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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/colombia/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Thu, 17 Sep 2026 09:55:38 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<title>Colombia environmental news</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/colombia/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Death and exile: A war plagues Indigenous Jiw and Nukak in the Colombian Amazon</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/death-and-exile-a-war-plagues-indigenous-jiw-and-nukak-in-the-colombian-amazon/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/death-and-exile-a-war-plagues-indigenous-jiw-and-nukak-in-the-colombian-amazon/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Jun 2026 19:15:03 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Pilar Puentes]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/19190508/banner-1-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=321516</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conflict, Crime, Drug Trade, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Rainforests, and Threats To Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[By late May, at least 48 people were killed in rural areas of Colombia following clashes between the FARC guerrilla dissident groups controlled by the aliases “Calarcá” and “Iván Mordisco.”]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Since the end of May, rural areas of San José del Guaviare, the capital city of the Guaviare department in the Colombian Amazon, have once again been turned into a war zone. A series of clashes between dissident cells of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), demobilized in 2016, and commanded by Alexander Díaz Mendoza, alias “Calarcá,” and Néstor Gregorio Vera Fernández, alias “‘Iván Mordisco,” has resulted in the deaths of at least 48 people. The warfare between the two armed groups concentrates on a strategic area for illicit economies on the Guaviare River, a tributary of the Orinoco River. The rural community of Cumare, as well as the Nukak and Jiw Indigenous people of the Barranco Colorado Reserve (an ancestral territory in San José del Guaviare), started hearing gunshots and rushed to hide. Since that frightening day, May 26, they have avoided leaving their homes. “People are on maximum alert; no one moves because they fear being caught in the middle of the confrontation,” said a resident of Charras, another rural area of San José del Guaviare, who requested anonymity for safety reasons. “We knew something like this could happen. A bomb fell in the middle of a sports field here in the Siberia rural district,” said a woman who has witnessed the clashes since their very beginning; she also requested anonymity. Colombian Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez stated, “The criminal structures of alias ‘Mordisco’ and ‘Calarcá’ fought in the Barranco Colorado sector, jurisdiction of San José del Guaviare,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/death-and-exile-a-war-plagues-indigenous-jiw-and-nukak-in-the-colombian-amazon/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/death-and-exile-a-war-plagues-indigenous-jiw-and-nukak-in-the-colombian-amazon/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-321516</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>What’s at stake for the environment in Colombia’s upcoming election?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-at-stake-for-the-environment-in-colombias-upcoming-election/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-at-stake-for-the-environment-in-colombias-upcoming-election/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Jun 2026 15:55:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aimee Gabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/06/21194943/colombia_1875-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=321507</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Global, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity Hotspots, Conservation, Crime, Deforestation, Development, Drivers Of Deforestation, Ecosystems, Energy Transition, Environment, Forest Destruction, Forests, Governance, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Infrastructure, Land Conflict, Land Use Change, Organized Crime, Politics, Traditional People, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Colombia’s first round of presidential elections on May 31 saw right-wing candidate Abelardo de la Espriella take the top spot with 43.7% of the vote, followed by left-wing candidate Iván Cepeda, with 40.9%. The future of the Colombian Amazon, the fossil fuel phaseout commitments made by current President Gustavo Petro and the rights of Indigenous [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Colombia’s first round of presidential elections on May 31 saw right-wing candidate Abelardo de la Espriella take the top spot with 43.7% of the vote, followed by left-wing candidate Iván Cepeda, with 40.9%. The future of the Colombian Amazon, the fossil fuel phaseout commitments made by current President Gustavo Petro and the rights of Indigenous peoples and other traditional communities are all at stake during the runoff on June 21. Colombia has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 51% by 2030 and has a legally binding net-zero target for 2050. Analysts at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) say Petro’s government made some progress, but deep reductions in emissions are critical, in particular from deforestation and agriculture, as well as reforms to phase out fossil fuel subsidies. As a result, who Colombia elects next will have major implications for the country’s climate ambitions. When Petro took office in 2022, he made the fossil fuel phaseout and environmental protection central features of his government’s agenda. He promised to become a leader in the defense of life, which involved transforming the country’s relationship with nature and “Total Peace” (Paz Total) — his administration’s flagship peace policy aimed to end Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict. Petro opposed new oil and gas exploration contracts and has been vocal about environmental justice and the energy transition at the international level, including at the United Nations General Assembly, the World Economic Forum in Davos and the United Nations Climate Change Conferences (COPs). In April,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-at-stake-for-the-environment-in-colombias-upcoming-election/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-at-stake-for-the-environment-in-colombias-upcoming-election/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-321507</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Will my president save the Amazon? (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/will-my-president-save-the-amazon-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/will-my-president-save-the-amazon-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 May 2026 23:50:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Enrique Ortiz]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/23235534/amazon_241209144859raw-26-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=320068</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Colombia, Latin America, Peru, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Commentary, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Forests, Governance, Politics, Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the coming months, voters in Brazil, Peru, and Colombia will elect new presidents. Together, these three countries contain roughly 82% of the Amazon rainforest, making their elections consequential far beyond national borders. The future of the world’s largest tropical forest — and, by extension, global climate stability — will depend in large measure on [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the coming months, voters in Brazil, Peru, and Colombia will elect new presidents. Together, these three countries contain roughly 82% of the Amazon rainforest, making their elections consequential far beyond national borders. The future of the world’s largest tropical forest — and, by extension, global climate stability — will depend in large measure on the choices their citizens make at the ballot box. More than 35 million people living in the Amazon region of these countries also depend directly on those outcomes. Brazil, home to about 62% of the Amazon, offers a stark example of how presidential policies can shape the fate of the forest. The country has experienced dramatic swings in deforestation over the past two decades. While commodity prices, global markets, climate conditions, and geopolitics all play a role, government policy has often been the decisive factor. In 2004, for example, Brazil lost more than 10 million acres of Amazon forest. By 2012, stronger environmental measures had gradually reduced that loss to less than one-sixth of that level. Those efforts relied not only on stricter enforcement, but also on cooperation with agricultural and business sectors long associated with deforestation. More recent data suggest Brazil’s renewed environmental policies have again reduced forest loss by more than 30% from the previous year. Annual deforestation in the Legal Amazon (Amazonia) from 1988-2025, according to a preliminary estimate from Brazil&#8217;s national space research institute, INPE. Annual primary forest loss in the Colombian Amazon from 2002 to 2025 (hectares). Data from the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/will-my-president-save-the-amazon-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/will-my-president-save-the-amazon-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-320068</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Fossil fuel transition summit seeks progress beyond stalled COP talks</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/fossil-fuel-transition-summit-seeks-progress-beyond-stalled-cop-talks/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/fossil-fuel-transition-summit-seeks-progress-beyond-stalled-cop-talks/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 May 2026 16:13:12 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aimee Gabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/11160224/AP26118020222261-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=319140</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Emissions, Clean Energy, Climate Change, Conservation, Deforestation, Energy Transition, Environment, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forests, Fossil Fuels, Governance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Impact Of Climate Change, Indigenous Peoples, Mining, Oil Drilling, Politics, and Renewable Energy]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels in Santa Marta, Colombia, was viewed by many as a historic achievement and a momentous step toward ending fossil fuel dependency. After more than 30 years of U.N. Climate Change Conferences, or COPs, where the topic has been repeatedly blocked by states and lobbyists resistant to [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels in Santa Marta, Colombia, was viewed by many as a historic achievement and a momentous step toward ending fossil fuel dependency. After more than 30 years of U.N. Climate Change Conferences, or COPs, where the topic has been repeatedly blocked by states and lobbyists resistant to any kind of phaseout, and many have struggled to get a seat on the table, such as Indigenous and Afro-descendent peoples, the Santa Marta conference has been hailed a success. “The conference was 100% positive,” Juan Carlos Jintiach, executive secretary of the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities (GATC), a coalition of Indigenous advocacy groups, told Mongabay over WhatsApp voice message. “These new proposals coming from the territories are being heard. It&#8217;s a responsible agenda regarding the paradigm shift of the transition, and it&#8217;s an opportunity.” During the first days of the conference, which ran from April 24-29, the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) released a new report that revealed the vast financial support fossil fuels continue to receive. According to its analysis, in 2024, fossil fuels globally received $1.2 trillion in subsidies and other forms of support, compared with $254 billion for clean energy. Florencia Ortúzar Greene, director of the climate program at the Inter-American Association for Environmental Defense (AIDA), told Mongabay over WhatsApp voice message that the