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		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
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	<title>Pacific Islands environmental news</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/pacific-islands/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Nations at southern bluefin tuna meeting stop short of adopting new seabird protections</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Oct 2026 10:17:25 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/10/15063719/6_B_Wandering_albatrosses_South_Georgia_Jamie_Latimer-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=332681</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Arctic Ocean, Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Belgium, East Asia, Europe, Global, Indian Ocean, Japan, New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, Polynesia, Southern Ocean, and Taiwan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Bycatch, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Saltwater Fish, Seabirds, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Seabird protections drew debate at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), held Oct. 5-8 in Brussels. The eight-member multilateral body that manages the stock has long struggled to curb seabird deaths caused by longline fishing targeting southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii) across several oceans. This year’s meeting [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Seabird protections drew debate at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), held Oct. 5-8 in Brussels. The eight-member multilateral body that manages the stock has long struggled to curb seabird deaths caused by longline fishing targeting southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii) across several oceans. This year’s meeting saw a modicum of progress on the issue. Based on recent modeling, the parties agreed on 13 priority seabird species for conservation efforts and designated high-risk areas for them. However, the designations don’t carry any new mandatory protections: Due to the reluctance of some members, the commission stopped short of adopting proposed conservation measures for the high-risk areas, most notably tighter seabird bycatch mitigation requirements. Oliver Yates, head of the marine program at BirdLife International, a U.K.-based NGO, told Mongabay that the identification of high-risk areas was “a good step forward” but said it was a problem that “they&#8217;ve not then adopted any management action to accompany the fishing activity in those spatial areas.” “[T]hey recognise bycatch of seabirds is a very serious issue but again agreed to do nothing about it,” Yates, who attended the Brussels meeting, added in a text message. There are more than a dozen RFMOs in the world, with some overlapping geographically but managing different fish stocks. The map shows the five best-known and most commercially important RFMOs, which focus on tuna and tuna-like species. Image courtesy of Pew Charitable Trusts. Sources: U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO Map Catalog.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-332681</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New Zealand builds an arsenal of tools to battle a ‘wily’ invasive seaweed</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/new-zealand-builds-an-arsenal-of-tools-to-battle-a-wily-invasive-seaweed/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/new-zealand-builds-an-arsenal-of-tools-to-battle-a-wily-invasive-seaweed/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Oct 2026 17:16:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/10/13102020/12_B_Advanced_Aquarium_Technologies_NZ_smaller_UV_C_Craig_Thorburn-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=332391</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Marine, Oceans, Plants, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BAY OF ISLANDS, Aotearoa New Zealand — Since an invasive seaweed called caulerpa was discovered in Aotearoa New Zealand in 2021, forming meadows that blanketed parts of the seabed, it’s taken on an almost mythical status among people who spend time in coastal waters. “It’s so wily and so resilient,” Michele Rogalin-Henderson, a doctoral candidate [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BAY OF ISLANDS, Aotearoa New Zealand — Since an invasive seaweed called caulerpa was discovered in Aotearoa New Zealand in 2021, forming meadows that blanketed parts of the seabed, it’s taken on an almost mythical status among people who spend time in coastal waters. “It’s so wily and so resilient,” Michele Rogalin-Henderson, a doctoral candidate at the University of Auckland’s Institute of Marine Science, told Mongabay. “Yes, I did say wily,” she added. “I anthropomorphize it. I spend a lot of time in the lab and in the field with this beast.” Stephen Te Tai, a commercial diver who removes the caulerpa, mainly in the Bay of Islands area in New Zealand’s tropical far north, also spoke about the invasive seaweed in such terms. “I know it&#8217;s airy fairy but sometimes I feel its energy,” Te Tai told Mongabay. In winter, he said, “it&#8217;s real low, it&#8217;s almost cowering, but in the summertime, it feels like its chest is puffed out, and it&#8217;s real vibrant and strong.” Te Tai is Ngāti Hine, a Māori tribal grouping, and his surname means “coast” or “tide” in Māori. He spoke to Mongabay on the shoreline after he’d worked in the waters off Urupukapuka Island one day in July. “The moana [ocean] is vital to our people,” he later added in a text message. “It is not just something that nourishes us, it is a part of us, it was a part of our ancestors and it will be part of our mokopuna [descendants].