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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/borneo/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Sat, 05 Sep 2026 07:43:31 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<title>Borneo environmental news</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/borneo/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Warming world could push Southeast Asia forests toward thermal limits, new study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/warming-world-could-push-southeast-asia-forests-toward-thermal-limits-new-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/warming-world-could-push-southeast-asia-forests-toward-thermal-limits-new-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Jul 2026 15:20:41 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Carolyn Cowan]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/15153104/raja-ampat2_RAB-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=323577</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Cambodia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Deforestation, Ecosystems, forest degradation, Forest Fragmentation, Forest Loss, Forests, Habitat, Habitat Degradation, Impact Of Climate Change, Rainforests, Research, Tropical Conservation Science, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Forest canopies create the conditions for an extraordinary diversity of life to thrive. By casting shade and retaining moisture in the air and soil, they generate cool and stable understory environments. In the tropics, this regulating effect is particularly crucial for countless species that otherwise would be unable to survive in the extreme heat of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Forest canopies create the conditions for an extraordinary diversity of life to thrive. By casting shade and retaining moisture in the air and soil, they generate cool and stable understory environments. In the tropics, this regulating effect is particularly crucial for countless species that otherwise would be unable to survive in the extreme heat of surrounding open landscapes. However, forest scientists are increasingly concerned that the combined pressures of global warming and habitat degradation could undermine forests’ critical thermal buffering capacity. New research from Southeast Asia predicts forests across the region will experience unprecedented peak temperatures over the next three decades. Heat levels beneath the canopy could hit new highs even within currently intact ecosystems by 2050, the study found, potentially exposing forest-dwelling animals, plants and fungi to severe levels of heat stress. “Our findings show that climate change is not only warming the atmosphere globally, but also reshaping the local conditions that species experience inside forests,” said Erone Ghizoni Santos, who led the study while he was a Ph.D. student at the University of Helsinki in Finland. Clouded leopards are one of many forest-dependent mammals that could be impacted by shifting understory microclimates. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. Region-wide warming Prior research in Malaysian Borneo has demonstrated that when forests are degraded, such as through logging, they become more affected by climate shifts in the surrounding landscape. Depleted canopies allow more sunlight to reach the ground and trap less moisture, allowing heat to permeate the ecosystem. What was missing,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/warming-world-could-push-southeast-asia-forests-toward-thermal-limits-new-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/warming-world-could-push-southeast-asia-forests-toward-thermal-limits-new-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-323577</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cutting back vines lets recovering forests grow faster, Borneo study shows</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/cutting-back-vines-lets-recovering-forests-grow-faster-borneo-study-shows/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/cutting-back-vines-lets-recovering-forests-grow-faster-borneo-study-shows/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Jul 2026 19:15:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Ruth Kamnitzer]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/13150416/5-Malaysian-field-assistant-cutting-lianas-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=323258</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Conservation Solutions, Ecosystems, Environment, Forest Recovery, Forests, Plants, Rainforests, Trees, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As the world faces the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss, researchers are trying to understand how to restore degraded forests to most effectively sequester carbon, benefit biodiversity, and promote sustainable land use. A new study published in Current Biology adds to this endeavor, finding that cutting vining plants called lianas dramatically boosts [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As the world faces the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss, researchers are trying to understand how to restore degraded forests to most effectively sequester carbon, benefit biodiversity, and promote sustainable land use. A new study published in Current Biology adds to this endeavor, finding that cutting vining plants called lianas dramatically boosts canopy height in previously logged forests in Borneo. Lianas are a signature part of tropical forests, with their abundant flowers and fruits attracting insects, birds and mammals, and their looping woody vines creating natural bridges in the canopy. But in logged or disturbed forests, lianas can grow out of control — and they aren’t always the most considerate of neighbors. Proliferating in sunlit gaps, lianas use trees as scaffolding to fast-track their way to the very top of the canopy, while their roots pull water and nutrients from the ground. This can smother trees and change the way they grow, inhibiting forest regeneration. A number of studies have found that removing lianas by severing their stems can boost tree growth in disturbed forests; for example, a 2022 meta-analysis in Ecology and Evolution found that removing lianas more than doubled tree growth and biomass accumulation. So far, though, most of this research has been done in Latin America; less is known about tropical forests elsewhere. Dipterocarp forest at the Danum Valley Field Centre. Borneo’s tropical forests, dominated by trees from the Dipterocarp family, have some of the highest canopies in the world, with some trees reaching&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/cutting-back-vines-lets-recovering-forests-grow-faster-borneo-study-shows/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/cutting-back-vines-lets-recovering-forests-grow-faster-borneo-study-shows/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-323258</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>A blueprint for effective activism 10 years after defeating a dam in Borneo (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/a-blueprint-for-effective-activism-10-years-after-defeating-a-dam-in-borneo-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/a-blueprint-for-effective-activism-10-years-after-defeating-a-dam-in-borneo-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Jun 2026 18:59:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Jessica MerrimanJoe Lamb]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/09193920/Baram-dam-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=320891</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Analysis, Commentary, Community Development, Conservation, Dams, Development, Ecosystems, Energy, Environment, Forests, Freshwater, Governance, Human Rights, Hydroelectric Power, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights, Rivers, Tropical Forests, and Tropics]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In October 2015, Indigenous activists from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Cambodia, Brazil, the United States, and Honduras, together with delegates from longhouse communities throughout the Malaysian state of Sarawak, gathered at Tanjung Tepalit, an Indigenous Kenyah village on the Baram River on the island of Borneo. They called the gathering WISER: the World Indigenous Summit [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In October 2015, Indigenous activists from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Cambodia, Brazil, the United States, and Honduras, together with delegates from longhouse communities throughout the Malaysian state of Sarawak, gathered at Tanjung Tepalit, an Indigenous Kenyah village on the Baram River on the island of Borneo. They called the gathering WISER: the World Indigenous Summit on Environment and Rivers. Tanjung Tepalit hosted the gathering because the village, along with more than two dozen others along the river, was scheduled to be drowned. The Baram Dam, a 1,200-megawatt hydroelectric mega project backed by the Sarawak state government and aligned with a regional industrial development scheme called the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE), would have flooded an area of more than 400 square kilometers (more than 150 square miles) and displaced an estimated 20,000 Kenyah, Kayan, and Penan people. Muslims, Catholics, Evangelicals, Buddhists, agnostics, and people who followed traditional Indigenous religions were among the attendees. As we gathered, Peter Kallang, the Kenyah founder and chair of the local advocacy group SAVE Rivers, addressed the assembly: &#8220;We are people of many faiths,&#8221; he said, &#8220;but we are united in one mission. To protect our forest homes and our ways of life.&#8221; In one sense the WISER gathering was a strategy meeting to coordinate an international coalition against a state-corporate project. In another, and perhaps deeper sense, WISER was rooted in something older. It was an assertion that the values that hold communities to their land across generations — the sanctity of the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/a-blueprint-for-effective-activism-10-years-after-defeating-a-dam-in-borneo-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/a-blueprint-for-effective-activism-10-years-after-defeating-a-dam-in-borneo-analysis/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-320891</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Smallholders are not the weak link in forest protection (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/smallholders-are-not-the-weak-link-in-forest-protection-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/smallholders-are-not-the-weak-link-in-forest-protection-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 May 2026 02:24:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aida Greenbury]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/20021450/kalbar_drone_190243-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=319771</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Commentary, Deforestation, Environment, Forests, Green, Tropical Forests, and Zero Deforestation Commitments]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In general, plantation companies view local communities and smallholders as obstacles to expanding operations and to securing social licenses. In deforestation-free supply chains, smallholders are also often treated as a risk. In my experience, this is one reason forest protection efforts fail: we don’t want to understand why smallholders are perceived as a risk. Yet [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In general, plantation companies view local communities and smallholders as obstacles to expanding operations and to securing social licenses. In deforestation-free supply chains, smallholders are also often treated as a risk. In my experience, this is one reason forest protection efforts fail: we don’t want to understand why smallholders are perceived as a risk. Yet many of the people closest to the forest are also the ones with the strongest reason to keep it standing. That was not how I saw things at the start of my career. Years inside corporate sustainability changed my view, as did many difficult conversations with communities. Customary forest behind smallholders oil palm plantation in Sanggau, West Kalimantan. Photo by Aida Greenbury. People often asked me, “How did someone like you, a corporate slave, end up working for smallholders?” It’s a long story. I worked for corporations for many years. Some people might remember me as Managing Director of Sustainability at one of the largest integrated forestry, pulp and paper companies headquartered in Indonesia. A forest-based company of that size in Indonesia is frequently criticized for