conference’s free-flowing format, with ministers and stakeholders given equal opportunities to contribute, was a great relief. Attendees were unable to open their computers, meaning they could&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/fossil-fuel-transition-summit-seeks-progress-beyond-stalled-cop-talks/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/fossil-fuel-transition-summit-seeks-progress-beyond-stalled-cop-talks/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-319140</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Vaupés River contamination identified near rapidly expanding Amazonian town</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/vaupes-river-contamination-identified-near-rapidly-expanding-amazonian-town/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/vaupes-river-contamination-identified-near-rapidly-expanding-amazonian-town/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Apr 2026 21:48:57 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aimee Gabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/21211556/IMG_3726-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317894</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, and Latin America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Cities, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Freshwater, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Rivers, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Forests, Tropics, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[VAUPÉS, COLOMBIA — Traditionally, for members of the Indigenous Macaquiño community in the southeastern Colombian Amazon, the Vaupés River is not just a source of water, but a living being that must be respected. It supports all kinds of life, including fish, which have sustained the community for generations. Now, as a nearby Amazonian town [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[VAUPÉS, COLOMBIA — Traditionally, for members of the Indigenous Macaquiño community in the southeastern Colombian Amazon, the Vaupés River is not just a source of water, but a living being that must be respected. It supports all kinds of life, including fish, which have sustained the community for generations. Now, as a nearby Amazonian town upstream rapidly transforms into an expanding urban municipality and increasingly brings untreated wastewater from its poorly constructed treatment plant to the banks of Macaquiño, that same water is bringing them sickness and disease, residents say. During a visit to Macaquiño in September 2025, community members told Mongabay the Vaupés River is contaminated by untreated sewage dumped into it in the town of Mitú. “It’s like an atomic bomb coming out of the sewer,” said Julian de Jesus Madrid Correa, a member of the Macaquiño community. He said it causes rashes, itches and fevers, especially in children, and has begun to spread diseases, such as dengue and hepatitis. The Indigenous Macaquiño community on the banks of the Vaupés River in Colombia’s Vaupés region. Image by Aimee Gabay/Mongabay. To verify what the community told us, Mongabay obtained water quality studies from the Corporation for Sustainable Development of the Northern and Eastern Amazon. Its latest report, which contains results from water samples taken in 2025 across four sites in Mitú, confirms there is contamination above safe limits in the Vaupés River that could impact public health and the quality of the aquatic ecosystem. Fecal coliforms (fecal bacteria), which&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/vaupes-river-contamination-identified-near-rapidly-expanding-amazonian-town/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317894</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Colombia’s main river redraws the map of little-known night monkeys</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/colombias-main-river-redraws-the-map-of-little-known-night-monkeys/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/colombias-main-river-redraws-the-map-of-little-known-night-monkeys/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Apr 2026 11:00:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Manuel Fonseca]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/09111227/night-monkeys-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317266</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Cryptic Species, Deforestation, Habitat Loss, Monkeys, Protected Areas, Research, Rivers, Species, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[One night, 10-year-old Sebastián Montilla heard a creature moving over a tree branch on his father’s farm in Pijao, Quindío department, one of Colombia’s renowned coffee-growing regions. As he pointed a lantern up to the canopy, he saw a wild creature with big red eyes and a long tail watching him before moving away from [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[One night, 10-year-old Sebastián Montilla heard a creature moving over a tree branch on his father’s farm in Pijao, Quindío department, one of Colombia’s renowned coffee-growing regions. As he pointed a lantern up to the canopy, he saw a wild creature with big red eyes and a long tail watching him before moving away from the light. It was a night monkey, from the genus Aotus. This brief encounter would decide Montilla’s path. “I became very passionate about those animals, in fact, when I was in school, my favorite pastime was to go outside and lie down under their sleeping place, to watch them do nothing,” Montilla, now a doctoral student in biological sciences at the University of the Andes in Bogotá, told Mongabay in a video call. “I’m very surprised by the fact that [night monkeys] have gone unnoticed for so long, both in the scientific community and in the public sphere,” he added. “It’s astonishing because at midnight they are moving right past our houses and we don’t even notice.” Night monkeys, also known as owl monkeys, are the only primate group in the Americas that have adapted to be active at night. These monkeys have evolved enormous round eyes with retinas 50% bigger than those of daytime-active primates to better capture the scarce light available in their environments. Unlike other nocturnal primate species in Asia and Africa, such as lorises (family Lorisidae), tarsiers (Tarsiidae) and lemurs (Lemuroidae), which tend to be solitary, night monkeys form lifelong monogamous&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/colombias-main-river-redraws-the-map-of-little-known-night-monkeys/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317266</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Working together, Indigenous peoples &#038; researchers describe new Amazonian palm</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/working-together-indigenous-peoples-researchers-describe-new-amazonian-palm/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/working-together-indigenous-peoples-researchers-describe-new-amazonian-palm/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Apr 2026 14:06:11 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sofia Moutinho]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[global forests]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/01135800/IMG_3106-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316712</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Biology, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Deforestation, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Plants, Research, Species, Species Discovery, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2025, botanists Rodrigo Cámara-Leret and Juan Carlos Copete embarked on a two-hour boat ride down the Vaupés River in the Colombian Amazon, followed by a two-hour hike to the village of Wacará, where about 140 Indigenous Cacua people live in relative isolation. They were aiming to study the medicinal plants used by this Indigenous [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2025, botanists Rodrigo Cámara-Leret and Juan Carlos Copete embarked on a two-hour boat ride down the Vaupés River in the Colombian Amazon, followed by a two-hour hike to the village of Wacará, where about 140 Indigenous Cacua people live in relative isolation. They were aiming to study the medicinal plants used by this Indigenous group, one of the smallest in the country. But their plans changed as soon as they had their first meal in the village of thatch-roofed houses, when some children offered them a yellowish-brown fruit the Cacau called táam. Although the duo had been studying tropical plants for more than a decade, they had never seen that drop-shaped fruit before. Initially, they thought the fruit might be from a palm tree introduced to the region from nearby Brazil. However, as they spent more time with the community, they realized it was likely an entirely new species of palm that had not yet been described by scientists. &#8220;We knew most of the plants we would encounter in the forest, so when we saw that fruit, we were extremely shocked and surprised,&#8221; Cámara-Leret, a professor in tropical plant diversity and ethnobotany at the University of Zürich, tells Mongabay. Discovering new palm species in the Amazon is rare, even more so one that is tall-stemmed and used in the human diet like the táam. Palms are among the most well-known species of the region and were extensively studied by European naturalists who explored the jungle between the 16th and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/working-together-indigenous-peoples-researchers-describe-new-amazonian-palm/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316712</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Colombia’s coffee industry well placed but wary as EU deforestation rule looms</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/colombias-coffee-industry-well-placed-but-wary-as-eu-deforestation-rule-looms/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/colombias-coffee-industry-well-placed-but-wary-as-eu-deforestation-rule-looms/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Mar 2026 16:23:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mie Hoejris Dahl]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[global forests]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/04114305/Juan-Nieves5-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=315196</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, European Union, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Coffee, Commodity agriculture, Conservation, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, EUDR, Farming, Forest Loss, International Trade, Law Enforcement, Rainforests, and Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[CIÉNAGA, Colombia — A handful of men swarm around a coffee collection center in the city of Ciénaga, shouldering burlap sacks of coffee as they move in and out of the mill. Ciénaga is a port town in the foothills of Colombia’s Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the world’s highest coastal mountain range, and is [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[CIÉNAGA, Colombia — A handful of men swarm around a coffee collection center in the city of Ciénaga, shouldering burlap sacks of coffee as they move in and out of the mill. Ciénaga is a port town in the foothills of Colombia’s Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the world’s highest coastal mountain range, and is known locally as the coffee capital of the Sierra Nevada region. “We hope EUDR will be to our benefit,” says Silver Polo Palomino, a coffee grower and representative of the Asociación de Agricultores Orgánicos de La Secreta (AGROSEC), a local organic coffee growers’ association in Ciénaga, speaking over the roar of the mill. Polo is one of many producers in Colombia who say they’re uncertain — and increasingly nervous — about what the implementation of the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) will mean for their livelihoods. The regulation, set to go into force at the end of this year, will ban the import into the EU market of seven key commodities linked to deforestation. Coffee is among them. But Colombia, the world’s No. 3 coffee producer, is well prepared for the EUDR and better positioned than coffee exporters in many parts of Africa and Asia, several experts told Mongabay. Despite a fragmented sector dominated by small-scale farmers, Colombia’s coffee industry is highly organized, largely through the National Federation of Coffee Growers of Colombia (FNC), which represents more than 500,000 coffee-growing families. The FNC has developed a centralized georeferenced database, the Coffee Information System (SICA), designed to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/colombias-coffee-industry-well-placed-but-wary-as-eu-deforestation-rule-looms/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-315196</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In Ecuador’s Chocó, roads shape the fate of the rainforest</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/in-ecuadors-choco-roads-shape-the-fate-of-the-rainforest/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/in-ecuadors-choco-roads-shape-the-fate-of-the-rainforest/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Feb 2026 19:05:01 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Maxwell Radwin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/02/06153811/DJI_20250923101309_0020_V-2-768x450.