&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/new-zealand-builds-an-arsenal-of-tools-to-battle-a-wily-invasive-seaweed/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/new-zealand-builds-an-arsenal-of-tools-to-battle-a-wily-invasive-seaweed/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-332391</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>As yellow-eyed penguins disappear, conservationists focus on deaths in fishing nets</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/as-yellow-eyed-penguins-disappear-conservationists-focus-on-deaths-in-fishing-nets/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/as-yellow-eyed-penguins-disappear-conservationists-focus-on-deaths-in-fishing-nets/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Sep 2026 16:57:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/09/28113111/12-A-yellow-eyed-penguin-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=331013</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Conservation, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Fishing, Governance, Islands, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Penguins, Seabirds, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[OTAGO PENINSULA, Aotearoa New Zealand — Sandfly Bay was long a key nesting area for yellow-eyed penguins (Megadyptes antipodes), noisy, pink-footed birds that spend long days foraging at sea. But this wild beach on the Otago Peninsula, like others nearby, has gone quiet. In 2024, the last breeding-age female at Sandfly Bay, who’d been consistently [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[OTAGO PENINSULA, Aotearoa New Zealand — Sandfly Bay was long a key nesting area for yellow-eyed penguins (Megadyptes antipodes), noisy, pink-footed birds that spend long days foraging at sea. But this wild beach on the Otago Peninsula, like others nearby, has gone quiet. In 2024, the last breeding-age female at Sandfly Bay, who’d been consistently producing chicks for a dozen years, drowned in a fishing net. Fishing has been one of many factors driving the species, which is only found in Aotearoa New Zealand, toward extinction. In the 2008-2009 breeding season, there were 739 breeding pairs in the “mainland” New Zealand population, which includes pairs on nearby islands. But the population has dropped since then to 117 pairs — a decline of more than 80%. These figures don’t account for yellow-eyed penguins on New Zealand’s remote southern islands, which are poorly surveyed. The IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority, listed the species as endangered in its last assessment, in 2020, when the mainland population was still twice what it is now. Several experts told Mongabay that the species’ chances of survival are slim, though most said they still had faith. “I think I’d always like to say that there’s hope because otherwise why do you do what you do, but things are pretty dire,” Trudi Webster, a marine scientist who’s worked on research and conservation of the species for the past decade, told Mongabay. A number of organizations are working to save the yellow-eyed penguin, and much of the conservation&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/as-yellow-eyed-penguins-disappear-conservationists-focus-on-deaths-in-fishing-nets/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-331013</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New Zealand put fishing boats under camera surveillance. Will it stay the course?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/new-zealand-put-fishing-boats-under-camera-surveillance-will-it-stay-the-course/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/new-zealand-put-fishing-boats-under-camera-surveillance-will-it-stay-the-course/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Sep 2026 14:59:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/09/09073936/6-Fishing-vessels-in-Dunedin-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=329241</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[cameras, Conservation, Environment, Fisheries, Fishing, Marine, Marine Conservation, Monitoring, Oceans, and Technology]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[NAPIER/DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — In 2016, a scandal engulfed Aotearoa New Zealand’s fisheries regulator. Leaked documents showed that the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) had found, during investigative operations conducted in prior years, systematic illegal discarding of low-value fish as well as other violations, such as failing to report the catch of an endangered [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[NAPIER/DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — In 2016, a scandal engulfed Aotearoa New Zealand’s fisheries regulator. Leaked documents showed that the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) had found, during investigative operations conducted in prior years, systematic illegal discarding of low-value fish as well as other violations, such as failing to report the catch of an endangered Hector’s dolphin (Cephalorhynchus hectori), on commercial vessels off the South Island — and elected not to prosecute or inform the public of the findings. The controversy raised a question that conservationists the world over have long asked about commercial fishing: what’s happening on vessels when no one is watching? In the years since, the MPI has mandated onboard cameras across most of the country’s inshore fleet, which operates close to the coast, alongside other forms of electronic monitoring. The rollout, aimed at monitoring catch, discards, protected species interactions, and the use of mitigation devices, has put New Zealand near the leading edge internationally in the use of onboard cameras. This comes as fisheries managers across the world are discussing the use of electronic monitoring as a complement to, or even an imperfect substitute for, the onboard work of fisheries observers, who collect scientific data and report on compliance with rules. Yet electronic monitoring has its detractors, including even Shane Jones, the politician who oversees Fisheries New Zealand (FNZ), a branch of the MPI. He took office following a 2023 general election, after the camera system rollout was already underway, as a member of the conservative&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/new-zealand-put-fishing-boats-under-camera-surveillance-will-it-stay-the-course/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-329241</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Local knowledge guides rediscovery of spinach pipefish, not seen in four decades</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/local-knowledge-guides-rediscovery-of-spinach-pipefish-not-seen-in-four-decades/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/local-knowledge-guides-rediscovery-of-spinach-pipefish-not-seen-in-four-decades/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 Aug 2026 17:19:23 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Spoorthy Raman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sharon Guynup]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/24155007/Spinach_Pipefish_iv_%C2%A9_New_Guinea_Binatang_Research_Center_edit-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=327148</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Melanesia, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Papua