deforestation. More than a decade ago, before I left the company, that work led me to help develop the High Carbon Stock Approach (HCSA), a multistakeholder initiative to develop a deforestation-free methodology for extractive companies operating in humid tropical regions. With many existing deforestation standards unclear and rife with loopholes, adopting a clear, science-based deforestation-free methodology, supported by companies, NGOs, and other global stakeholders, was what I needed to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/smallholders-are-not-the-weak-link-in-forest-protection-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/smallholders-are-not-the-weak-link-in-forest-protection-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-319771</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Solar brings power to women entrepreneurs in Borneo, but rural energy inequality remains</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/solar-brings-power-to-women-entrepreneurs-in-borneo-but-rural-energy-inequality-remains/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/solar-brings-power-to-women-entrepreneurs-in-borneo-but-rural-energy-inequality-remains/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>14 May 2026 10:36:12 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Yuda Almerio]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/14100334/solar-panels-and-cacti-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=319421</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, East Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Alternative Energy, Bioenergy, Clean Energy, Climate Change, Emission Reduction, Energy, Environment, Fossil Fuels, Gender, Governance, Just Transition, Politics, Renewable Energy, and Solar Power]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KUTAI KARTANEGARA, Indonesia — Asniah recalls nights lying in darkness listening to cicadas and the passing hum of outboard motors after her family moved to Muara Enggelam in the 1990s, an over-the-water village in the interior of Indonesian Borneo, cut off from basic services. Around the turn of the century, a handful of homes in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KUTAI KARTANEGARA, Indonesia — Asniah recalls nights lying in darkness listening to cicadas and the passing hum of outboard motors after her family moved to Muara Enggelam in the 1990s, an over-the-water village in the interior of Indonesian Borneo, cut off from basic services. Around the turn of the century, a handful of homes in Muara Enggelam acquired diesel generators, bringing electric lighting for the first time to the timber stilt houses that still line the last mile of the river where the Enggelam meets Borneo’s Lake Melintang. The Kutai Kartanegara district government here later expanded this basic electrification program, but residents paid several times more for power than a grid-connected urban household. Moreover, the generators ran only from dusk to dawn and would frequently break down, plunging Muara Enggelam back into the void Asniah recalled on moving here three decades earlier as a child. “We were just grateful — things had been harder before,” Asniah, a mother of three now in her early 40s, told Mongabay Indonesia at her home. “Even though there was 24-hour electricity in the city at the time,” she added. Stable energy access provides greater scope for women to develop businesses and contribute to the family economy. Image by Yuda Almerio/Mongabay Indonesia Remote work Uneven access to electricity has abetted inequality in what is now Indonesia ever since Dutch colonialists introduced captive coal plants in the 19th century to power their plantation operations. Indonesia’s Gini coefficient, a measure of inequality, records the wealth gap between&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/solar-brings-power-to-women-entrepreneurs-in-borneo-but-rural-energy-inequality-remains/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-319421</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>See an orangutan, take a photo, earn some money: A viable conservation model?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/see-an-orangutan-take-a-photo-earn-some-money-a-viable-conservation-model/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/see-an-orangutan-take-a-photo-earn-some-money-a-viable-conservation-model/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Apr 2026 22:54:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Linnea Hoover]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/11/10154758/orangutan-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317580</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Apes, Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Great Apes, Mammals, Orangutans, Primates, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Kapuas Hulu district in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan province, a pilot program is attempting to change how people living in Borneo perceive and engage with wildlife and wildlife conservation. KehatiKu, a play on the Indonesian words for “my heart” or “biodiversity,” was the brainchild of Borneo Futures, a scientific consultancy company, says biologist Erik Meijaard, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Kapuas Hulu district in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan province, a pilot program is attempting to change how people living in Borneo perceive and engage with wildlife and wildlife conservation. KehatiKu, a play on the Indonesian words for “my heart” or “biodiversity,” was the brainchild of Borneo Futures, a scientific consultancy company, says biologist Erik Meijaard, the consultancy’s managing director. Under the program, citizen observers are offered small payments for recording and reporting wildlife sightings, collecting around 175,000 records in around a year of operations. In a video interview, Meijaard says the project came about because he was frustrated with inefficiency in conservation. In 2022, Meijaard worked on a study analyzing 20 years of efforts to save orangutans. The study found that from 2000-19, nearly $1 billion was spent on orangutan conservation worldwide, even as around 100,000 orangutans were lost. By offering small payments directly to residents, Meijaard says KehatiKu has shown concrete successes at a fraction of the cost of normal conservation. Photograph of a Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus) submitted by a KehatiKu citizen observer. Participants can earn Rp. 100,000 (about $5.84) for finding and photographing orangutans. Image courtesy of Borneo Futures. He estimates the program is spending less than $1 per hectare (2.5 acres) per year across the 200,000 hectares (494,210 acres) they are studying. For that money, they are both building community engagement and getting real-time data on multiple species ranging from common birds to rare and endangered species such as the flat-headed cat (Prionailurus planiceps), Rhinoceros hornbill&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/see-an-orangutan-take-a-photo-earn-some-money-a-viable-conservation-model/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317580</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia reviews firms in river basins after latest floods affect 7% of Bornean province</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-reviews-firms-in-river-basins-after-latest-floods-affect-7-of-bornean-province/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-reviews-firms-in-river-basins-after-latest-floods-affect-7-of-bornean-province/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>31 Mar 2026 13:38:50 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Riyad Dafhi Rizki]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/31101819/5-B-Warga-menggunakan-sampan-untuk-beraktivitas-selama-banjir-melanda-Kabupaten-Banjar.-Foto_-Riyad-Dafhi-Rizki_Mongabay-Indonesia-768x512-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316611</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, South Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Flooding, Forests, Land Use Change, Planetary Health, Rivers, and Water]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BANJAR, Indonesia – Indonesia’s government continues to review mines and plantations in the river basins of southern Borneo, months after more than 7% of the population there was impacted by flooding in December last year. “An audit is still in progress,” environment ministry spokesperson Yulia Suryanti told Mongabay Indonesia. South Kalimantan is one of five [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BANJAR, Indonesia – Indonesia’s government continues to review mines and plantations in the river basins of southern Borneo, months after more than 7% of the population there was impacted by flooding in December last year. “An audit is still in progress,” environment ministry spokesperson Yulia Suryanti told Mongabay Indonesia. South Kalimantan is one of five Indonesian provinces on the highly biodiverse island of Borneo, which Indonesia shares with Brunei and Malaysia. The southeastern province is particularly vulnerable to flooding during the region’s main rainy season — at least 35 people were killed during major floods that destroyed more than 100,000 homes in 2021. The population of South Kalimantan was almost 4.4 million as of the 2020 census, the most recent conducted by the government. Meanwhile, data from Indonesia’s disaster management agency showed that nearly 290,000 people were affected by the latest annual floods since the beginning of December last year. Eleven out of the 13 cities and districts that make up the province experienced flooding by January. Civil society organizations say that likely reflects wholesale destruction of old-growth forest throughout the basins of the Barito and Maluka rivers, which run through the province and out into the Java Sea. The Barito is the second-longest river in Borneo, after the Kapuas. “Across South Kalimantan, especially in the mid and lower sections of the Barito River Basin, a lot of the forest cover has been lost,” said Anggi Prayoga, a forestry campaigner at Greenpeace Indonesia. The head of the forestry department in&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-reviews-firms-in-river-basins-after-latest-floods-affect-7-of-bornean-province/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-reviews-firms-in-river-basins-after-latest-floods-affect-7-of-bornean-province/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316611</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Birutė Galdikas, primatologist who spent a lifetime studying &#038; defending orangutans, has died at 79</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/birute-galdikas-primatologist-who-spent-a-lifetime-studying-defending-orangutans-has-died-at-79/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/birute-galdikas-primatologist-who-spent-a-lifetime-studying-defending-orangutans-has-died-at-79/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Mar 2026 03:21:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rhett Ayers Butler]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/26032516/birute-galdikas-bw-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316316</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animal Welfare, Animals, Apes, Biodiversity, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Great Apes, Habitat Loss, Mammals, Obituary, Orangutans, Primates, Reintroductions, Wildlife, and Wildlife Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the early 1970s, orangutans occupied an ambiguous place in science. They were known to exist, of course, but remained poorly understood, rarely observed, and difficult to study in the wild. Their forest habitat in Borneo and Sumatra was still vast, though already beginning to change. Logging roads were extending into areas that had long [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the early 1970s, orangutans occupied an ambiguous place in science. They were known to exist, of course, but remained poorly understood, rarely observed, and difficult to study in the wild. Their forest habitat in Borneo and Sumatra was still vast, though already beginning to change. Logging roads were extending into areas that had long resisted access. The outlines of a larger problem were visible, even if its scale was not yet clear. At the same time, a small group of researchers was beginning to reshape how great apes were studied. Fieldwork, rather than captivity, became the preferred approach. Long-term observation replaced short expeditions. The premise was simple but demanding: to understand animals that were hard to find, one had to remain in place long enough for them to become familiar with human presence. Into this setting came a young graduate student with an interest in human evolution