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=313840</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Choco Forest, Ecuador, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Infrastructure, Land Conflict, Land Rights, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Roads, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[HOJA BLANCO, Ecuador — Some parts of the rainforest in northwestern Ecuador used to be so dense and impenetrable that only a few hundred people were believed to live there. Even when loggers moved into the area in the 1980s and 1990s, setting up the first roads, it would take hours to travel only a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[HOJA BLANCO, Ecuador — Some parts of the rainforest in northwestern Ecuador used to be so dense and impenetrable that only a few hundred people were believed to live there. Even when loggers moved into the area in the 1980s and 1990s, setting up the first roads, it would take hours to travel only a few miles. It’s one of the rainiest regions on the planet, and the terrain rises sharply into the western Andes before dropping off into rivers and valleys. Because it was so inaccessible, the area remained one of the most biodiverse on the planet, with thousands of endemic plant species and hundreds of birds and amphibians. But in recent decades, much of that biodiversity has been lost. The region, known as the Chocó, has experienced historic deforestation, with only around 3% of its lower-elevation forest — below 900 meters (3,000 feet) — still remaining. In one area of the Chocó, in Esmeraldas province, the rise in deforestation coincided with the arrival of timber companies like Endesa-Botrosa, which built some of the first roads while logging the forest. Even when the companies reduced their work in the area a few years ago, deforestation continued to pose a major threat — largely because the companies left behind roads that people want to extend, conservation groups in the area say. Today, many of the roads that used to take hours to navigate are relatively clean and patched up, allowing people from other parts of the country to move in.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/in-ecuadors-choco-roads-shape-the-fate-of-the-rainforest/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-313840</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Colombia poised for another drop in deforestation in 2025, data show</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/colombia-poised-for-another-drop-in-deforestation-in-2025-data-show/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/colombia-poised-for-another-drop-in-deforestation-in-2025-data-show/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Jan 2026 19:58:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Maxwell Radwin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/15211439/AP25339572345149-768x450.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=313048</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forests, Logging, Mining, Organized Crime, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Deforestation in Colombia appears to have declined in 2025, with notable reductions in several departments that have historically struggled with forest loss. An estimated 36,280 hectares (89,650 acres) of forest were lost during the first three quarters of the year, a 25% drop from the 48,500 hectares (about 119,850 acres) recorded over the same period [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Deforestation in Colombia appears to have declined in 2025, with notable reductions in several departments that have historically struggled with forest loss. An estimated 36,280 hectares (89,650 acres) of forest were lost during the first three quarters of the year, a 25% drop from the 48,500 hectares (about 119,850 acres) recorded over the same period in 2024, according to the Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology and Environmental Studies (IDEAM), a government agency. The figures only account for January to September, as data for the final quarter of the year are still being processed. Officials celebrated the results while stressing the need to continue improving forest conservation strategies. “The sustained reduction of deforestation in the Amazon is the result of collaboration between the national government and communities, through ecological restoration actions, voluntary conservation agreements, strengthening of sustainable production chains and forest management,” the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development said in a December statement. Colombia has around 60 million hectares (148 million acres) of forest cover, representing more than half of its total land area. This includes the Amazon Rainforest and savanna ecosystems like the Orinoquía. For decades, the country has struggled to slow the spread of cattle ranching and agriculture as well as illicit crops like coca, the primary ingredient in cocaine. In 2025, many of the worst-hit departments also saw the largest drops in forest loss, signaling progress in addressing some of these long-standing drivers. “When the figures are low, we should take advantage and strengthen actions to reduce threats,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/colombia-poised-for-another-drop-in-deforestation-in-2025-data-show/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-313048</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Urban sprawl and illegal mining reshape a fragile Amazon frontier</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/illegal-mining-and-urban-sprawl-reshape-a-fragile-amazon-frontier/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/illegal-mining-and-urban-sprawl-reshape-a-fragile-amazon-frontier/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Jan 2026 17:15:50 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aimee Gabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/06105654/Mitu-expansion-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312653</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Cities, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forests, Illegal Mining, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Logging, Mining, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Forests, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MITÚ, Colombia — Beneath the rising sun, people from nearby Indigenous communities navigate across the Vaupés River in traditional wooden canoes toward Mitú, a rapidly expanding town in the Colombian Amazon. The canoes are packed with fish, plucked from the river’s tea-colored waters hours before, and produce, harvested from their traditional gardens. To reach the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MITÚ, Colombia — Beneath the rising sun, people from nearby Indigenous communities navigate across the Vaupés River in traditional wooden canoes toward Mitú, a rapidly expanding town in the Colombian Amazon. The canoes are packed with fish, plucked from the river’s tea-colored waters hours before, and produce, harvested from their traditional gardens. To reach the town’s market, where merchants wait above a concrete slipway, the canoes stream past huge concrete sewage pipes and a statue of the Virgin Mary. As they navigate farther in, they’re no longer in the Great Vaupés Indigenous Reserve, an Indigenous territory whose borders surround Mitú and its connecting highway. They’re now in an urban frontier experiencing staggering changes in the middle of the Amazon Rainforest. Today, Mitú’s population has swelled to almost 30,000, from just over 4,000 five decades ago. This is due to an influx of Indigenous people who move between their traditional communities and the urban center, and non-Indigenous settlers who have established businesses or work for research centers or NGOs. The population boom is also due to illegal gold mining by organized crime groups and the illegal extraction of critical minerals in the wider region, including coltan, which is used in electronics and in electric vehicle batteries. Residents, NGOs and authorities have also reported an expansion in cattle farming and the illegal extraction and trafficking of timber, fish and animals. Members of the Indigenous Macaquiño community take Mongabay to visit their traditional forest garden, or chagra, in September 2025. Image by Aimee&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/illegal-mining-and-urban-sprawl-reshape-a-fragile-amazon-frontier/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312653</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cultural changes shift an Indigenous community’s relationship with the Amazon forest</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/cultural-changes-shift-an-indigenous-communitys-relationship-with-the-amazon-forest/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/cultural-changes-shift-an-indigenous-communitys-relationship-with-the-amazon-forest/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Jan 2026 18:14:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aimee Gabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/05142855/4-Indigenous-Macaquino-community-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312610</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Culture, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Rainforests, Traditional Knowledge, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[VAUPÉS, COLOMBIA – As a baby, Elisa Fernández Sánchez’ mother would place her into the bow of the canoe and glide across the murky waters of the Vaupés River in the thick Amazon rainforest. Their journey towards the traditional forest gardens was not easy, but they did it almost every day. Her mom would plunge [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[VAUPÉS, COLOMBIA – As a baby, Elisa Fernández Sánchez’ mother would place her into the bow of the canoe and glide across the murky waters of the Vaupés River in the thick Amazon rainforest. Their journey towards the traditional forest gardens was not easy, but they did it almost every day. Her mom would plunge the canoe into a series of small river channels, ducking to protect herself from the violent blizzard of branches, vines and leaves that threatened to gouge her eyes if she was not careful. Like most members of the mostly Cubeo Macaquiño community at the time, her mother respected nature and the spiritual beings that guard its sacred sites. It was dangerous to enter the forest unprotected. To enter sacred sites, the payé (an Indigenous authority responsible for maintaining the community’s cultural and spiritual well-being) had to pray to the spirits for permission. Failure to respect this rule could result in severe illness, they believed. Through rituals, prayers and their careful relationship with nature, the Macaquiño community has maintained a healthy territory. It is one of four Indigenous communities that form part of the Association of Traditional Indigenous Authorities Surrounding Mitú (AATIAM), a public entity with a state-recognized right to govern autonomously. Manuel Claudio Fernández, the captain of Macaquiño, said that the community does not care for the land; they co-exist with it. “How do we co-exist? By respecting the forest, the articulation of spirits, the water, the forest and us humans. We, the people, depend&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/cultural-changes-shift-an-indigenous-communitys-relationship-with-the-amazon-forest/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312610</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The year in rainforests 2025: Deforestation fell; the risks did not</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-year-in-rainforests-2025-deforestation-fell-the-risks-did-not/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-year-in-rainforests-2025-deforestation-fell-the-risks-did-not/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Dec 