proposed a 10-year plan that includes major potential water cuts for Arizona, California and Nevada.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/lake-powell-hits-record-low-threatening-key-water-and-electricity-supply-for-millions/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/lake-powell-hits-record-low-threatening-key-water-and-electricity-supply-for-millions/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326458</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Fatal barge crashes fuel fear over Madeira River waterway expansion in Brazil</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/fatal-barge-crashes-fuel-fear-over-madeira-river-waterway-expansion-in-brazil/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/fatal-barge-crashes-fuel-fear-over-madeira-river-waterway-expansion-in-brazil/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Aug 2026 19:21:33 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Karla Mendes]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/17140812/DJI_0060-river-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326412</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conflict, Disasters, Environment, Environmental Law, Governance, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Infrastructure, Law, Pollution, Rivers, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[With an election looming, Amazon communities worry their safety will be traded for faster agribusiness growth.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[CALAMA AND PARAÍSO GRANDE, Brazil — A mother and her three kids died after a barge loaded with soybeans collided with a floating structure and completely destroyed their stilt house on Jan. 17, 2025,  in the Urumatuba riverine community along the Madeira River, in the Brazilian Amazon. Four months later, another freight vessel hit three mining barges anchored in the neighboring Nova Catarina riverine community, in the Manicoré municipality, in Amazonas state. The owner of one of the mining barges was the husband of the woman and father of the three kids who died in the January accident, according to a local news outlet. Mongabay was reporting in riverine communities in the region of the city of Humaitá, 190 kilometers (118 miles) southeast and downstream from Manicoré, when the second accident happened. All those interviewed on that day and the following days said they were terrified by the event — and knew someone who suffered losses or even died in collisions involving grain barges in the Madeira River. &#8220;We are very worried here in our community about these vessels,&#8221; smallholder Maria Delci Barros de Morais, 59, told Mongabay on the balcony of her house in the riverine community of Paraíso Grande, located 30 minutes by fast boat from Humaitá. &#8220;They&#8217;ve already run over someone we know.&#8221; The barge smashed the boat used by the family as a home, she recalled. &#8220;Thank God no one died.&#8221; According to Morais, the risk increases during the Madeira River&#8217;s high-water season, between December and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/fatal-barge-crashes-fuel-fear-over-madeira-river-waterway-expansion-in-brazil/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326412</doi>				</item>
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