and a determination to study orangutans in their natural habitat, despite doubts that such work was feasible. With limited funding and little infrastructure, she established a research station in a remote peat swamp in Indonesian Borneo in 1971. Over time, that station would become one of the longest-running field sites for any wild mammal. Galdikas in the field. Photo courtesy of Orangutan Foundation International (OFI). Birutė Galdikas spent the next five decades working from that base. Her early years were marked less by discovery than by persistence. Finding orangutans could take weeks. Observing them required learning to move through dense forest and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/birute-galdikas-primatologist-who-spent-a-lifetime-studying-defending-orangutans-has-died-at-79/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/birute-galdikas-primatologist-who-spent-a-lifetime-studying-defending-orangutans-has-died-at-79/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316316</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia court orders release of withheld impact studies on new capital</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-court-orders-release-of-withheld-impact-studies-on-new-capital/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-court-orders-release-of-withheld-impact-studies-on-new-capital/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Mar 2026 11:16:34 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Niken D. Sitoningrum]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/19101439/nusantara-wings-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=315963</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, East Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Cities, Dams, Development, Environment, Environmental Law, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Infrastructure, Law, Tropical Forests, and Water]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[EAST KALIMANTAN, Indonesia — Indonesia’s Supreme Court has ordered the government to release environmental impact assessments for two projects at the country’s new capital city, handing civil society groups a rare transparency victory. The case brought by the East Kalimantan provincial chapter of the Mining Advocacy Network, a civil society organization known as Jatam, was [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[EAST KALIMANTAN, Indonesia — Indonesia’s Supreme Court has ordered the government to release environmental impact assessments for two projects at the country’s new capital city, handing civil society groups a rare transparency victory. The case brought by the East Kalimantan provincial chapter of the Mining Advocacy Network, a civil society organization known as Jatam, was formally read out at Indonesia’s Information Commissioner, the KIP, in early March. “It’s a victory for the people in general, I think, especially those directly affected by the construction of the [new capital] infrastructure project in East Kalimantan,” said Muh. Jamil, the head of Jatam’s legal team on the case. An environmental impact assessment is a legal requirement to assess the immediate and cumulative environmental impacts of a project. It also formally identifies measures required to prevent undue harm to an ecosystem. The decision requires the Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing to publish these environmental documents concerning the Sepaku Semoi Dam and Sepaku River intake, two utility water projects campaigners blamed for displacing Indigenous Balik families at Indonesia’s largest-ever construction site. The Balik community in Penajam Paser district numbers around 1,000 people and speaks a different language to the broader Dayak Indigenous groups living in East Kalimantan province. The Sepaku River intake comprises transmission pipes running 16 kilometers (10 miles) to Nusantara, the new capital city, with a supply capacity of 3,000 liters per second (nearly 800 gallons per second). The government calls the Sepaku Semoi Dam “a crucial supplier of water” for&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-court-orders-release-of-withheld-impact-studies-on-new-capital/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/indonesia-court-orders-release-of-withheld-impact-studies-on-new-capital/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-315963</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>World Bank carbon program risks further infringing upon rights of Indonesian Indigenous community (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/world-bank-carbon-program-risks-further-infringing-upon-rights-of-indonesian-indigenous-community-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/world-bank-carbon-program-risks-further-infringing-upon-rights-of-indonesian-indigenous-community-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Jan 2026 00:22:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Anna Christi SuwardiFuat Edi KurniawanSadar Ginting]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/27155741/c6e3108f-c040-4581-a22b-14f4f1d66a0a-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=313404</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, carbon, Carbon Credits, Carbon Market, Carbon Offsets, Climate Change, climate finance, Commentary, Culture, Finance, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights, Rainforests, Social Justice, and Traditional Knowledge]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the upper reaches of the Mahakam River, inside one of the last intact rainforest corridors of Borneo, the Dayak Bahau community of Long Isun has been fighting a long, layered battle for justice. Their history on the land predates the Indonesian state, yet on official maps their existence is reduced to an administrative code [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the upper reaches of the Mahakam River, inside one of the last intact rainforest corridors of Borneo, the Dayak Bahau community of Long Isun has been fighting a long, layered battle for justice. Their history on the land predates the Indonesian state, yet on official maps their existence is reduced to an administrative code printed on a sheet of paper, with no record of the rivers they follow like family, the sacred groves where their elders are buried, the hills that hold ancestral stories. In the documents that decide the fate of their territory, their cosmology disappears beneath lines drawn to serve other interests. Erasure becomes technical: their land is not seen, so their rights are not acknowledged. The consequence is real. When companies arrive with permits approved in distant government offices, those papers speak louder than generations of lived governance. And now, international climate finance mechanisms have entered this same forest, treating the landscape as a source of carbon emission reductions while the people who protected it have yet to see their rights recognized. In November 2025, representatives from Long Isun filed a formal grievance against the World Bank’s Emission Reduction (ER) Program in East Kalimantan province, arguing that the project infringed upon their rights, ignored unresolved territorial conflicts, and failed to uphold a meaningful process of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC). The complaint is not a sudden reaction, but is the culmination of more than a decade of resistance, from daily patrols and adat (customary laws&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/world-bank-carbon-program-risks-further-infringing-upon-rights-of-indonesian-indigenous-community-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/world-bank-carbon-program-risks-further-infringing-upon-rights-of-indonesian-indigenous-community-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-313404</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Ditches on peatland oil palm plantations are an overlooked source of methane: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Dec 2025 14:18:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/30075343/Tropical-peatland-clearance-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312273</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Southeast Asia, and Tropics]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Peatlands, Politics, Research, Soil Carbon, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The water-filled ditches that laced through the oil palm plantation in Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, nagged at Kuno Kasak when he saw them in 2022. He knew that these canals, used to draw water out of spongy peatlands to make them suitable for agriculture, had been shown to be sources [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The water-filled ditches that laced through the oil palm plantation in Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, nagged at Kuno Kasak when he saw them in 2022. He knew that these canals, used to draw water out of spongy peatlands to make them suitable for agriculture, had been shown to be sources of methane. But just how much remains an open question, with too few data points to make estimates with certainty. Though methane dissipates more quickly in the atmosphere than CO2, it’s more than 20 times more effective at trapping heat. It’s also responsible for nearly a third of the global temperature rise since the industrial revolution, making accurate methane accounting imperative for addressing climate change. Kasak, a professor of environmental technology at Estonia’s University of Tartu, is the lead author of a recent study in which he and his colleagues report that methane from these drainage canals accounted for as much as 10% of the total greenhouse gases from a given hectare of the oil palm plantations they studied. At the same time, the ditches covered no more than 4% of the plantations’ total area. “This is significant because it means that previous estimates of emissions from drained peatlands likely underestimate the contribution from ditches, which are often ignored in global carbon accounting,” Kasak told Mongabay in an email. They also found that the ditches were sources of CO2. One of the oil palm plantations where Kasak and his colleagues sampled emissions from drainage ditches.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312273</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>On Indonesia’s longest river, a Borneo community passes crucial public health milestone</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/on-indonesias-longest-river-a-borneo-community-passes-crucial-public-health-milestone/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/on-indonesias-longest-river-a-borneo-community-passes-crucial-public-health-milestone/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>29 Dec 2025 08:18:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Anggita Raissa]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/11142044/Ningsih-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311135</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Drinking Water, Environment, Freshwater, Global Environmental Crisis, Health, Pollution, Public Health, Rivers, Sustainable Development, Waste, Water, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SEKADAU, Indonesia — Children’s laughter skimmed over water the color of mud as mothers wrung laundry over banks where the Sekadau joins the Kapuas, the longest river in Indonesia. Local testimony along the Kapuas River, which flows 1,143 kilometers (710 miles) east to west from Borneo’s Müller Mountains out into the Natuna Sea, suggests this [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SEKADAU, Indonesia — Children’s laughter skimmed over water the color of mud as mothers wrung laundry over banks where the Sekadau joins the Kapuas, the longest river in Indonesia. Local testimony along the Kapuas River, which flows 1,143 kilometers (710 miles) east to west from Borneo’s Müller Mountains out into the Natuna Sea, suggests this river — like many flowing across the world’s largest archipelagic country — may be losing prominence as a center of community life. “The river is dirtier now and no longer a gathering place like before,” an older resident told researchers from Tanjungpura University downriver in Pontianak, the capital of West Kalimantan province, for a study published in September. But here in Sekadau, the river remains central to daily life — a place to bathe, wash vegetables, and, until recently, to defecate. Research conducted on the Kapuas from 2020-2022 and published in the Journal of Aquaculture and Fish Health last year recorded double the legal limit of lead, a heavy metal pollutant that impairs neurological development — and 24 times the maximum coliform bacteria level for rivers permitted by Indonesia’s government. The study authors said the dangerous coliform level reflected the