2025 20:11:46 +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/20/2025/12/26174503/14-brunei_251114145042_0254z-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312083</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Amazon, Asia, Brazil, Central Africa, Colombia, Congo Basin, Democratic Republic Of Congo, Global, Indonesia, Latin America, Peru, Southeast Asia, Sumatra, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Biodiversity credits, Carbon Credits, Carbon Market, Conservation, Conservation Finance, Deforestation, Environment, Fires, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Green, Illegal Logging, Illegal Trade, Indigenous Peoples, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Redd, Regulations, Remote Sensing, Satellite Imagery, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, Technology, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Forests, and Year-end review]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The story of the world’s tropical forests in 2025 was not one of dramatic reversal, but one shaped by accumulated pressure. In several regions, deforestation slowed. In others, loss continued in less visible forms, shaped by fire, degradation, and political choices not limited to large-scale clearing alone. Governments continued to speak the language of protection, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The story of the world’s tropical forests in 2025 was not one of dramatic reversal, but one shaped by accumulated pressure. In several regions, deforestation slowed. In others, loss continued in less visible forms, shaped by fire, degradation, and political choices not limited to large-scale clearing alone. Governments continued to speak the language of protection, even as infrastructure, extraction, and energy projects advanced into forest landscapes. Progress was real, though uneven, and the distance between policy commitments and conditions on the ground remained substantial. What distinguished the year was the growing influence of indirect forces, rather than a single driver of loss. Heat, drought, and past damage increasingly shaped forest outcomes, even where new clearing slowed. Commodity markets rewarded persistence more than short-lived price spikes. Finance shifted away from individual projects toward broader fiscal tools. Enforcement mattered, alongside institutional credibility and the ability to operate consistently over time. At the global level, climate diplomacy continued, with limited appetite for binding decisions. COP30 avoided collapse and deferred the hardest choices. Forests remained prominent in rhetoric while enforceable outcomes remained limited. Market-based tools—carbon credits, trade regulation, and conservation finance—advanced unevenly, shaped as much by political confidence and capacity as by technical design. Taken together, 2025 underscored that tropical forests are now shaped more by interacting systems rather than single policies. Finance, science, enforcement, conflict, and climate stress increasingly operate together, often reinforcing one another. This review traces where those systems functioned, where they faltered, and what that means for the forests caught&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-year-in-rainforests-2025-deforestation-fell-the-risks-did-not/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312083</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Agroforestry grows in popularity among central Colombia&#8217;s coffee farmers (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/agroforestry-grows-in-popularity-among-central-colombias-coffee-farmers-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/agroforestry-grows-in-popularity-among-central-colombias-coffee-farmers-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Dec 2025 18:05:36 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Juliana Cajiao Raigosa]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/23171032/coffee-lady-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311971</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Agroecology, Agroforestry, Analysis, Coffee, Commentary, Commodity agriculture, Community Development, Conflict, Deforestation, Education, Forests, Social Conflict, Sustainability, Sustainable Development, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Colombia is the world&#8217;s third-largest coffee producer and the main producer of Arabica coffee, which is known worldwide for its quality. The nation began developing commercial production in 1870, which now accounts for 22% of the national gross domestic product (GDP). According to the National Federation of Coffee Growers, there are approximately 560,000 farms in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Colombia is the world&#8217;s third-largest coffee producer and the main producer of Arabica coffee, which is known worldwide for its quality. The nation began developing commercial production in 1870, which now accounts for 22% of the national gross domestic product (GDP). According to the National Federation of Coffee Growers, there are approximately 560,000 farms in the country dedicated to coffee production, most of them small scale and accounting for 15% of total production. Coffee in Colombia has become part of the national identity and is also considered part of its cultural heritage. Besides this, it has been of vital importance for the economy, representing up to 80% of total exports, and is undoubtedly partly responsible for the changes that took place between 1870 and 1930, which allowed for the integration of the country&#8217;s economy and generated positive political and social effects. However, only 5% of smallholder farmers are technically efficient (TE), reflecting poor agronomic management strategies such as inadequate uses of inputs, irrational uses of fertilizers and pesticides, low phytosanitary control and monitoring strategies, lack of labor and substandard production conditions, among other factors. Mr. Arlisson Neussa, an agricultural engineer, assisting with coffee berry borer monitoring on a coffee plantation. The agroforestry coffee system, in which the coffee is interplanted within a native forest, can be clearly seen. Image courtesy of Juliana Cajiao Raigosa. The main coffee-producing departments of the “cafetal zone” are Risalda, Caldas, Antioquia and Quindío. Coffee in these areas is considered a cultural heritage and is mainly&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/agroforestry-grows-in-popularity-among-central-colombias-coffee-farmers-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311971</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The Amazon in 2026: A challenging year ahead, now off the center stage</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-amazon-in-2026-a-challenging-year-ahead-now-off-the-center-stage/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-amazon-in-2026-a-challenging-year-ahead-now-off-the-center-stage/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Dec 2025 14:27:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/03/19151029/Parque_Estadual_Encontro_das_Aguas_Thomas-Fuhrmann_2023-_01_Jaguar_-_Panthera_onca_swimming-scaled-e1710871756906-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311879</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Latin America, Peru, South America, Suriname, and Venezuela]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Agriculture, Bioeconomy, Climate Change, Conflict, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, and Threats To Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As Belém's COP30 ended in compromise, political forces moved swiftly to accelerate destruction far from the global spotlight. 
]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Amazon enters 2026 carrying the bitter taste of compromise. The world’s attention was fixed on Belém for the COP30 summit in November, transforming the Brazilian city into a brief, intense stage for climate diplomacy, where ambitious calls for a fossil fuel phaseout ultimately died on the negotiating floor. Yet, in 2025, the true battle for the rainforest was fought far from the Blue Zone. In the quiet shadows, powerful political forces moved to roll back environmental protections in Brazil (which holds 64% of the rainforest), successfully passing the anti-conservation bills and green-lighting critical infrastructure projects. This dual reality — grand promises versus accelerated development on the frontier — set the defining tension for the year, even as a more hopeful, grassroots movement gained momentum, finding new, valuable purpose for biodiversity in innovations, proving the rainforest is worth far more standing than cut. COP30 was wrapped in global expectations. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva opened the summit by proposing a road map to enable humankind to overcome its dependence on fossil fuels in a fair and planned manner and to halt deforestation. However, the ambitious calls for a fossil fuel phaseout were excluded from the official COP outcomes. In response, Brazil, alongside the Colombian and Dutch delegations, agreed to develop road maps outside the formal U.N. process. This effort will culminate in the First International Conference on the Just Transition Away from Fossil Fuels, scheduled for April 2026, in Santa Marta, Colombia, to negotiate an equitable Fossil Fuel&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/the-amazon-in-2026-a-challenging-year-ahead-now-off-the-center-stage/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311879</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous guardians protecting the Amazon Trapeze continue to face challenges</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-guardians-protecting-the-amazon-trapeze-continue-to-face-challenges/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-guardians-protecting-the-amazon-trapeze-continue-to-face-challenges/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Nov 2025 11:12:59 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[César Giraldo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/28110701/3_Illustracion_Los-retos-que-afrontan-los-indigenas_2-1-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310293</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Deforestation, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, and Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Olegario Sánchez Pinto, 74, wakes up at 7 a.m. every day to complete all the tasks he must perform as a member of the Indigenous guard in the Colombian community of San Martín de Amacayacu. He begins work early, using only his traditional walking stick to patrol the hamlet along the Amacayacu River, a two-hour [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Olegario Sánchez Pinto, 74, wakes up at 7 a.m. every day to complete all the tasks he must perform as a member of the Indigenous guard in the Colombian community of San Martín de Amacayacu. He begins work early, using only his traditional walking stick to patrol the hamlet along the Amacayacu River, a two-hour boat ride from the city of Leticia on the Amazon River. First, he travels along the shore, which serves as a port where people arrive at and depart from San Martín. Next, he walks among the houses to find out if anyone is sick. In the event of an argument or fight, he immediately seeks out the curaca, or chief, the community’s highest authority. The curaca is responsible for resolving these problems, including imposing any penalties if necessary. Then, along with other guards, Sánchez travels along the ravines to determine whether anyone is cutting trees or fishing. In late March, according to Sánchez, he’s also very watchful for hunting. “That’s the breeding season, so animals can’t be hunted. During those days, tapirs can’t be killed because they’re pregnant. If you kill an animal with [a large] belly, that to us is a crime,” he says. Sánchez has more years of experience as a guard than almost anyone else in San Martín, an Indigenous Tikuna community. Over the years, he’s watched as dozens of his colleagues have left the Indigenous guard due to a lack of income. He recalls a former fellow guardian telling him, “I&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-guardians-protecting-the-amazon-trapeze-continue-to-face-challenges/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310293</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Brazil aims for alternative route to fossil fuel road map after COP30 