New Guinea]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Biology, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Freshwater, Freshwater Fish, Indigenous Peoples, Rediscovered Species, Species, Surveying, Traditional Knowledge, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[By mid-June, Jerrica Agebigo was staring at disappointment. Her nearly two-week-long, exhausting search for a mysterious fish that hasn’t been seen by scientists for nearly four decades was drawing to a close. Her team of researchers had braved Papua New Guinea’s hot, humid summer days, meandering along the Sepik River’s course by boat and canoe [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[By mid-June, Jerrica Agebigo was staring at disappointment. Her nearly two-week-long, exhausting search for a mysterious fish that hasn’t been seen by scientists for nearly four decades was drawing to a close. Her team of researchers had braved Papua New Guinea’s hot, humid summer days, meandering along the Sepik River’s course by boat and canoe — but the spinach pipefish still eluded them. “We had spent days travelling through the Lower Sepik, talking with communities and looking for information about the pipefish,” Agebigo, a researcher at the Papua New Guinea University of Technology and the New Guinea Binatang Research Centre, wrote in an email. “We had almost given up hope.” The spinach pipefish (Microphis spinachioides) is a small, slender pipefish with an elongated snout it uses to capture small prey, reaching maybe 15 centimeters (6 inches) in length. This greenish-brown freshwater creature, a close relative of seahorses and seadragons, is well camouflaged in its only known home here in the Sepik River — the country’s longest waterway — hiding among water lilies and other plants near riverbanks. Just like seahorses, pipefish males carry their embryos in a brood pouch for weeks until the young are born. Much about the spinach pipefish has remained an enigma, because scientists haven’t seen it since 1985. It was last assessed for the IUCN Red List in 2016, and at the time, was classified as data deficient by IUCN, the global conservation authority. The only known museum specimen, on which the taxonomy of the species&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/local-knowledge-guides-rediscovery-of-spinach-pipefish-not-seen-in-four-decades/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-327148</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New Zealand opens marine reserves with groundbreaking Māori co-management model</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Aug 2026 14:48:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18170638/2-Members-of-the-Kai-Tahu-marine-ranger-team-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326516</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Conservation leadership, Culture, Environment, Governance, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Hope and optimism, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Law, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, Protected Areas, and Solutions]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — At a U.N. meeting in 2015, Aotearoa New Zealand’s then Prime Minister John Key made a major announcement that drew praise from international conservation groups: His administration would turn a swath of waters far larger than the country’s land mass into a marine protected area (MPA). The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[DUNEDIN, Aotearoa New Zealand — At a U.N. meeting in 2015, Aotearoa New Zealand’s then Prime Minister John Key made a major announcement that drew praise from international conservation groups: His administration would turn a swath of waters far larger than the country’s land mass into a marine protected area (MPA). The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary, planned for New Zealand’s northern waters, would have been one of the largest fully no-take MPAs in the world, but the sanctuary violated Māori fishing rights enshrined decades earlier. Key’s government had done relatively little to consult with Māori groups about the proposal, many of whom resisted the plan, calling for more recognition of their authority and their role in ocean governance. The sanctuary plan fell through. Yet, even as Key’s top-down exercise drew criticism, a more bottom-up approach to marine governance was underway in the country’s far southeast. There, Māori leaders helped develop a network of small MPAs, five of which became official on July 1, 2026, after more than a decade of grassroots and governmental work. A key aim is to protect seabed habitats, offshore canyons, rocky reefs, tidal lagoons and kelp forests. The network, called Te Au Roa o Te Rakihouia, is co-managed by the regional Māori tribe Kāi Tahu (Ngāi Tahu in standard Māori), and the Department of Conservation. The reserves are the first in the country to be co-managed by Indigenous people and the government using shared decision-making and a joint marine ranger team. The network name refers to the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-zealand-opens-marine-reserves-with-groundbreaking-maori-co-management-model/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326516</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New ‘conservation deed’ aims to protect tree kangaroos, forests, people in Papua New Guinea</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-conservation-deed-aims-to-protect-tree-kangaroos-forests-people-in-papua-new-guinea/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-conservation-deed-aims-to-protect-tree-kangaroos-forests-people-in-papua-new-guinea/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Aug 2026 03:56:42 +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/20/2026/08/03125116/weimang-tree-kangaroo-Dendrolagus-pulcherrimus-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=325195</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Melanesia, Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Papua New Guinea]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Law, Mammals, Marsupials, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, Tropical Deforestation, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[It happened with a few strokes of a pen on a hilltop in northwestern Papua New Guinea on June 30: The leaders of the Tenkile