rapid population growth that has taken place in recent decades along the banks of the Kapuas. Some here in the village of Sekadau, the seat of an eponymous district on the Kapuas, say they hope the hardening of Borneo’s main arterial river can still be mended. From 2002-2024 West Kalimantan province lost one-fifth of its&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/on-indonesias-longest-river-a-borneo-community-passes-crucial-public-health-milestone/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311135</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Taboo against harming strangler fig spirits protects forests in Indonesian Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/taboo-against-harming-strangler-fig-spirits-protects-forests-in-indonesian-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/taboo-against-harming-strangler-fig-spirits-protects-forests-in-indonesian-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Dec 2025 22:37:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/22221311/Copy-of-IMG_7244-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311796</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Conservation and Religion]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Forest Destruction, Forests, Habitat, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Indigenous Peoples, Rainforests, Religions, Traditional Knowledge, Trees, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[When a young boy went missing near his mother&#8217;s rice field in Indonesian Borneo, the entire village searched for him. After nearly a day, he was found near a large strangler fig tree. The boy insisted he hadn&#8217;t been hiding. Spirits living in the fig tree had called his name and lured him away, he [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[When a young boy went missing near his mother&#8217;s rice field in Indonesian Borneo, the entire village searched for him. After nearly a day, he was found near a large strangler fig tree. The boy insisted he hadn&#8217;t been hiding. Spirits living in the fig tree had called his name and lured him away, he said, then prevented his mother from seeing him even as she walked around the tree looking for him. The family took him to a shaman, who confirmed the boy had been targeted by spirits dwelling in the strangler fig. To protect him from future encounters, they changed his name entirely. This story, shared with researcher Ditro Wibisono Wardi Parikesit during interviews with an Iban Indigenous community in Sungai Utik, West Kalimantan, illustrates a powerful belief among the community. Almost all (30 out of 32) community members considered large strangler figs to host supernatural entities that may be dangerous if disturbed. New research published in the journal Biotropica reveals that this belief system has measurable ecological benefits. Photo of the largest strangler fig recorded which found in the farmland area. It consists of three different species and stands more than 40 meters tall. Photo by Ditro Wibisono Wardi Parikesit Strangler figs grow by depositing their seeds in the canopy of another tree. Their aerial roots grow downward, surrounding and squeezing the host tree until eventually dies. Once the host dies and decays, a hollow root structure supports the fig tree above. When farmers in the Iban&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/taboo-against-harming-strangler-fig-spirits-protects-forests-in-indonesian-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311796</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Endangered knowledge and endangered plants: Threats to Indigenous medicinal traditions in Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Dec 2025 00:42:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Cassidy Beach]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/29162522/beach_indigenous_medicine_1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310375</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Sarawak, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, and Traditional Knowledge]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Borneo’s dense rainforest, some communities of Punan people still find their medicine among the trees. For generations the forest has been their living pharmacy, with each medicinal plant tied to tradition. But as modern pressures grow, both the forest and the knowledge it shelters are slipping away. To understand what’s at stake, researchers from [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Borneo’s dense rainforest, some communities of Punan people still find their medicine among the trees. For generations the forest has been their living pharmacy, with each medicinal plant tied to tradition. But as modern pressures grow, both the forest and the knowledge it shelters are slipping away. To understand what’s at stake, researchers from Universiti Putra Malaysia traveled to Punan communities in the Malaysian state of Sarawak to document traditional medicinal practices and identify the plants behind them. The results were recently published in the journal Tropical Conservation Science. Tribes in Sarawak, Borneo live in stilted longhouses often along rivers. Historically housing one kin group, today a longhouse is typically home to multiple extended families of mixed heritage. Photo by Beatrice Anak Kayok Thirteen Indigenous Punan people guided ecologist Keeren Sundara Rajoo and his colleagues through the forest, locating plants and sharing a “spider web” of stories and knowledge. “When a plant species disappears, it’s not only a biological loss,” Sundara Rajoo said. “It also erases part of a community’s heritage and traditional knowledge system.” Indigenous communities in Sarawak live in stilted longhouses, home to multiple families in private bilik rooms that open onto a shared ruai, the center of communal life. Another tribe’s longhouse may stand only 40 kilometers (25 miles) away, Sundara Rajoo said, yet each group preserves its own system of beliefs, unique language, and festivals. Among these communities, the Punan are struggling to hold onto some of these cultural traditions. They believe their medicine draws&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310375</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bearing witness to Indonesia’s environmental challenges: Sapariah Saturi</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/bearing-witness-to-indonesias-environmental-challenges-sapariah-saturi/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/bearing-witness-to-indonesias-environmental-challenges-sapariah-saturi/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Nov 2025 20:48:35 +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/20/2025/11/21043947/Sapariah-Sorong-Papua-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309882</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Conversations with Mongabay leaders]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, Environment, Forests, Green, Interviews, Interviews With Environmental Journalists, and Journalism]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia’s environmental issues often feel too vast to take in at once. A nation said to have more than 17,000 islands, it contains the world’s third-largest tropical rainforest and one of its busiest commodity frontiers. For many Indonesians, the story of modern development is told not in charts but in the air they breathe. Some [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia’s environmental issues often feel too vast to take in at once. A nation said to have more than 17,000 islands, it contains the world’s third-largest tropical rainforest and one of its busiest commodity frontiers. For many Indonesians, the story of modern development is told not in charts but in the air they breathe. Some remember childhoods spent under yellowed skies, the sting of peat-fire smoke seeping through school windows, the sweet-acrid smell that clings to clothes long after the fires fade. Others know the slow rise of the sea by the way the ground squelches underfoot in places where it didn’t use to. Or the way Jakarta’s air tastes metallic on mornings when the pollution monitors glow red. For Sapariah “Arie” Saturi, these scenes are not abstractions. They are a biography. She grew up along the Kapuas River in West Kalimantan, a region shaped by the uneasy coexistence of forest, peatland, and the ambitions of logging firms, palm-oil giants, and mining companies. Fires arrived each dry season in the 1990s, and with them the haze: darkened skies, eyes that burned after a few minutes outdoors, a kind of muffled stillness that settles over the landscape when the smoke grows dense enough to dull sound and color alike. Masks were rare then. Children simply endured. Sapariah Saturi. Photo courtesy of Saturi. Today Arie lives in Jakarta, where the problems are different but no less tangible. The capital sinks a little each year, traffic is a consistent source of frustration, and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/bearing-witness-to-indonesias-environmental-challenges-sapariah-saturi/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/bearing-witness-to-indonesias-environmental-challenges-sapariah-saturi/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309882</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous Dayak resist new southern Borneo national park amid global protection deficit</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-dayak-resist-new-southern-borneo-national-park-amid-global-protection-deficit/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-dayak-resist-new-southern-borneo-national-park-amid-global-protection-deficit/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Nov 2025 10:10:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rendy TisnaRiyad Dafhi Rizki]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/18100750/1001354092-1200x800-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309722</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conflict, Conservation, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Use Change, National Parks, Protests, Rainforests, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — A growing coalition of Indigenous communities, students and civil society organizations from Borneo is rallying against fast-moving plans to establish a new national park in the remote Meratus mountain range. “The Meratus forest is our mother,” said Anang Suriani, a spokesperson for the Dayak Indigenous community from Kambiayin, a village in South [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — A growing coalition of Indigenous communities, students and civil society organizations from Borneo is rallying against fast-moving plans to establish a new national park in the remote Meratus mountain range. “The Meratus forest is our mother,” said Anang Suriani, a spokesperson for the Dayak Indigenous community from Kambiayin, a village in South Kalimantan province that falls within the borders of the proposed Meratus Mountains National Park. “It&#8217;s a place where we live, farm, forage, practice tradition and obtain medicine,” he added. “Making it a national park is tantamount to destroying us.” The government plans to zone Meratus Mountains National Park over 119,779 hectares (295,980 acres), an area twice the size of the city of Chicago, or more than 50% larger than the country of Singapore. Since Indonesia’s independence in 1945, successive governments have established 57 national parks across the country, the largest of which is Lorentz National Park in Papua, at around 2.5 million hectares (6.2 million acres), an area 30 times larger than Singapore. The smallest, Kelimutu National Park on Flores island, is slightly smaller than the city state. South Kalimantan is one of only four of the 38 provinces across Indonesia that doesn’t have a national park. However, in April this year, UNESCO, the United Nations’ cultural office, designated the Meratus Mountains as a Global Geopark for its “fascinating geological record of complex tectonic evolution beginning in the Jurassic period, 201 to 145 million years ago.” Officials in Indonesia unveiled the national park draft in&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-dayak-resist-new-southern-borneo-national-park-amid-global-protection-deficit/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/indigenous-dayak-resist-new-southern-borneo-national-park-amid-global-protection-deficit/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309722</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cautious win for Indigenous groups in Malaysia as palm oil firm pauses forest clearing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/cautious-win-for-indigenous-groups-in-malaysia-as-palm-oil-firm-pauses-forest-clearing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/cautious-win-for-indigenous-groups-in-malaysia-as-palm-oil-firm-pauses-forest-clearing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Nov 