failure</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/brazil-aims-for-alternative-route-to-fossil-fuel-road-map-after-cop30-failure/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/brazil-aims-for-alternative-route-to-fossil-fuel-road-map-after-cop30-failure/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>25 Nov 2025 13:51:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Carla Ruas]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/25125453/marcha-cop30-crop-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310125</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Agriculture, Climate Change, Conflict, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, and Threats To Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Phaseout plan gained unexpected momentum at the summit, only to vanish from the final deal and unlock a new stage. ]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BELÉM, Brazil — In April 2026, a new summit in Santa Marta, Colombia, promises to advance on one crucial point the U.N. climate summits have been failing to address after 30 editions: planning the transition to a world without fossil fuels. An action plan for a phaseout was once again left out of COP official outcomes in the Amazonian city of Belém, which held the event for two weeks ending Nov. 22. Although Brazil spearheaded a road map to move away from planet-warming fossil fuels, it was never included in the official agenda — despite expectations following COP28’s call for a transition. Brazil hosted COP30 with high promises despite its scaling environmental contradictions, such as green-lighting the exploration of oil on the Amazon coast weeks before the event. However, the Belém summit was presented as the “implementation COP” and the “COP of the truth” in official banners. In a powerful opening speech, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva first launched the road map proposal. “We need road maps that will enable humankind, in a fair and planned manner, to overcome its dependence on fossil fuels, halt and reverse deforestation and mobilize resources to achieve these goals,” he said. Lula’s speech was within the spirit of mutirão, which initially took over negotiations in Belém. The Portuguese word with roots in the Indigenous language Tupi-Guarani means making a “collective effort” to achieve concrete results. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, with COP30 President André Corrêa do Lago on his left and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/brazil-aims-for-alternative-route-to-fossil-fuel-road-map-after-cop30-failure/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310125</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Top ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin&#8217;s COP30 reflections on Amazon conservation (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Nov 2025 21:45:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mark J. Plotkin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/17210100/Suriname-2-e1763414931233-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309585</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Latin America, Peru, South America, and Suriname]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Analysis, Biodiversity, Botany, Commentary, Conservation, Development, Environment, Forest Products, Forests, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Indigenous Peoples, Land Rights, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Rainforests, Research, Sustainable Development, Threats To Rainforests, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Having studied the healing plants and peoples of tropical South America for well over four decades, I am often asked, “What is the conservation status of the Amazon Rainforest? Is the glass half-full or half-empty?” My reply never changes. “By definition, any glass that is half-full is half-empty!” When I first traveled to the Amazon [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Having studied the healing plants and peoples of tropical South America for well over four decades, I am often asked, “What is the conservation status of the Amazon Rainforest? Is the glass half-full or half-empty?” My reply never changes. “By definition, any glass that is half-full is half-empty!” When I first traveled to the Amazon in the 1970s, the world was a different place. Most people thought of the rainforest, if they thought of it at all, as a green hell to be avoided at all costs. Soon thereafter, public perception of tropical rainforests shifted dramatically, driven by the emerging modern environmental movement. Tropical forest and river in Suriname. Image courtesy of Mark J. Plotkin. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962 and Earth Day in 1970 were milestones in generating global awareness and concern over deforestation, pesticides, pollution and species extinction, particularly in the industrialized world. However, Western scientists like Tom Lovejoy, Richard Schultes and E.O. Wilson — as well as Brazilian scientists like Marcio Ayres, Paulo Nogueiro-Neto and Paulo Vanzolini — presented a compelling case that the biological richness and fragility of tropical forests merited at least as much attention as ecosystems in the temperate regions. These scientists reframed the global image of Amazonia from “green hell” to “treasure trove of biodiversity.” The media also played a positive role. The vast scale of burning and clearing — turning a green wonderland into a red desert through major development projects like ill-planned dams or road building — shocked and horrified&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309585</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Report urges full protection of world’s 196 uncontacted Indigenous peoples</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>27 Oct 2025 14:22:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sue Branford]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/27113221/Photo-9-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=308336</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Asia, Brazil, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Latin America, Pacific Islands, Peru, South America, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Conservation, Culture, Development, Diseases, Drug Trade, Environment, extractives, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Logging, Mining, Oil Drilling, Rainforests, Uncontacted Tribes, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[“My children died. My mother died. My husband died. My brothers, my sisters, my aunts and uncles. I saw the bones sticking out of their rotting corpses inside the longhouse. We were too weak to bury them. I was left alone with my two baby brothers. All my family died, and all we got in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[“My children died. My mother died. My husband died. My brothers, my sisters, my aunts and uncles. I saw the bones sticking out of their rotting corpses inside the longhouse. We were too weak to bury them. I was left alone with my two baby brothers. All my family died, and all we got in return were a few machetes.” This story comes from a Matis Indigenous woman living in Brazil and speaking to an anthropologist in the 1990s. Her people were almost wiped out in the years after they were initially contacted by outsiders in the 1970s. Loggers and wildcat miners brought in diseases, mainly influenza, against which the Matis had little resistance. Testimonies like this one from the Matis Indigenous woman convinced Survival International of the urgent need to campaign to safeguard the collective rights of the Indigenous, tribal and uncontacted peoples of the world, whom the human rights organization says must be left alone and fully protected. On Oct. 27, the NGO published a 300-page report, Uncontacted Indigenous Peoples: at the Edge of Survival, documenting the past and looming threats posed by contact and offering up the experiences of numerous Indigenous peoples whose lives have been uprooted, disrupted and forever changed by contact. It states: “In particular, the rush by extractive industries and agribusiness to seize the resources of uncontacted peoples risks their total annihilation.” A Tupá Matis Indigenous person near the Itui river in the Javari Valley, Brazil. The Matis were devastated by western diseases after&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-308336</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous monitoring project helps protect isolated peoples in Colombia’s Amazon</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indigenous-monitoring-project-helps-protect-isolated-peoples-in-colombias-amazon/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indigenous-monitoring-project-helps-protect-isolated-peoples-in-colombias-amazon/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Oct 2025 15:23:43 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Pilar Puentes]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/13124216/PORTADA-Escudo-de-proteccion-de-los-aislados-_-Sara-Arredondo-Baudo-Agencia-Publica-1200x675-1-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307491</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conflict, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forests, Governance, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Rights, Mining, Monitoring, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Rivers, Technology, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Colombia’s Amazon, two communities have worked for more than a decade to guard their territory and to protect the right of other Indigenous peoples to remain isolated. The community of Manacaro and the Curare-Los Ingleses Indigenous Reserve, located in the lower Caquetá River region, were fundamental in the federal government’s decision to formally recognize [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Colombia’s Amazon, two communities have worked for more than a decade to guard their territory and to protect the right of other Indigenous peoples to remain isolated. The community of Manacaro and the Curare-Los Ingleses Indigenous Reserve, located in the lower Caquetá River region, were fundamental in the federal government’s decision to formally recognize the existence of two voluntarily isolated peoples in Colombia: the Yuri and the Passé. Since the late 1800s, there have been reports of at least 18 Indigenous communities that have chosen not to have contact with the outside world, or who — after colonization, the rubber boom and the trafficking of Amazonian animal skins — decided to flee and remain isolated. However, it wasn’t until October 2024, 15 years after the first hints of isolated peoples (some footsteps and scattered seeds on the ground), that the Ministry of the Interior issued a resolution confirming the presence of two of those 18 communities. That resolution would never have been possible without the monitoring work of these communities’ Indigenous neighbors. The territory inhabited by the Indigenous communities living in voluntary isolation is surrounded by threats that put their way of life at risk: missionaries who try to contact them, armed actors, drug trafficking and the advance of illegal mining. The Ombudsman has issued several alerts about these risks. The most recent ones, in February 2025, are the new territorial disputes between former commanders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC in Spanish) who did not agree&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indigenous-monitoring-project-helps-protect-isolated-peoples-in-colombias-amazon/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307491</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous fishers lead science-backed conservation of Colombia’s wetlands</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/indigenous-fishers-lead-science-backed-conservation-of-colombias-wetlands/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/indigenous-fishers-lead-science-backed-conservation-of-colombias-wetlands/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 Sep 2025 15:36:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Camilo Alzate]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/09/24152329/PORTADA-Estrella-fluvial-Inirida-_-Sara-Arredondo-Baudo-Agencia-Publica-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=306527</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous-led conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Rainforests, Regulations, and Wetlands]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[When Fredy Yavinape was a young child, he didn’t know the biological concept of an “umbrella species.” These are species that require large areas of undisturbed habitat to survive, which is why they serve as an indicator of the conservation status of the entire ecosystem. Now, at 48 years old, Yavinape knows what they are. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[When Fredy Yavinape was a young child, he didn’t know the biological concept of an “umbrella species.” These are species that require large areas of undisturbed habitat to survive, which is why they serve as an indicator of the conservation status of the entire ecosystem. Now, at 48 years old, Yavinape knows what they are. He’s spent more than a decade collecting samples and documenting the daily events that occur in the vast territory of lagoons and rivers where he resides: Estrella Fluvial del Inírida, or EFI. This is an important complex of wetlands in eastern Colombia, formed by the confluence of the Inírida, Guaviare and Atabapo rivers, where the Amazon Rainforest meets the flood-prone savannas of the Orinoquía. “Every time anyone left, my father said to us, ‘Watch out for Grandpa; he must be around here. Don’t bother him. He could be fishing or hunting — you have to respect him,’” Yavinape says. The “grandpa” his father was referring to was a jaguar, said to be the ancestor of the Curripaco Indigenous people. Yavinape even has the big cat’s in his surname: In his native language, “Yavinape” means “jaguar’s arm.” “He’s always watching, wherever a jaguar is. That means that there’s food there,” he says. The last time he encountered one, he says, was in December 2024, during his monitoring work through the Ramsar board, of which Yavinape is president. The Ramsar board is a governing entity established by local communities and Indigenous peoples in the area following the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/indigenous-fishers-lead-science-backed-conservation-of-colombias-wetlands/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-306527</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Protecting Indigenous Amazon lands may also protect public health, study says</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/protecting-indigenous-amazon-lands-may-also-protect-public-health-study-says/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/protecting-indigenous-amazon-lands-may-also-protect-public-health-study-says/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Sep 2025 16:13:05 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Constance Malleret]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/10/07100930/DSCF1540NK_Wao_nemopare_retrato_pekes-2048x1365-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=306273</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Latin America, Peru, South America, Suriname, and Venezuela]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Aerosol Pollution, Biodiversity, Conservation, Deforestation, Diseases, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Governance, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Rights, Planetary Health, Pollution, Protected Areas, Public Health, Rainforests, Research, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Deforestation, and Zoonotic Diseases]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous territories are widely recognized as vital for conserving the environment and biodiversity, but far less is known about their role in protecting human health. Only recently have researchers begun to fill in this knowledge gap and investigate how the protection of these areas can provide health benefits as well as ecosystem services. Now, a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous territories are widely recognized as vital for conserving the environment and biodiversity, but far less is known about their role in protecting human health. Only recently have researchers begun to fill in this knowledge gap and investigate how the protection of these areas can provide health benefits as well as ecosystem services. Now, a new paper analyzing the relationship between Indigenous territories and the occurrence of 21 diseases in the Amazon biome over 20 years suggests that healthy forests on protected Indigenous territories can help reduce disease incidence and risks to human health. “Indigenous forests act as a sort of shield for health,” said study lead author Júlia Rodrigues Barreto, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of São Paulo in Brazil. Published in Communications Earth &amp; Environment, the study is the first of its kind to look at all nine Amazonian countries. Its main contribution, according to Barreto, is to convey the importance of guaranteeing land rights for Indigenous peoples across the Amazon. Indigenous village of the Huni Kuin people in Jordão, Acre. Indigenous territories with secure land rights not only reduce deforestation inside their lands in the Brazilian Amazon, but also lead to higher secondary forest growth on previously deforested areas. Image by AgniBa via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0). Barreto and her colleagues looked at how Indigenous territories, depending on their legal status and landscape characteristics, could influence the incidence of fire-related illnesses, as well as vector-borne and zoonotic diseases — those transmitted by insect bites or&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/09/protecting-indigenous-amazon-lands-may-also-protect-public-health-study-says/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-306273</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Despite pledge, Colombia still has ways to expand Amazon oil exploration</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/despite-pledge-colombia-still-has-ways-to-expand-amazon-oil-exploration/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/despite-pledge-colombia-still-has-ways-to-expand-amazon-oil-exploration/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>29 Aug 2025 18:50:39 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Maxwell Radwin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/29184358/AP22286596848453-1-768x500.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=305112</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forests, Governance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Land Rights, Law, Natural Gas, Oil Drilling, Politics, Pollution, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Over the last several years, the Colombian government has taken steps to end oil and gas drilling in the Amazon. It pledged to stop issuing new exploration licenses and signed onto treaties to phase out current production, which has shown some signs of decline. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that oil drilling will stop altogether, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Over the last several years, the Colombian government has taken steps to end oil and gas drilling in the Amazon. It pledged to stop issuing new exploration licenses and signed onto treaties to phase out current production, which has shown some signs of decline. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that oil drilling will stop altogether, critics say. Active oil blocks can continue to operate, and inactive blocks without contracts remain legally available for future exploration. “Ongoing and potential new fossil fuel activities in the region, encouraged by narratives around economic profitability and energy security, continue to threaten the livelihoods and human rights of Indigenous peoples and local communities, the region’s rich biodiversity, and its carbon sink,” warns a new analysis from Earth Insight, a nature and climate policy group. So far, the government has granted 33 exploration permits and 14 production licenses in the Amazon, and maintains inactive blocks without licenses, together covering around 14 million hectares (34.6 million acres) — more than a tenth of the country’s total area — the group found in its analysis. But even if the government phases out current operations and maintains its pledge to issue no new licenses, there are still oil blocks on the map that haven’t been contracted out, as well as blocks that have been temporarily “shelved” but can still be reactivated. Indigenous leaders from across the Amazon protest against fossil fuels in Bogota, Colombia. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara) Around 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) have been shelved and designated as&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/despite-pledge-colombia-still-has-ways-to-expand-amazon-oil-exploration/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-305112</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cross-border operation cracks down on environmental crimes in the Amazon</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/cross-border-operation-cracks-down-on-environmental-crimes-in-the-amazon/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/cross-border-operation-cracks-down-on-environmental-crimes-in-the-amazon/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Aug 2025 16:00:52 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mie Hoejris Dahl]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/06152253/Illegal-Mining-Green-River-Brasil-Photo-3-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=303861</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Latin America, Peru, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Crime, Deforestation, Environment, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Illegal Logging, Illegal Mining, Illegal Trade, Indigenous Peoples, Law Enforcement, Mining, Rainforests, Saving Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, timber trade, Wildlife, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY – About two dozen police officers, government officials and a data specialist sat side by side in a command center in northern Bogotá, Colombia’s capital. For two weeks, they reviewed live camera footage and tracked geolocations of police actions that were part of Operation Green Shield, a field initiative targeting cross-border environmental crime [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY – About two dozen police officers, government officials and a data specialist sat side by side in a command center in northern Bogotá, Colombia’s capital. For two weeks, they reviewed live camera footage and tracked geolocations of police actions that were part of Operation Green Shield, a field initiative targeting cross-border environmental crime across the Amazon Rainforest. Criminal groups engaging in destructive, illicit activities have expanded across vast stretches of the Amazon over the past decade. They move largely unimpeded across national borders within the Amazon Rainforest, where state presence is often weak and government efforts remain fragmented and siloed. Between June 23 and July 6, 2025, Operation Green Shield relied on cross-border cooperation and technology to target illegal mining, wildlife trafficking, poaching, illegal logging, fuel smuggling and illegal waste. Yet environmental crime continues to proliferate across the Amazon Basin, experts warn. The operation deployed more than 1,500 police officers across the Amazon Basin in Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. They made more than 90 arrests and more than 350 coordinated simultaneous raids, seizing assets worth more than $64 million. Police seized more than 310 tons of raw minerals and 61 tons of calcium oxide (used to separate metal from ores) from illegal mining sites. They recovered more than 2,100 live animals and 6,350 dead specimens, including birds, lizards and mammals. The National Police of Peru told Mongabay they had seized lizard heads, yellow-spotted river turtles (Podocnemis unifilis), Andean foxes (Lycalopex culpaeus), caimans, parrots, sloths and other species.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/cross-border-operation-cracks-down-on-environmental-crimes-in-the-amazon/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-303861</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Mexico’s rising mercury trade fuels toxic gold mining in Latin America: Report</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/mexicos-rising-mercury-trade-fuels-toxic-gold-mining-in-latin-america-report/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/mexicos-rising-mercury-trade-fuels-toxic-gold-mining-in-latin-america-report/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Jul 2025 17:07:35 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Maxwell Radwin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/07/30170037/AP110519174590-1-768x450.