Conservation Alliance (TCA) finalized an agreement to protect the densely canopied forests of the Torricelli Mountains that ripple outward in every direction. Their signatures were the last of hundreds collected [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[It happened with a few strokes of a pen on a hilltop in northwestern Papua New Guinea on June 30: The leaders of the Tenkile Conservation Alliance (TCA) finalized an agreement to protect the densely canopied forests of the Torricelli Mountains that ripple outward in every direction. Their signatures were the last of hundreds collected from clan leaders across the range in June. With this conservation deed, TCA and the people of the Torricellis have achieved a key milestone after decades of work to stave off logging, help wildlife rebound and improve the lives of community members. After the signing, those gathered erupted in celebration, dance and song at TCA’s base in the village of Lumi. In all, 266 clan leaders signed the document. Caleb Bulu, a project manager with TCA, called it an “exciting time.” “We have been waiting for so long,” said Bulu, who has fought to keep loggers off his own land in the region. The people of the Torricelli Mountains were ecstatic, he said in a call via WhatsApp a few days after the signing. “They were very happy, all across the 41 villages [and] were celebrating at that time.” The Torricellis are home to a staggering array of species — perhaps 4% of the world’s biodiversity in a relatively tiny speck of mostly intact montane forest — including two species of critically endangered tree kangaroo. In the 1990s, mammologist Tim Flannery and his colleagues in PNG first described the tenkile (Dendrolagus scottae) and the weimang&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/new-conservation-deed-aims-to-protect-tree-kangaroos-forests-people-in-papua-new-guinea/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-325195</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Coral reef experts press on, with climate looming over international conference</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/coral-reef-experts-press-on-with-climate-looming-over-international-conference/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/coral-reef-experts-press-on-with-climate-looming-over-international-conference/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>31 Jul 2026 18:34:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/31142917/8-conference-attendee-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=325038</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global and New Zealand]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Biodiversity, Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Coral Bleaching, Coral Reefs, Environment, Environmental Policy, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Impact Of Climate Change, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[AUCKLAND — Lest anyone think scientific conferences must be staid affairs, the International Coral Reefs Symposium closed with inspiration from none other than U.S. rap metal band Rage Against the Machine, known for revolutionary lyrics in the 1990s: “It has to start somewhere. It has to start sometime. What better place than here? What better [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
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							<![CDATA[AUCKLAND — Lest anyone think scientific conferences must be staid affairs, the International Coral Reefs Symposium closed with inspiration from none other than U.S. rap metal band Rage Against the Machine, known for revolutionary lyrics in the 1990s: “It has to start somewhere. It has to start sometime. What better place than here? What better time than now? All hell can&#8217;t stop us now!” Christian Voolstra, a professor at the University of Konstanz in Germany and president of the International Coral Reef Society (ICRS), which organizes the conference, choked up as he read those lyrics at the closing ceremony, as did this reporter. Reflections on how conference participants could address the many threats to coral reefs, including seas that are becoming hotter and more acidic due to climate change, had punctuated the program of more narrowly focused presentations on research and conservation practice during the conference, held July 19-24 in Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand. This 16th iteration of the conference, which takes place every four years, drew more than 2,100 participants from more than 90 countries, including coral reef scientists, conservationists, policymakers and community leaders. (Previous ICRS conferences held in locations nearer to Global North research hubs drew even more people.) Recurring themes in conference discussions included how much to focus on climate mitigation, how to characterize and communicate the current condition of coral reefs, and how to empower Indigenous communities and integrate their knowledge systems. A reef off Komodo Island in Indonesia. Image courtesy of Greg Asner/divephoto.org. Prioritizing climate?&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/coral-reef-experts-press-on-with-climate-looming-over-international-conference/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-325038</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Melanesian nations announce intention to create massive ocean reserve corridor</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/melanesian-nations-announce-intention-to-create-massive-ocean-reserve-corridor/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/melanesian-nations-announce-intention-to-create-massive-ocean-reserve-corridor/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Jul 2026 17:16:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Ashley Yeong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/17151125/a.-%C2%A9Justin-Hofman-Massau-PNG-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=323862</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Fiji, Melanesia, Oceania, Pacific Islands, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[30x30 conservation target, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Culture, Fisheries, Fishing, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Protected Areas, Saltwater Fish, Traditional People, and Wildlife Corridors]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A group of Pacific island nations have agreed to formally establish the Melanesian Ocean Corridor of Reserves (MOCOR), a massive transboundary marine protected area (MPA) that will span their territorial waters. Papua New Guinea (PNG), Vanuatu and Fiji made a joint declaration announcing plans for the corridor at the first Melanesian Ocean Summit in May. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A group of Pacific island nations have agreed to formally establish the Melanesian Ocean Corridor of Reserves (MOCOR), a massive transboundary marine protected area (MPA) that will span their territorial waters. Papua New Guinea (PNG), Vanuatu and Fiji made a joint declaration announcing plans for the corridor at the first Melanesian Ocean Summit in May. Solomon Islands joined the initiative in late June. Melanesia, a subregion of Oceania in the southwestern Pacific that also includes the French territory of New Caledonia and parts of Indonesia, is one of the world’s most biodiverse regions. Located in the Coral Triangle, its ocean waters contain an estimated 75% of known coral species, along with iconic marine megafauna, including sharks, rays, dugongs and whales. This part of the ocean is also a hotspot for the discovery of new species. “The initiative represents a bold and timely step forward, recognizing that our oceans do not end at national boundaries, and that our stewardship responsibilities must therefore extend across them,” 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Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka told leaders at the summit in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. The U.S.-based NGO National Geographic Pristine Seas, which has partnered with governments throughout the region to conduct research on priority protection areas, has confirmed to Mongabay that the MOCOR is an entirely separate initiative from the Melanesian Ocean Reserve (MOR) announced by Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and PNG at the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference in France. A variety of corals in the shallows off Manus Island, Papua New Guinea. Image&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/melanesian-nations-announce-intention-to-create-massive-ocean-reserve-corridor/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/melanesian-nations-announce-intention-to-create-massive-ocean-reserve-corridor/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-323862</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>From the wreckage of Super Typhoon Sinlaku, Pacific Islanders slowly recover</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/from-the-wreckage-of-super-typhoon-sinlaku-pacific-islanders-slowly-recover/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/from-the-wreckage-of-super-typhoon-sinlaku-pacific-islanders-slowly-recover/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Jun 2026 17:02:38 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Anita Hofschneider]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://news.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/55238351703_d74c4a52fe_o-e1780506566735-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=320547</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Disasters, Extreme Weather, Indigenous Peoples, Storms, and Weather]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Katelynn Delos Reyes thought she knew what to expect when Typhoon Sinlaku slammed into Saipan in April. As a lifelong resident of the island, Delos Reyes had survived frequent storms, including Super Typhoon Yutu, the second-strongest in U.S. history. Eight years ago, Yutu’s 274-kmph (about 170-mph) winds devastated her village in the southern end of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
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							<![CDATA[Katelynn Delos Reyes thought she knew what to expect when Typhoon Sinlaku slammed into Saipan in April. As a lifelong resident of the island, Delos Reyes had survived frequent storms, including Super Typhoon Yutu, the second-strongest in U.S. history. Eight years ago, Yutu’s 274-kmph (about 170-mph) winds devastated her village in the southern end of Saipan. Just three years before that, she survived Typhoon Soudelor. But Sinlaku was different. “At the beginning, it was OK. But later on it wasn’t,” said Delos Reyes, who is Chamorro, Indigenous to the Mariana Islands. A few days before it hit the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, or CNMI, on April 14, Sinlaku had tropical-storm winds. That made it what is known in the Marianas as a “banana typhoon” because such storms level banana trees but leave others standing. Then over the weekend, the typhoon rapidly intensified by 120 kmph (75 mph) in just 24 hours before becoming a 298-kmph (about 185-mph) monstrosity and the strongest storm on Earth so far this year. Delos Reyes and her family had done what they could to prepare. They boarded up the windows. They bought gallons of drinking water and filled plastic drums to use in the shower and toilet. Then the storm hit, and Delos Reyes grew scared. The winds, which had weakened to 240 kmph (about 150 mph), ripped the wood from a window. Rainwater gushed through the ceiling and soaked their belongings, including Delos Reyes’ mattress. She and her partner, her mother, her&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/from-the-wreckage-of-super-typhoon-sinlaku-pacific-islanders-slowly-recover/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-320547</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How we tracked China’s deep-sea mining fleet</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/how-we-tracked-chinas-deep-sea-mining-fleet/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/how-we-tracked-chinas-deep-sea-mining-fleet/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Jun 2026 20:33:43 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire AlbertsKara Fox]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Andy Lehren]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/01160549/Model_of_Jiaolong_submersible_at_the_Five-Year_Achievements_Exhibition_-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=320430</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[China, Cook Islands, Pacific Ocean, Polynesia, Taiwan, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conflict, Critical Minerals, Deep Sea Mining, Energy, Environment, Marine, Marine Conservation, Military, Mongabay Data Studio, Mongabay investigation, Oceans, and Research]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A version of this story was originally published by the Pulitzer Center, which