2025 22:48:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Danielle Keeton-Olsen]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/11175004/Community-Blockade_borneoproject-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309126</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Sarawak, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous activists in central Sarawak state in Malaysian Borneo have declared victory, at least temporarily, after palm oil firm Urun Plantations agreed to a moratorium on clearing land in a disputed area. Penan and Kenyah residents of the Long Urun region alleged that the plantation, which is certified as sustainable, was clearing natural forest that [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous activists in central Sarawak state in Malaysian Borneo have declared victory, at least temporarily, after palm oil firm Urun Plantations agreed to a moratorium on clearing land in a disputed area. Penan and Kenyah residents of the Long Urun region alleged that the plantation, which is certified as sustainable, was clearing natural forest that should remain standing — even as the plantation company maintains any land clearing was within legal guidelines. This Sept. 24, 2025 image shows land clearing in the Long Urun area. Image courtesy of The Borneo Project. According to a press release from Indigenous rights and environmental protection NGO SAVE Rivers, community leaders reported that the Glenealy/Samling Belaga Mill, the last remaining mill within 50 kilometers (30 miles) still buying palm fruit from Urun Plantations, has suspended sourcing from the plantation. The moratorium agreement also follows a recent media campaign by SAVE Rivers and environmental advocacy group The Borneo Project, which called on international palm oil producer SD Guthrie (formerly known as Sime Darby Plantation and one of the world’s largest producers of certified sustainable palm oil), to suspend purchases from the Glenealy/Samling Belaga Mill. Satellite imagery shows deforestation within Urun Plantations’ concession. Image by Emilie Languedoc / Mongabay. Eileen Clare Ipa, a resident of Long Urun’s Uma Pawa village, told Mongabay she was glad the company had stopped cutting trees, but she saw them still planting oil palm and doing maintenance on the cleared area. Ipa said she wants the company to leave that area&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/cautious-win-for-indigenous-groups-in-malaysia-as-palm-oil-firm-pauses-forest-clearing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/cautious-win-for-indigenous-groups-in-malaysia-as-palm-oil-firm-pauses-forest-clearing/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309126</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Connecting Indonesia’s environmental stories to millions</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/connecting-indonesias-environmental-stories-to-millions/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/connecting-indonesias-environmental-stories-to-millions/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Oct 2025 16:06:03 +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/20/2025/10/13144449/Akhyari-Hananto-20230927_111532-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307481</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Conversations with Mongabay leaders]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Java, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Environment, Green, Interviews, Interviews with conservation players, and Interviews With Environmental Journalists]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Before dawn breaks over Surabaya, Indonesia’s “City of Heroes,” Akhyari Hananto has already begun his day. After morning prayers, he opens Google Analytics to scan real-time graphs showing how Mongabay Indonesia’s readers moved through the night—what stories caught their attention, which posts resonated, and where curiosity waned. “That information often determines how I’ll prioritize my [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Before dawn breaks over Surabaya, Indonesia’s “City of Heroes,” Akhyari Hananto has already begun his day. After morning prayers, he opens Google Analytics to scan real-time graphs showing how Mongabay Indonesia’s readers moved through the night—what stories caught their attention, which posts resonated, and where curiosity waned. “That information often determines how I’ll prioritize my work for the rest of the day,” he says. By the time most people are pouring their first cup of coffee, he has already drafted ideas to re-energize audiences across the country. As Multimedia Manager for Mongabay Indonesia, Hananto sits at the intersection of creativity, data, and strategy. His job blends newsroom production, design, and analytics. On any given day, he may be editing multimedia, managing the outlet’s social media presence, or translating insights from Google Analytics into tactical decisions for Mongabay’s headquarters. “Everything I do connects to one central mission,” he explains, “ensuring that Mongabay’s environmental journalism reaches, engages, and resonates with audiences across Indonesia.” That mission has become increasingly important in a nation whose 280 million people live amid some of the planet’s richest biodiversity—and where forests, peatlands, and coral reefs are rapidly disappearing. For Hananto, who joined Mongabay in 2014, making environmental issues accessible is not just professional work; it is personal. “As an Indonesian, it’s impossible not to care,” he says. “These issues are not distant or abstract—they’re unfolding right here, on our own islands.” Akhyari Hananto. Courtesy of Hananto Hananto’s path to journalism was far from conventional. As a university&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/connecting-indonesias-environmental-stories-to-millions/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/connecting-indonesias-environmental-stories-to-millions/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307481</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Study maps rare Borneo forests with unique habitats &#038; urgent need for protection</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/study-maps-rare-borneo-forests-with-unique-habitats-urgent-need-for-protection/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/study-maps-rare-borneo-forests-with-unique-habitats-urgent-need-for-protection/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Aug 2025 02:19:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/12094955/Heath-Forest_Bernat-Ripoll-Capilla-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=304113</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Fires, Forests, Gold Mining, Mining, Palm Oil, Peatlands, Plantations, Protected Areas, Research, and Restoration]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In their latest study, a group of researchers from Indonesia, the U.K., and the U.S. find that heath forests (locally known as kerangas) span 16,586 square kilometers (6,400 square miles) — almost the size of Hawaii’s land area — across Kalimantan. This figure suggests about a 33% loss of forest cover since a 1996 estimate [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In their latest study, a group of researchers from Indonesia, the U.K., and the U.S. find that heath forests (locally known as kerangas) span 16,586 square kilometers (6,400 square miles) — almost the size of Hawaii’s land area — across Kalimantan. This figure suggests about a 33% loss of forest cover since a 1996 estimate of 24,750 km² (9,550 mi²), they write in a paper published July 16 in Cambridge University Press’ Journal of Tropical Ecology. The authors say their research offered a baseline by clarifying the mosaic structure of lowland kerangas and highlighting their distinct role as a unique habitat within the landscape, given limited research on these forests and the resulting gaps in understanding the effects of human pressures and conservation measures. “Research into kerangas forest coverage in Kalimantan was inspired by our discovery of the Rungan forest landscape’s fascinating forest and exceptional conservation value,” Namrata Biligeri Anirudh, a Ph.D. ecologist from the University of Indonesia who is the paper’s lead author, told Mongabay in an email interview. A new study mapping lowland heath forests (kerangas) in Indonesian Borneo reveals major changes in their extent and limited formal protection. Image courtesy of Bernat Ripoll Capilla. Anirudh noted that the landscape was nestled between the Rungan and Kahayan rivers in Central Kalimantan, serving as home to an extraordinary variety of endangered plants and animals, thanks to its rare mix of heath forests on sandy soils, swamps, lowland forests and abundant Borneo ironwood (Eusideroxylon zwageri). “The fact that such a&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/study-maps-rare-borneo-forests-with-unique-habitats-urgent-need-for-protection/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/study-maps-rare-borneo-forests-with-unique-habitats-urgent-need-for-protection/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-304113</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Borneo killing linked to coal industry stays unsolved as Indonesia VP visits Dayak village</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/borneo-killing-linked-to-coal-industry-stays-unsolved-as-indonesia-vp-visits-dayak-village/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/borneo-killing-linked-to-coal-industry-stays-unsolved-as-indonesia-vp-visits-dayak-village/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>12 Aug 2025 02:22:22 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Muhibar Sobary Ardan]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/12110946/2dfdddc1-3bd4-4e37-bd5c-61c8a2a444c6-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=304049</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, East Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Coal, Conflict, Environment, Environmental Law, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Industry, Land Rights, Law, Law Enforcement, Mining, Murdered Activists, Politics, Rainforests, Tropical Forests, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MUARA KATE, Indonesia — More than eight months after the bloody killing of an Indigenous elder in eastern Borneo, police in Indonesia have yet to name a suspect, while community leaders in the country’s coal heartland continue to demand justice. “Our concern is that the problem hasn’t been resolved,” Yusuf, a community leader, told Mongabay [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MUARA KATE, Indonesia — More than eight months after the bloody killing of an Indigenous elder in eastern Borneo, police in Indonesia have yet to name a suspect, while community leaders in the country’s coal heartland continue to demand justice. “Our concern is that the problem hasn’t been resolved,” Yusuf, a community leader, told Mongabay in the hamlet of Muara Kate, in East Kalimantan province, following a visit by Indonesia’s vice president in June. Dayak elder Khahirnawati and Yusuf, her husband, explained the troubling chronology to Gibran Rakabuming Raka as Indonesia’s vice president sat cross-legged on the veranda of their home during the visit on June 14. Tensions in the community are running high because of the heavy coal trucks passing through from a nearby mine. In October last year, a coal truck failed to power its way up Mount Merangit, a short walk from the home of Khahirnawati and Yusuf. The truck stalled, rolled backward, and crushed a young motorcyclist behind it. The victim, named Veronika, was a trainee pastor with the Protestant Church of Western Indonesia (GPIB in Indonesian). She died at the scene. She had ordained in the church less than a year earlier. Yusuf recalled that none of the dozens of other coal trucks in the convoy had stopped at the scene. Instead, they drove past Veronika’s body, inflaming tensions further with the population in Muara Kate. Prosecutors in Paser district have filed criminal charges against the coal hauler. However, the local community took matters further&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/borneo-killing-linked-to-coal-industry-stays-unsolved-as-indonesia-vp-visits-dayak-village/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/borneo-killing-linked-to-coal-industry-stays-unsolved-as-indonesia-vp-visits-dayak-village/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-304049</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Study finds worrying uptick in proboscis monkey trade in