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=303440</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Bolivia, Colombia, Latin America, Mexico, North America, Peru, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forests, Gold Mining, Governance, Illegal Mining, Illegal Trade, Law, Law Enforcement, Mercury, Mining, Organized Crime, Politics, Pollution, Protected Areas, and Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY — In 2017, as part of an international treaty, Mexico started phasing down mercury production and eliminating its use in gold mining, citing major environmental and public health hazards. The effort appeared to work: Between 2017 and 2018, the government reported that national mercury production had dropped from 442 metric tons to just [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY — In 2017, as part of an international treaty, Mexico started phasing down mercury production and eliminating its use in gold mining, citing major environmental and public health hazards. The effort appeared to work: Between 2017 and 2018, the government reported that national mercury production had dropped from 442 metric tons to just half a metric ton. Over the following three years, it reportedly dropped to zero. But for some environmental groups, those numbers looked too good to be true. The government wasn’t reporting mercury smuggling during those years, they said, and had even left several key sections of its progress reports blank. Ultimately, the government would have to issue a correction to some official figures, clarifying that mercury was still being produced in the country. Today, mercury production persists in several states across Mexico, including in protected areas, and has turned the country into one of the main suppliers for the mercury used in gold mines across Latin America. “Mercury mining production is spinning out of control, with bursts of activity driven by mercury prices, increased violence and an alleged recent takeover of productive mines by a drug cartel,” the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) said in a recent report. Peruvian jungle devastated by wild cat gold miners in Madre de Dios, Peru. (Guadalupe Pardo/Pool Photo via AP) Mercury is considered one of the top 10 chemicals of major public health concern by the World Health Organization. Once released into an ecosystem, it can pollute soils and streams&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/mexicos-rising-mercury-trade-fuels-toxic-gold-mining-in-latin-america-report/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-303440</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Illegal roads expand in Colombia’s deforestation hotspots</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/illegal-roads-expand-in-colombias-deforestation-hotspots/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/illegal-roads-expand-in-colombias-deforestation-hotspots/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>25 Jul 2025 10:37:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mie Hoejris Dahl]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/18140144/WhatsApp-Image-2023-10-31-at-9.17.40-PM-1600x890-1-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=303135</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Conservation, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, forest degradation, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Governance, Illegal Logging, Illegal Mining, Infrastructure, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Roads, and Threats To Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MOCOA, Colombia — From the air, the forests in Putumayo, Colombia’s southwestern Amazonian department, look scarred. Light brown lines snake through the canopy. In the eastern part of Putumayo’s Puerto Guzmán municipality, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) of irregular roads, mostly dirt tracks, cut through the forests, according to the report. Many of them are [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MOCOA, Colombia — From the air, the forests in Putumayo, Colombia’s southwestern Amazonian department, look scarred. Light brown lines snake through the canopy. In the eastern part of Putumayo’s Puerto Guzmán municipality, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) of irregular roads, mostly dirt tracks, cut through the forests, according to the report. Many of them are flanked by bare land where trees once stood. From October 2024 to March 2025, more than 11,000 hectares (about 27,000 acres) of forest have been lost in Putumayo. Colombia’s southwestern department is one of the seven areas featured in a new report documenting recent expansion of deforestation in biodiversity hotspots, driven especially by illicit crops and illegal roads. The areas chosen have higher historical levels of deforestation than other regions in the Colombian Amazon. According to Colombia’s Inspector General’s Office, between October 2024 and March 2025, 88,808 hectares (about 219,400 acres) were deforested across Río Naya, Meta-Mapiripán, Vista Hermosa-Puerto Rico, Triple Frontera (Guaviare), Llanos del Yarí – northern Chiribiquete, Caquetá and Putumayo. The Inspector General’s Office monitored an area of about 3.3 million hectares (8.1 million acres), roughly the size of Belgium. The report, supported by data from the Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development (FCDS), a Colombian environmental conservation nonprofit, also highlights 1,107 km (688 mi) of irregular roads associated with forest loss: 782 km (486 mi) were identified by the General Inspector’s Office between March 2024 and March 2025 and are subject to verification by local authorities; the remaining were identified by FCDS&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/illegal-roads-expand-in-colombias-deforestation-hotspots/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-303135</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In the Andes, decentralization fails to address environmental harm</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/in-the-andes-decentralization-fails-to-address-environmental-harm/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/in-the-andes-decentralization-fails-to-address-environmental-harm/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Jul 2025 20:46:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Timothy J. Killeen]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mayra]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/08/01104814/06_JHOUSTON_180305_00288-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=302223</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Perfect Storm in the Amazon]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Latin America, Peru, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Forests, Governance, Illegal Logging, Illegal Mining, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Infrastructure, Logging, Mining, Politics, Protected Areas, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Deforestation, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Andean nations are unitary republics by history and constitution. Consequently, the push to devolve power to lower jurisdictions is less obvious and its degree of implementation variable. Over the last several decades, Andean countries have, at different times and with different levels of determination, organized efforts to decentralize decision-making and the state’s administrative functions. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Andean nations are unitary republics by history and constitution. Consequently, the push to devolve power to lower jurisdictions is less obvious and its degree of implementation variable. Over the last several decades, Andean countries have, at different times and with different levels of determination, organized efforts to decentralize decision-making and the state’s administrative functions. These reforms have profoundly changed the nature of governance, because they have transferred responsibility for providing key public services to local institutions answerable to individuals elected by their neighbors. Peru started its decentralization process in 2002, when constitutional and legal reforms enacted after the collapse of the Fujimori government led to the first local elections in the nation’s history. The transfer of administrative responsibility was matched by revenues that were earmarked for social programmes, such as teacher salaries and healthcare centers. By 2016, about 8% of GDP and 50% of total government expenditures were executed by regional and local governments, an increase of more than 100% compared to 2002. Most revenues are now distributed according to population; consequently, benefits have accrued to urban areas on the coast and the mid-sized cities in the highlands, with one notable exception: revenues from the exploitation of natural resources. Peru’s economy is highly dependent on mining and hydrocarbons, and the political reforms of the early 2000s included a revenue-sharing mechanism that is among the most generous in the world. Known as the canon, it refers to a series of rules for collection of taxes, fees and royalties generated by&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/in-the-andes-decentralization-fails-to-address-environmental-harm/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-302223</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Forest corridors protect Colombia’s critically endangered brown spider monkey</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/forest-corridors-protect-colombias-critically-endangered-brown-spider-monkey/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/forest-corridors-protect-colombias-critically-endangered-brown-spider-monkey/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>02 Jul 2025 09:44:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sean Mowbray]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/07/02092251/Image_1_Andres-_Link-_2025_Colombia_Species_Brown-spider-monkey_Ateles-hybridus_Ana-Malagon-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=301794</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Conservation, Deforestation, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Forest Loss, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Monkeys, Palm Oil, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Research, Restoration, Tropical Deforestation, Tropical Forests, Wildlife, and Wildlife Corridors]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Colombia’s Middle Magdalena region, a patchwork of forest corridors is linking up isolated populations of the critically endangered brown spider monkey (Ateles hybridus). Composed of native and fruit-bearing trees, these corridors on the margins of agricultural land and along riverbanks are providing a lifeline to this species and others, enabling them to move between [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Colombia’s Middle Magdalena region, a patchwork of forest corridors is linking up isolated populations of the critically endangered brown spider monkey (Ateles hybridus). Composed of native and fruit-bearing trees, these corridors on the margins of agricultural land and along riverbanks are providing a lifeline to this species and others, enabling them to move between isolated forest fragments. Around 600 hectares (1,480 acres) of forest providing habitat for the brown spider monkey in the Middle Magdalena are being connected by 15 ecological corridors, created by conservationists Andrés Link and Gabriela de Luna. Their NGO, Fundación Proyecto Primates (the Primates Project Foundation), aims to add another six corridors and connect a total of 2,000 hectares (4,940 acres) of forest across the region. “We&#8217;ve used the brown spider monkey as an umbrella species,” Link says. “We believe that working for the brown spider monkey is helping the entire biological community in this really diverse area of central Colombia.” Reversing fragmentation The brown spider monkey, also known as the variegated spider monkey or Choibos locally in Spanish, is one of the world’s most threatened primates. Over the past few decades, the middle Magdalena saw two waves of deforestation and land use change; more than 50 years ago, cattle ranching arrived, followed by oil palm plantations that have intensified in the last 15 years and continue to expand. Remaining forest patches that were spared in the first wave, such as in mountainous areas or wetlands, are now threatened by oil palms, biologist de