supported Elizabeth Claire Alberts as an Ocean Reporting Network fellow. We didn’t set out to investigate China’s deep-sea mining fleet, but as our research into the burgeoning industry developed over our yearlong partnership, it became clear that an investigation into the fleet’s [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A version of this story was originally published by the Pulitzer Center, which supported Elizabeth Claire Alberts as an Ocean Reporting Network fellow. We didn’t set out to investigate China’s deep-sea mining fleet, but as our research into the burgeoning industry developed over our yearlong partnership, it became clear that an investigation into the fleet’s alleged military dual use was emerging as an important, untold story. Shortly after we embarked on our joint project, geopolitics around the deep-sea mining landscape began to shift dramatically. In February 2025, China signed an agreement with the Cook Islands government to collaborate on deep-sea mining research and exploration. At the same time, it was pursuing a similar deal with the archipelago nation of Kiribati, marking a notable expansion of Chinese influence in the Pacific. China holds the largest number of exploration contracts issued by the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the U.N.-affiliated deep-sea mining regulator, and is also its biggest financial contributor. It also operates the world’s largest oceanographic research fleet. Against this backdrop, we kept returning to a central question: was China’s pursuit of deep-sea mining driven solely for accessing mineral resources, or was it also shaped by broader geopolitical strategy? Through extensive reporting, we learned that China’s interest in seabed mining was motivated by both of these things, and that some of its vessels were engaged in both deep-sea mining work and militarily strategic surveillance. Meanwhile, deep-sea mining efforts have been gathering pace in the United States. In March 2025, The Metals Company,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/how-we-tracked-chinas-deep-sea-mining-fleet/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-320430</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>US prepares to auction leases for seabed mining blocks in federal waters</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/us-prepares-to-auction-leases-for-seabed-mining-blocks-in-federal-waters/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/us-prepares-to-auction-leases-for-seabed-mining-blocks-in-federal-waters/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>27 May 2026 20:29:27 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/27100412/sea-star-coral-ex1702-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=320180</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Alaska, Pacific Islands, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Deep Sea Mining, Ecosystems, Environment, extractives, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Industry, Islands, Marine, Marine Conservation, Mining, Oceans, and Politics]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This is part 1 of a two-part series examining the U.S.’s efforts to begin deep-sea mining in federal waters. Part 1 explores the process behind proposed lease sales in U.S. federal waters and reactions to those plans. Part 2 examines the regulations that would govern the industry. The U.S. agency responsible for overseeing deep-sea mining [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This is part 1 of a two-part series examining the U.S.’s efforts to begin deep-sea mining in federal waters. Part 1 explores the process behind proposed lease sales in U.S. federal waters and reactions to those plans. Part 2 examines the regulations that would govern the industry. The U.S. agency responsible for overseeing deep-sea mining in federal waters is preparing to auction off seabed blocks within months — a step that could kick-start commercial-scale deep-sea mining and make the U.S. one of the first countries to allow it. Deep-sea mining has not yet begun anywhere in the world. Opponents say it could cause widespread and irreversible damage to the marine environment if it begins, while supporters say it could provide an important source of critical minerals. In a budgetary document released in April 2026, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) indicated it intends to hold at least three offshore lease sales during the 2026 and 2027 fiscal years. The lease sales will take place through competitive auctions, providing a pathway for winning companies to gain exclusive rights to explore and exploit minerals in designated tracts of seabed. The first sale is slated for the federal waters of American Samoa in August 2026; a second in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) in November 2026; and a third in Alaska in 2027. A spokesperson for the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), the U.S. agency currently responsible for the development of offshore energy and mineral resources on the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/us-prepares-to-auction-leases-for-seabed-mining-blocks-in-federal-waters/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-320180</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘We’ve got bats’: The community bringing New Zealand’s pekapeka into the spotlight</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/weve-got-bats-the-community-bringing-new-zealands-pekapeka-into-the-spotlight/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/weve-got-bats-the-community-bringing-new-zealands-pekapeka-into-the-spotlight/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 May 2026 18:50:05 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Isabel Gil]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/19162609/new-zealand-bat-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=319727</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand and Oceania]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Bats, Biodiversity, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Endangered Species, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Mammals, Research, Surveying, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Billy Mclean knew nothing about bats. As a lifelong Kiwi, there was no reason for him to. Unlike in neighboring Australia and other parts of Oceania whose renowned flying foxes grow meter-long wingspans, Aotearoa New Zealand is famous for its birds, not bats. Mclean worked as an arborist