Indonesia</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/study-finds-worrying-uptick-in-proboscis-monkey-trade-in-indonesia/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/study-finds-worrying-uptick-in-proboscis-monkey-trade-in-indonesia/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Jul 2025 17:47:53 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Spoorthy Raman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/07/18153442/proboscis-monkey-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=302807</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Brunei, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Malaysia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Bushmeat, Conservation, Deforestation, Endangered Species, Environmental Law, Forests, Fragmentation, Habitat Loss, Hunting, Illegal Trade, Mammals, Monkeys, Pet Trade, Poaching, Primates, Regulations, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[With its long, pendulous nose, characteristic pot belly and large size, the odd-looking, leaf-eating proboscis monkey (Nasalis larvatus) may not feature on the list of the world’s cutest animals. Yet, this endangered primate, a Borneo native living along rivers and swampy mangrove forests, seems to have gained newfound appeal in recent years in the international [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[With its long, pendulous nose, characteristic pot belly and large size, the odd-looking, leaf-eating proboscis monkey (Nasalis larvatus) may not feature on the list of the world’s cutest animals. Yet, this endangered primate, a Borneo native living along rivers and swampy mangrove forests, seems to have gained newfound appeal in recent years in the international wildlife trade, according to a study published in the journal Discover Animals. The researchers searched the internet for media reports of seizures, social media ads and legal trade data from CITES — the international wildlife trade agreement — relating to proboscis monkeys between 1999 and 2024. They found about a hundred individuals in the illegal trade, all from Indonesia. There was a marked uptick in the trade in the last decade, with nearly half of the individuals traded listed on social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. In addition, zoos in Indonesia were found to have increasingly acquired these monkeys since 2016, possibly from the wild. The researchers say this surge in trade could have repercussions for the conservation of this endangered species. Proboscis monkeys are legally protected in all three countries where they are found: Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia. It is illegal to keep, buy or sell them or their parts. The species is also listed on CITES Appendix I, which prohibits all international commercial trade, except for exchanges between zoos and for scientific research. While proboscis monkeys have been on study co-author Vincent Nijman’s radar since his Ph.D. research nearly three decades&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/study-finds-worrying-uptick-in-proboscis-monkey-trade-in-indonesia/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-302807</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Uniting plantations to save Bornean elephants: Interview with Farina Othman</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/uniting-plantations-to-save-bornean-elephants-interview-with-farina-othman/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/uniting-plantations-to-save-bornean-elephants-interview-with-farina-othman/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Jun 2025 14:34:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Lee Kwai Han]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Karen Coates]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/09170118/borneo-elephants-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=300428</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Sabah, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Animals, Biodiversity, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Conservation leadership, Deforestation, Elephants, Endangered Species, Environment, Fellows, Forests, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Human-wildlife Conflict, Interviews, Interviews with conservation players, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2006, Farina Othman heard a loud boom when she was observing a group of Bornean elephants in a forest in the Lower Kinabatangan area, one of the largest floodplains in Malaysia. She recognized that it was the sound from a bamboo cannon. It’s a type of homemade firecracker locals use to chase elephants away. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2006, Farina Othman heard a loud boom when she was observing a group of Bornean elephants in a forest in the Lower Kinabatangan area, one of the largest floodplains in Malaysia. She recognized that it was the sound from a bamboo cannon. It’s a type of homemade firecracker locals use to chase elephants away. At that time, she had just started her master’s studies, focusing on Bornean elephants (Elephas maximus borneensis). She felt humans were being unfair to the elephants. Determined to help, she decided to step in to be their voice. Today, only about 1,000 Bornean elephants remain in the wild, mainly in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. In 2024, the species was listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. The plight of the Bornean elephants began in the 1970s. Between 1973 and 2010, Sabah lost more than 52% of its lowland forest (below 500 meters, or 1,640 feet, above sea level) to logging. Many of these lands were later converted into oil palm plantations. For the Bornean elephants, more than half of their ideal habitat is gone. Othman, now in her early 40s, has become a Bornean elephant conservationist and teaches at Universiti Malaysia Sabah. She told Mongabay that habitat loss and fragmentation fuel human-elephant conflict. “They don&#8217;t want to live or share the landscape with the elephants,” Othman said of some local communities. Despite being protected by law, the elephants face retaliatory killings by gun or poison. Farina Othman, a Bornean elephant conservationist who&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/uniting-plantations-to-save-bornean-elephants-interview-with-farina-othman/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-300428</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia new capital yet to spark electricity for low-income neighbors on Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/indonesia-new-capital-yet-to-spark-electricity-for-low-income-neighbors-on-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/indonesia-new-capital-yet-to-spark-electricity-for-low-income-neighbors-on-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Jun 2025 02:41:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Niken D. Sitoningrum]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/04085838/Marwati-menunjukan-instalasi-listrik-sederhana-dari-yang-tersambung-dengan-panel-surya--768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=300168</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, East Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Cities, Coal, Development, Energy, Environment, Environmental Law, Governance, Law, Mining, Natural Resources, Politics, Resource Conflict, and Social Justice]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[RANGAN, Indonesia — Every night for three decades, Marwati would worry about snakes crawling out of the walls of her house near the east coast of Borneo. Today, a small rooftop solar panel powers a 3-watt bulb, illuminating the interior of her timber home in a reassuring glow. However, Marwati begins to worry again when [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[RANGAN, Indonesia — Every night for three decades, Marwati would worry about snakes crawling out of the walls of her house near the east coast of Borneo. Today, a small rooftop solar panel powers a 3-watt bulb, illuminating the interior of her timber home in a reassuring glow. However, Marwati begins to worry again when the sky darkens in November as the rainy season grows in intensity. “If there is no sun, it’ll be too dim,” she says, pointing to a small array of small flashlights at her home in Paser district, in Indonesia’s East Kalimantan province. “So for the night, we add flashlights.” Sometimes Marwati prioritizes buying batteries for the constellation of flashlights in her home ahead of groceries. Marwati is not alone. Data from the provincial energy department of East Kalimantan showed that 10% of households in Paser district did not have a formal electricity connection in 2022. Many households here query why the prosperity promised by the construction of Indonesia’s new capital city, Nusantara, which is being built 140 kilometers (87 miles) up the road, has yet to trickle down to basic services like electricity. Moreover, Paser is among the highest-ranking districts for coal output in a country that produced 831 million metric tons of thermal coal in 2024, an all-time high. Last month, the Indonesian ministry for villages and remote communities told parliament that 3,264 villages across the archipelagic country had yet to receive electricity access. “If there’s no electricity,” Taufik Madjid, the ministry’s secretary-general, asked a parliamentary&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/indonesia-new-capital-yet-to-spark-electricity-for-low-income-neighbors-on-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-300168</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>After years of silence, Indonesia moves to assess its iconic wildlife</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/after-years-of-silence-indonesia-moves-to-assess-its-iconic-wildlife/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/after-years-of-silence-indonesia-moves-to-assess-its-iconic-wildlife/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>29 May 2025 16:40:32 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Dyna Rochmyaningsih]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/29072153/javan-gibbon-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=299844</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Java, Kalimantan, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, data, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Forests, Governance, Mammals, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Surveying, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia, one of the most biodiverse nations on Earth, appears to be gearing up to renew official estimates of its remaining wildlife populations, following nearly two decades without official updates on the status of some key species. With a new forestry minister, Raja Juli Antoni, appointed in October 2024 under President Prabowo Subianto, scientists say [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia, one of the most biodiverse nations on Earth, appears to be gearing up to renew official estimates of its remaining wildlife populations, following nearly two decades without official updates on the status of some key species. With a new forestry minister, Raja Juli Antoni, appointed in October 2024 under President Prabowo Subianto, scientists say they hope the initiatives signal a more open and transparent approach to conservation in the country. A change in tone would be a welcome shift from the previous forestry administration, led by Siti Nurbaya Bakar, whose era was marked with data censorship and a tight grip over conservation organizations. On Jan. 31, dozens of national park managers, heads of provincial conservation offices, NGO workers, and academics across the country joined an online meeting organized by the Ministry of Forestry’s conservation directorate-general. At the meeting, the director-general, Satyawan Pudyatmoko, urged the attendees to “work together” to initiate wildlife population surveys and conduct the latest population and habitat viability analyses (PHVA) for some iconic species. Both efforts, he said, are “the current priorities of Indonesia’s conservation.” “Oftentimes, conservation actions that are not based in science, only common sense, are not effective and wastes of money,” said Satyawan, a conservation scientist himself, who has held his current role since 2023. Population surveys provide the raw data used for PHVA computer modeling, which aims to assess how certain species could survive under multiple scenarios in the future. This information, in turn, is crucial in developing species conservation strategies and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/after-years-of-silence-indonesia-moves-to-assess-its-iconic-wildlife/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-299844</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Borneo project hopes to prove that forests and oil palms can