Luna&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/forest-corridors-protect-colombias-critically-endangered-brown-spider-monkey/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-301794</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous guards: The shield of Colombia&#8217;s Amazon</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/the-indigenous-guardians-shielding-colombias-amazon/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/the-indigenous-guardians-shielding-colombias-amazon/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Jun 2025 19:50:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Daniela Quintero Díaz]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/26192316/6_Ilustracion_Guardia-indigena_3-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=301498</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conflict, Conservation, Crime, Culture, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Rights, and Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In early February, in downtown Bogotá, Colombia, Luis Alfredo Acosta recited a line in a book from memory: “I am from the rainforest because I smell like the rainforest; I smell like the mountains. And when I smell like the mountains and I smell like the trees, I can touch the forehead of a wild [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In early February, in downtown Bogotá, Colombia, Luis Alfredo Acosta recited a line in a book from memory: “I am from the rainforest because I smell like the rainforest; I smell like the mountains. And when I smell like the mountains and I smell like the trees, I can touch the forehead of a wild deer in the afternoon.” Acosta, the national coordinator of the Indigenous guard within the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC), is from the department of Cauca and a member of the Nasa (or Páez) Indigenous community. For 35 years, he has been part of the Indigenous guard, and as national coordinator, he has been part of multiple processes in the Amazon, where — just as in other places far from the Colombian capital — Indigenous guards spend day after day accomplishing a silent but vital, task. They protect their territory, despite violence and the presence of armed actors. The Indigenous guards do this work even when the sociopolitical landscape in Bogotá is unfriendly toward them: 15,000 Indigenous people arrived to participate in marches on May 1, to demand that the government fulfill the promises it made, but they experienced several incidents of hate speech. “What are these Indians doing here?” a woman in El Nogal, an exclusive club in Bogotá, said in a viral video on social media. They were also accused of being “kidnappers” and “militia.” In their own territories, however, guided by their elders and following their communities’ mandates, hundreds of Indigenous men&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/the-indigenous-guardians-shielding-colombias-amazon/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/the-indigenous-guardians-shielding-colombias-amazon/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-301498</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In Colombia, bird-watching brings tourism and a love for conservation</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/in-colombia-bird-watching-brings-tourism-and-a-love-for-conservation/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/in-colombia-bird-watching-brings-tourism-and-a-love-for-conservation/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Jun 2025 13:58:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Charlie Cordero]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/23133727/MincaGlobalBigDay-Charlie-14-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=301214</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Birding, Birds, Conservation, Conservation Solutions, Ecosystems, Ecotourism, Global Environmental Crisis, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Private Reserves, Protected Areas, Solutions, Tourism, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[It was 3 in the morning when Lorenzo Mora, 41, was getting ready to go bird-watching. This wasn’t just any birding trip: he’d meticulously prepared his boots, clothes, jacket, recorder, speaker, laser pointer, vehicle and binoculars days in advance. “I went to bed at 6 last night,” he said, as I hopped on the back [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[It was 3 in the morning when Lorenzo Mora, 41, was getting ready to go bird-watching. This wasn’t just any birding trip: he’d meticulously prepared his boots, clothes, jacket, recorder, speaker, laser pointer, vehicle and binoculars days in advance. “I went to bed at 6 last night,” he said, as I hopped on the back of his motorcycle. We began a two-hour journey in the darkness, navigating muddy trails to La Cuchilla de San Lorenzo, 2,600 meters (about 8,500 feet) above sea level, near the peak of Cerro Kennedy, in the heart of Colombia’s Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta range. It was May 11, also known by the bird-watching community as the Global Big Day, an annual event organized by Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology in the U.S., during which thousands of people across the world aim to record as many bird species as possible in a single day.  Using the eBird platform, the event promotes citizen science and conservation. Mora was hoping to beat his personal best and make it into the ranks of Colombia’s top 10 birders. His family has been growing coffee on the Biscanieves farm in Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in the northern department of Magdalena, for more than 60 years. From a young age, Mora was always drawn to birds. Lorenzo Mora, 41, rides along the rugged road from Minca to La Cuchilla de San Lorenzo, at 2,600 meters above sea level, to begin his Global Big Day journey. Image by Charlie Cordero. “My&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/in-colombia-bird-watching-brings-tourism-and-a-love-for-conservation/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-301214</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Wildfires push tropical forest loss in Latin America to record highs</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/wildfires-push-tropical-forest-loss-in-latin-america-to-record-highs/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/wildfires-push-tropical-forest-loss-in-latin-america-to-record-highs/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Jun 2025 13:41:30 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mie Hoejris Dahl]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/01/08184720/fogo_pantanal_Gustavo-Figueiroa_SOS-Pantanal-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=300871</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Colombia, Guyana, Latin America, Mexico, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Deforestation, Fires, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forests, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Research, Threats To Rainforests, Tropical Deforestation, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY — In 2024, six Latin American countries were in the top 10 nations with the highest loss of tropical primary forest, according to recent data from the University of Maryland, U.S. Topping the list were Brazil and Bolivia, in a year that saw the record-breaking loss of 6.7 million hectares (16.6 million acres) [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MEXICO CITY — In 2024, six Latin American countries were in the top 10 nations with the highest loss of tropical primary forest, according to recent data from the University of Maryland, U.S. Topping the list were Brazil and Bolivia, in a year that saw the record-breaking loss of 6.7 million hectares (16.6 million acres) of forest, 80% more than in 2023. In the Amazon, forest loss jumped by 110% compared to 2023, the biggest increase since 2016. Although tropical forest loss rose globally, some countries, like Indonesia and Malaysia, saw improvements. In Latin America, however, even countries that had previously curbed forest loss, such as Brazil and Colombia, experienced dramatic losses. Wildfires encroach on tropical forests In 2024, wildfires burned five times more tropical primary forest than the year before. Brazil, Bolivia and Mexico saw particularly high numbers of wildfires. “The rapid loss of forest is very sad news at a time when we need our forests more than ever,” says Marlene Quintanilla Palacios, director of research and knowledge management at Bolivian conservation NGO Fundación Amigos de la Naturaleza (Friends of Nature Foundation). Last year was also the hottest year on record, with Latin America experiencing intense droughts due to a strong El Niño, a recurring climate pattern marked by warmer Pacific waters. “Climate change is accelerating all of this,” Quintanilla Palacios says. Hotspots show areas in Latin America that were newly affected by fires in 2024. Source: Global Forest Watch. If wildfires become the main driver of tropical&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/wildfires-push-tropical-forest-loss-in-latin-america-to-record-highs/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-300871</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Strategic planning for development in the Pan Amazon</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/strategic-planning-for-development-in-the-pan-amazon/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/strategic-planning-for-development-in-the-pan-amazon/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Jun 2025 15:49:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Timothy J. Killeen]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mayra]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Amazon]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/06181922/BRAZIL-PORTADA-animals_199593-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=300349</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Perfect Storm in the Amazon]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Latin America, Peru, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Deforestation, Energy, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Infrastructure, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Roads, and Threats To Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the late 1990s, academics developed a variant of the environmental impact assessment (EIA) methodology known as a strategic environmental assessment (SEA). Originally conceived as a super-EIA, the scope of the analysis was broadened to consider long-term, indirect and cumulative impacts, as well as alternative development scenarios. Key to the SEA methodology is the participation [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the late 1990s, academics developed a variant of the environmental impact assessment (EIA) methodology known as a strategic environmental assessment (SEA). Originally conceived as a super-EIA, the scope of the analysis was broadened to consider long-term, indirect and cumulative impacts, as well as alternative development scenarios. Key to the SEA methodology is the participation of all stakeholders in open dialogue while multiple development options are still on the table. Over time, EIAs have become formalized as a narrow pathway for mitigating the environmental and social liabilities of a specific project. In contrast, SEAs have evolved in the other direction and now are promoted as a strategic planning process that seeks to maximize the positive outcomes from higher-level policies, plans and programmes. There was a flurry of interest in SEAs at the turn of the millennium, and the methodology was applied in several high-profile projects in the Pan Amazon. Strategic Environmental Assessment for the Bi-Oceanic Corridor, a highway linking Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and Corumbá, Brazil, which connected the transportation networks of the Central Andes with Southern Brazil, an early-stage IIRSA priority built between 2000 and 2012. The Plan for a Sustainable BR-163: a Brazilian government initiative to promote sustainable development on the landscapes surrounding the highway between Cuiabá (MT) and Santarém (PA). This highway was originally opened in the 1970s during Operação Amazônia and the segment traversing Pará was essentially abandoned until the early 2000s, when it became an export corridor for soy and corn. Improvements to the highway began&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/strategic-planning-for-development-in-the-pan-amazon/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-300349</doi>				</item>
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