in the Franklin area, an agricultural county [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Billy Mclean knew nothing about bats. As a lifelong Kiwi, there was no reason for him to. Unlike in neighboring Australia and other parts of Oceania whose renowned flying foxes grow meter-long wingspans, Aotearoa New Zealand is famous for its birds, not bats. Mclean worked as an arborist in the Franklin area, an agricultural county south of Auckland on the North Island. He said he felt he knew everything about the local forest, until one night 23 years ago. As he headed home from a nighttime walk on his property, a shadow swooped from the arched tree canopy. He ducked — all his years spent in the trees, and he had never seen anything move like it. Mclean said it took a minute to register what he had seen. “As the picture develops, you get that classic crescent-shaped wing,” he told Mongabay by phone. “That’s when I knew. We’ve got bats.” That night sparked a passion for bats that Mclean has been pursuing ever since. After years of being “straight-up ridiculed” for trying to convince his community that these creatures lived in their backyards, many are starting to believe him. Today, he’s an active member with Finding Franklin Bats (FFB), a locally run research project teaching community members how to find, monitor and protect the overlooked bats that live in their backyards. (Left) Billy Mclean assists in weighing a long-tailed bat. (Right) Billy Mclean&#8217;s daughter practices using a radio telemetry set to detect bat calls. Image courtesy of Finding Franklin&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/weve-got-bats-the-community-bringing-new-zealands-pekapeka-into-the-spotlight/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-319727</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘Rediscovered’ species in Papua spotlight importance of Indigenous knowledge</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/rediscovered-species-in-papua-spotlights-importance-of-indigenous-knowledge/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/rediscovered-species-in-papua-spotlights-importance-of-indigenous-knowledge/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Apr 2026 02:22:50 +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/20/2026/04/14103750/20230611-BE4A9979-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317487</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Oceania, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Mammals, Marsupials, Rediscovered Species, Research, Traditional Knowledge, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[It started with a set of photographs, taken of an animal captured in 2015 on the Bird’s Head Peninsula in Indonesian Papua, the western half of the island of New Guinea. The smallish animal with “large hands” looked a bit like a slow loris, a small primate that doesn’t live on the island, or perhaps [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[It started with a set of photographs, taken of an animal captured in 2015 on the Bird’s Head Peninsula in Indonesian Papua, the western half of the island of New Guinea. The smallish animal with “large hands” looked a bit like a slow loris, a small primate that doesn’t live on the island, or perhaps a cuscus, which, like this specimen, is also a marsupial. Further inspection of the photos, however, suggested it might be something else altogether, a species long thought lost to extinction — by scientists, anyway. Interviews in local communities provided a breadcrumb trail suggesting that a forest-dwelling glider, known — again, to science — only from millennia-old fragments of teeth and bone, might yet live in the forests of Indonesian Papua. Several years later, Rika Korain was approached by her longtime friend and colleague, Australian mammalogist Tim Flannery, who asked if she might help him get a bead on whether the animal still existed. Korain, a human rights lawyer and Indigenous Maybrat woman, immediately thought of the elders from the Tambrauw people, a group that lives close to the Maybrat and with whom they share traditions in common. “I’m from the Bird’s Head area,” she says. “I told [Flannery], let’s find out from my clan, from my people’s side. Let’s try to talk with the elders or especially the hunters who always go to the jungle to find out whether they see this particular animal.” So in 2023, she and Flannery spoke with two Tambrauw elders,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/rediscovered-species-in-papua-spotlights-importance-of-indigenous-knowledge/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317487</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Māori knowledge shows climate change domino effects on forest food chains</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/maori-knowledge-shows-climate-change-domino-effects-on-forest-food-chains/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/maori-knowledge-shows-climate-change-domino-effects-on-forest-food-chains/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>14 Apr 2026 20:26:02 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Monica Evans]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/14200310/Phil-Lyver-second-from-left-and-Tuawhenua-kaumatua-elders.-Photo-by-Manaaki-Whenua-Landcare-Research-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317537</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[New Zealand and Oceania]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Birds, Food, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Science, Traditional Knowledge, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[RAGLAN, Aotearoa New Zealand — Imagine a forest floor so thick with juicy, crunchy purple tawa (Beilschmiedia tawa) fruit in summertime that you can’t cross it without skidding and falling. Birds so fat with toromiro (Pectinopitys ferruginea) berries that they explode when you shoot them. Pigs that don’t bother to dig in the ground because [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[RAGLAN, Aotearoa New Zealand — Imagine a forest floor so thick with juicy, crunchy purple tawa (Beilschmiedia tawa) fruit in summertime that you can’t cross it without skidding and falling. Birds so fat with toromiro (Pectinopitys ferruginea) berries that they explode when you shoot them. Pigs that don’t bother to dig in the ground because there’s so much food on top of it for the taking. For elder Māori of the Tūhoe Tuawhenua and Ngāti Whare iwi (tribal groups) in Aotearoa New Zealand’s North Island, such