coexist</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/borneo-project-hopes-to-prove-that-forests-and-oil-palms-can-coexist/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/borneo-project-hopes-to-prove-that-forests-and-oil-palms-can-coexist/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 May 2025 00:50:33 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Louise Hunt]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/14235348/RIV_0908-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=299033</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Agroecology, Agroforestry, Ecosystems, Elephants, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Green, Habitat, Industrial Agriculture, Landscape Restoration, Palm Oil, Plantations, Primates, Rainforests, Reforestation, Restoration, Soil Carbon, Trees, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Kinabatangan River is the last major area in Malaysian Borneo’s Sabah state with a semblance of forest corridor linking the interior rainforest with mangroves on the east coast, according to Marc Ancrenaz, scientific director of Sabah-based NGO Hutan. It’s a hub for biodiversity, with orangutans, proboscis monkeys and pygmy elephants among the threatened species [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Kinabatangan River is the last major area in Malaysian Borneo’s Sabah state with a semblance of forest corridor linking the interior rainforest with mangroves on the east coast, according to Marc Ancrenaz, scientific director of Sabah-based NGO Hutan. It’s a hub for biodiversity, with orangutans, proboscis monkeys and pygmy elephants among the threatened species that dwell there. But most of the floodplain has been converted to agriculture, mainly oil palm, leaving a “very fragmented, very degraded,” landscape, Ancrenaz says. “We still have about 50,000 hectares [124,000 acres] of protected forest on both sides of the river, but they are isolated from one another, so a lot of wildlife is stuck in these forest islands. Unfortunately, they are not enough to sustain viable populations of orangutan and other species,” says Ancrenaz, who co-founded the community-based environmental NGO with Isabelle Lackman 30 years ago with a mission to conserve Borneo’s iconic wildlife. At 560 kilometers (350 miles), the Kinabatangan is Malaysia&#8217;s second-longest river. Image by Alain Rival/TRAILS Monoculture oil palm plantations expanded rapidly in Malaysia and Indonesia in recent decades. While they’ve been a commercial success, the large-scale deforestation of rainforest and peatlands that they’ve wrought has damaged biodiversity and ecosystems. “We know we need to diversify this landscape. So far, the oil palm industry views other trees as competitors, that’s why they go for monoculture,” Ancrenaz says. But this mindset is starting to shift, as agroforestry, in which crops and livestock are grown among native trees and shrubs, is gaining&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/borneo-project-hopes-to-prove-that-forests-and-oil-palms-can-coexist/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-299033</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In Borneo village, Indigenous Dayaks leave farming amid stricter fire rules</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/in-borneo-village-indigenous-dayaks-leave-farming-amid-stricter-fire-rules/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/in-borneo-village-indigenous-dayaks-leave-farming-amid-stricter-fire-rules/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 Apr 2025 03:59:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rendy Tisna]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/22123507/borneo-Dayak-fire-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=297993</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Conflict, Culture, Environment, Environmental Law, Farming, Fires, Food, food security, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Law, Law Enforcement, Regulations, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MANTANGAI, Indonesia — The last time Remie recalled a good harvest season here in Central Kalimantan province was in 2018, when 20-liter bags of rice seed were piled against the walls. “The house was full back then,” Remie told Mongabay Indonesia. “We packed almost 100 bags of seeds in here.” Today it is increasingly difficult [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MANTANGAI, Indonesia — The last time Remie recalled a good harvest season here in Central Kalimantan province was in 2018, when 20-liter bags of rice seed were piled against the walls. “The house was full back then,” Remie told Mongabay Indonesia. “We packed almost 100 bags of seeds in here.” Today it is increasingly difficult for Indigenous Dayak farmers like Remie to procure seeds around Mantangai subdistrict, near the banks of the Kapuas River. The price for a 20-l (5.3-gallon) sack of rice seed has bulged to around 300,000 rupiah ($18). Instead of growing food for his family, Remie now earns a small cash wage from rummaging around the landscape collecting galam, a durable wood from the cajuput tree (Melaleuca cajuputi) used in basic construction. The 46-year-old says the blame lies mainly with an environmental and public health policy introduced a decade ago by then-President Joko Widodo, known as Jokowi. Between May and October in 2015, an unrelenting dry season fueled by the El Niño climate pattern led to fires on 2.6 million hectares (6.4 million acres) of peatlands and mineral soils. One study estimated that the resulting air pollution blanketing Borneo and Sumatra Islands would lead to 100,000 premature deaths. In the embers of that 2015 Southeast Asia wildfire crisis, Jokowi drew up Presidential Instruction No. 11 to harden existing rules against the burning of biomass. The policy ignited a police crackdown against smallholder farmers starting fires to clear forests for planting. However, a large number of farmers were also detained&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/in-borneo-village-indigenous-dayaks-leave-farming-amid-stricter-fire-rules/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-297993</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Action plan aims to save Asia’s leaf-eating monkeys amid ‘alarming’ declines</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/action-plan-aims-to-save-asias-leaf-eating-monkeys-amid-alarming-declines/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/action-plan-aims-to-save-asias-leaf-eating-monkeys-amid-alarming-declines/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Apr 2025 14:42:34 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Carolyn Cowan]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/15130428/Image-2_Raffles_-banded-langur-Credit-Andie-Ang-e1744727879673-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=297655</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Thailand]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Bushmeat, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Deforestation, Endangered Species, Extinction, Forests, Fragmentation, Green, Habitat Loss, Hunting, Law Enforcement, Mammals, Monkeys, Pet Trade, Poaching, Primates, Traditional Medicine, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Primatologists and conservation organizations have launched a 10-year action plan to improve the outlook for langur monkeys in the Sundaland biodiversity hotspot, a region of Southeast Asia that spans Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Thailand. Asian langurs, a group of 20 species in the genus Presbytis, are in steep decline across Southeast Asia due [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Primatologists and conservation organizations have launched a 10-year action plan to improve the outlook for langur monkeys in the Sundaland biodiversity hotspot, a region of Southeast Asia that spans Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Thailand. Asian langurs, a group of 20 species in the genus Presbytis, are in steep decline across Southeast Asia due to habitat loss, hunting and retaliatory killings triggered by crop-raiding conflicts, said action plan co-author Andie Ang, a researcher at Singapore-based Mandai Nature. The medium-size arboreal monkeys face particularly severe pressure in the Sundaland region, she noted. “Sundaland has among the world’s highest deforestation rates: over 50% of forest cover [has] been lost since 1970, fragmenting langur habitats,” Ang, who is also deputy chair of the primate specialist group at the IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority and part of the consortium behind the plan, told Mongabay. As the first ever conservation framework targeting an entire genus of threatened monkeys in Asia, Ang said the new plan will help to make the most of limited conservation resources. “By focusing on Sundaland — a region of both crisis and opportunity — the plan maximizes impact for langurs and ecosystems alike,” she said. The drivers of forest loss vary across the Sundaland region, from expansion of oil palm monoculture in Borneo, to road construction, urban encroachment and forest fires in Sumatra. The impacts on langur numbers have been just as devastating. According to the IUCN Red List, 24 of the 28 types of langur found across Sundaland&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/action-plan-aims-to-save-asias-leaf-eating-monkeys-amid-alarming-declines/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-297655</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘Heart of Borneo’ dams raze Indigenous forests for Indonesia green energy drive</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/heart-of-borneo-dams-raze-indigenous-forests-for-indonesia-green-energy-drive/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/heart-of-borneo-dams-raze-indigenous-forests-for-indonesia-green-energy-drive/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>14 Apr 2025 02:58:52 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Abdallah Naem]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/10070020/presbytis-rubicunda-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=297368</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, North Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Dams, Deforestation, Energy, Environment, Forests, Governance, Hydroelectric Power, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Renewable Energy, Threats To Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MALINAU, Indonesia — Indonesia is pressing ahead with construction of a new network of dams in Borneo to power a major “green” industrial estate that will relocate Indigenous communities and cut into one of Asia’s largest stretches of intact rainforest. “Finding fish and animals has already become difficult,” Yusmarang, a member of North Kalimantan’s Punan [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MALINAU, Indonesia — Indonesia is pressing ahead with construction of a new network of dams in Borneo to power a major “green” industrial estate that will relocate Indigenous communities and cut into one of Asia’s largest stretches of intact rainforest. “Finding fish and animals has already become difficult,” Yusmarang, a member of North Kalimantan’s Punan Indigenous community, told Mongabay Indonesia. Last year, Mongabay reported from Malinau district, near Indonesia’s border with Malaysia, on efforts by PT Malinau Hijau Lestari to deforest thousands of hectares to grow biomass for coal-fired power plants. Indonesia’s central government is also forging ahead with plans to construct five dams along three rivers in North Kalimantan province as part of Southeast Asia’s largest hydroelectric project. The cost of the cascade is estimated at more than $20 billion. Then-president Joko Widodo attended a ceremony in 2023 to mark the beginning of the Mentarang Induk Dam. Another dam planned in Bulungan district on the Kayan River will flood two villages, Long Leju and Long Peleban. On completion of the final stage, which is scheduled for 2035, the five combined units could yield a generation capacity of 9,000 megawatts. This cascade of dams through the old-growth forests of northern Borneo will power a vast new industrial estate that authorities in Jakarta consider of strategic importance for Indonesia. The government says it hopes the Kalimantan Industrial Park Indonesia (KIPI) estate will be the largest “green industrial area” in the world. “The industrial park, which covers an area of 13,000 hectares&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/heart-of-borneo-dams-raze-indigenous-forests-for-indonesia-green-energy-drive/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/heart-of-borneo-dams-raze-indigenous-forests-for-indonesia-green-energy-drive/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-297368</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous Dayak community makes strides on Borneo toward forest autonomy</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/indigenous-dayak-community-makes-strides-on-borneo-toward-forest-autonomy/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/indigenous-dayak-community-makes-strides-on-borneo-toward-forest-autonomy/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Feb 2025 04:55:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Aseanty Pahlevi]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/02/21112034/Narsum-pemuda-Ignatius-Tondi--768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=294823</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conflict, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Use Change, Rainforests, Rivers, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, Sustainable Forest Management, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MEKAR RAYA, Indonesia — Yulius Yogi kneels under the forest canopy here on the island of Borneo, surveying land he plans to reclaim for his Dayak Simpan Indigenous community. “Our ancestors safeguarded [the forest], now it’s our responsibility to look after it,” Yulius, 35, told Mongabay Indonesia on the outskirts of Mekar Raya village, in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MEKAR RAYA, Indonesia — Yulius Yogi kneels under the forest canopy here on the island of Borneo, surveying land he plans to reclaim for his Dayak Simpan Indigenous community. “Our ancestors safeguarded [the forest], now it’s our responsibility to look after it,” Yulius, 35, told Mongabay Indonesia on the outskirts of Mekar Raya village, in Ketapang district, West Kalimantan province. As leader of the local forest management institute, a village-level institution in Indonesia’s heavily decentralized political framework, Yulius is responsible for drafting a forest management proposal to the central government in Jakarta. That application requires merging centuries-old customary traditions, regulated by Dayak elders, with the rules of the modern state introduced after Indonesia declared independence in 1945. Here in Mekar Raya, a successful petition could entail the handover of up to 2,000 hectares (5,000 acres) of forest upland, bisected by rivers the Dayak consider protected by a higher authority. In August last year, then-forestry minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar said Indonesia’s community forestry program had so far transferred more than 8 million hectares (20 million acres) for local leases (hutan desa), and in some cases Indigenous control (hutan adat), comparable to a sort of communal freehold. These two categories of rural devolution had reached 1.4 million families by August last year, the minister said. In May 2020, the forestry ministry authorized a 9,480-hectare (23,426-acre) hutan adat forest to the Dayak Iban community in the north of Indonesian Borneo. That was the largest award to an Indigenous community at the time, spurring&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/indigenous-dayak-community-makes-strides-on-borneo-toward-forest-autonomy/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-294823</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>NGOs raise concerns over Borneo pilot of ‘jurisdictional’ certification for palm oil</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/01/ngos-raise-concerns-over-borneo-pilot-of-jurisdictional-certification-for-palm-oil/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/01/ngos-raise-concerns-over-borneo-pilot-of-jurisdictional-certification-for-palm-oil/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Jan 2025 05:01:22 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rendy Tisna]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/01/08080918/oil-palm-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=292722</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Business, Certification, Community-based Conservation, Conflict, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporations, Environment, Farming, Industrial Agriculture, Industry, Jurisdictional Approaches, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Law, NGOs, Palm Oil, Plantations, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — In October 2023 in the Indigenous Dayak village of Bangkal, Indonesian police fired on farmers demonstrating against PT Hamparan Masawit Bangun Persada (HMBP), a palm oil plantation company owned by Indonesia’s BEST Group. “Without any trigger from the protesters, the security forces shot tear gas and bullets from firearms,” Bayu Herinata, director [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — In October 2023 in the Indigenous Dayak village of Bangkal, Indonesian police fired on farmers demonstrating against PT Hamparan Masawit Bangun Persada (HMBP), a palm oil plantation company owned by Indonesia’s BEST Group. “Without any trigger from the protesters, the security forces shot tear gas and bullets from firearms,” Bayu Herinata, director of the Central Kalimantan provincial chapter of the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), an NGO, told Mongabay at the time. The farmers in Bangkal, located in the Central Kalimantan district of Seruyan, had taken to the streets to press the firm to release 20% of its land concession to local farmers, as many plantations are required to do by law. The demonstrators maintained that the BEST Group subsidiary had neglected to fulfill its legal obligation to smallholders under a required profit-sharing scheme known as “plasma.” One person from Bangkal, named Gijik, was shot dead during the protest, Mongabay reported last year. Now, civil society researchers worry that such conflicts, which are numerous in Indonesia, could be papered over by a proposed change to the way the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the main global body certifying palm oil as responsibly produced, assesses supply chains for compliance. Normally, the RSPO certifies palm oil produced by a single company, which can then sell it for a premium. Under the new methodology, the RSPO would vet the environmental and social credentials of an entire jurisdiction, like a province or a district, treating it as a single&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/01/ngos-raise-concerns-over-borneo-pilot-of-jurisdictional-certification-for-palm-oil/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-292722</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Study shows, via clouded leopards, how to better protect forests</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/study-shows-via-clouded-leopards-how-to-better-protect-forests/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/study-shows-via-clouded-leopards-how-to-better-protect-forests/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Nov 2024 08:24:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Carolyn Cowan]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/11/08081435/Camera_trap_A.J.-Hearn-and-WildCRU-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=289866</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Big Cats, Biodiversity, Cats, Conservation, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Endangered Species, Environment, Forest Fragmentation, Forests, Green, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Infrastructure, Predators, and Protected Areas]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Protected areas are intended to protect the species and habitats they contain. When well-managed, they can result in clean water, healthy soils, and reduced poaching pressure, all of which can spill over to nourish and replenish surrounding areas. But new research from Borneo suggests we could improve the performance of these sanctuaries of life by [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Protected areas are intended to protect the species and habitats they contain. When well-managed, they can result in clean water, healthy soils, and reduced poaching pressure, all of which can spill over to nourish and replenish surrounding areas. But new research from Borneo suggests we could improve the performance of these sanctuaries of life by better selecting where to locate them in the first place. Focusing protection efforts in forest areas with not only high biodiversity but also high risk of development could significantly improve conservation outcomes for key measures of biodiversity, according to the study. It used the Sunda clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi), a wildcat about the size of a medium dog, as a proxy for these measures. Such an “assertive” approach to protected area design is becoming a matter of urgency in Borneo, where studies show that massive infrastructure projects underway will significantly erode core habitats for clouded leopards, even inside existing protected areas. However, this recommended strategy stands in stark contrast to prevailing practices the world over. Multiple studies show that, globally, protected areas are typically situated in rugged and remote landscapes that are safeguarded more by their inaccessibility to development, rather than by proactive conservation planning. The concentration of conservation efforts in areas with few competing interests could risk overlooking more development-prone, but nonetheless ecologically valuable, areas. “We risk using our limited attention, social capital, financial capital to do stuff that is not in fact advancing the protection of nature (or, at least, is doing less&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/study-shows-via-clouded-leopards-how-to-better-protect-forests/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-289866</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>NGOs, officials trade blame as Malaysian forest conservation project is scrapped</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/ngos-officials-trade-blame-as-malaysian-forest-conservation-project-is-scrapped/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/ngos-officials-trade-blame-as-malaysian-forest-conservation-project-is-scrapped/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Oct 2024 16:39:35 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Danielle Keeton-Olsen]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/10/30133903/timber-sarawak-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=289439</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Forest Trackers]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Sarawak, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Logging, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[With an internationally backed project to protect core forest in Malaysia’s Sarawak state now quashed at the request of the state’s forest department, both NGOs and Sarawak forestry officials cite difficulties working together on what was pitched as a collaborative project. The project, one of two operated in the region by the International Tropical Timber [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[With an internationally backed project to protect core forest in Malaysia’s Sarawak state now quashed at the request of the state’s forest department, both NGOs and Sarawak forestry officials cite difficulties working together on what was pitched as a collaborative project. The project, one of two operated in the region by the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO), aimed to protect 283,500 hectares (about 700,500 acres) of land in the Upper Baram Forest Area, an area encompassing 79,000 hectares (about 195,000 acres) of primary forest as well as more than 20 villages of four different Indigenous ethnicities. Its $1.3 million budget would have been primarily supported by the Malaysian government, with the remaining $556,885 coming from the government of Japan, the Bruno Manser Fonds (BMF), a Swiss NGO, and the government of the Swiss canton of Basel. The Sarawak government told the ITTO that it would “endeavour to seek alternative funding to complete the implementation of this project,” said ITTO executive director Sheam Satkuru. There’s still one active ITTO project in the Upper Baram Forest Area supporting forest management training and landscape restoration, but that project, valued at $479,500, is scheduled to end in November, Satkuru said. Rainforest in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. A new timber concession A key point of contention between the government and NGOs is the existence of an active timber concession within the Upper Baram Forest Area (UBFA). Sarawak officials say planning for the ITTO project always accounted for the existence of this&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/ngos-officials-trade-blame-as-malaysian-forest-conservation-project-is-scrapped/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-289439</doi>				</item>
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