phenomena used to be commonplace. But they’re now a distant memory. The fruits of the Te Urewera and Whirinaki forests used to set, ripen and drop with rhythmic regularity, and people who lived there were attuned to those beats and their impact across the food chain. In the past three decades, those patterns have started to falter. Over a decades-long engagement process, an Indigenous-led team of researchers has drawn on mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge) to document and understand changes in these forests across the last 75 years. Their new study tracks, for the first time, fruiting changes in line with shifting climatic patterns in the country. Elders and scientists show how relatively subtle shifts like the timing of fruit ripening can cascade through such diverse issues as soil health, food systems and culture. Image by Jacqui Geux via iNaturalist (CC BY 4.0). The kererū, also known as the New Zealand pigeon (Hemiphaga novaeseelandiae). Image courtesy of Phil Lyver. “The forest itself has signaled change,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/maori-knowledge-shows-climate-change-domino-effects-on-forest-food-chains/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317537</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Deep-sea wildernesses are more important than the promise of seafloor mining (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/deep-sea-wildernesses-are-more-important-than-the-promise-of-seafloor-mining-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/deep-sea-wildernesses-are-more-important-than-the-promise-of-seafloor-mining-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>14 Apr 2026 18:23:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Andrew D. Thaler]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/21170043/FK210726-Dive443-BubblegumCoral-20210728-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317523</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Oceania, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and Papua New Guinea]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Analysis, Animals, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Business, Commentary, Critical Minerals, Deep Sea, Deep Sea Mining, Ecosystems, Environment, Ethics, Fisheries, Governance, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Mining, Oceans, and Renewable Energy]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[When I set sail on the MV NorSky in the summer of 2008 to probe the depths of Manus Basin off the coast of Papua New Guinea, I believed in the promise of deep-sea mining. As an early-career deep-sea ecologist, I was swayed by arguments in favor of this emerging industry. It offered a new [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[When I set sail on the MV NorSky in the summer of 2008 to probe the depths of Manus Basin off the coast of Papua New Guinea, I believed in the promise of deep-sea mining. As an early-career deep-sea ecologist, I was swayed by arguments in favor of this emerging industry. It offered a new way to obtain the metals needed for the renewable energy revolution, one allegedly free of the human rights and environmental abuses of terrestrial mining. The company was Nautilus Minerals, and the plan was to mine an active hydrothermal vent field called Solwara I. What is a hydrothermal vent and why would anyone want to mine one? When seawater is drawn down into the earth and heated under enormous pressure, it rises through cracks in the crust, erupting from the seafloor in metal-rich plumes. Those metals are deposited on the walls of a growing chimney. Deep-sea miners call this structure a seafloor massive sulfide. They can be rich in gold and silver, as well as copper, zinc, lead and rare earth elements. By most estimates, Solwara I is among the most valuable seafloor massive sulfides ever discovered. And it is not only rich in metals, it is rich with life. The dumbo octopus is a species only found in the deep sea. Image courtesy of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research. The communities that grow around hydrothermal vents depend on the chemical energy of the vent plume. The geological process that deposits metals also&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/deep-sea-wildernesses-are-more-important-than-the-promise-of-seafloor-mining-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317523</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>American Samoa said ‘no’ to deep sea mining, Washington heard ‘faster’ (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/american-samoa-said-no-to-deep-sea-mining-washington-heard-faster-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/american-samoa-said-no-to-deep-sea-mining-washington-heard-faster-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Apr 2026 16:07:22 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Jackie Dragon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/07/31170320/50928446358_f3bcd48e6c_o-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316722</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Guam, Pacific Ocean, Samoa, United States, and United States Minor Outlying Islands]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Commentary, Conservation, Deep Sea, Deep Sea Mining, Ecosystems, Environment, Ethics, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Marine, Marine Conservation, Mining, and Oceans]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[At 7:45 a.m. one recent January day in American Samoa, a delegation from Greenpeace and Pacific Island partners sat in a small radio studio explaining why we had traveled thousands of miles across the Pacific. We were invited by local leaders to the unincorporated U.S. territory — halfway between Hawai‘i and Australia — to listen, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[At 7:45 a.m. one recent January day in American Samoa, a delegation from Greenpeace and Pacific Island partners sat in a small radio studio explaining why we had traveled thousands of miles across the Pacific. We were invited by local leaders to the unincorporated U.S. territory — halfway between Hawai‘i and Australia — to listen, to learn, and to help elevate what people in American Samoa have been saying for years. Communities there are deeply concerned about deep-sea mining, and they want to be heard before decisions are made about the ocean that sustains them. Hours later, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) stood before local officials in a meeting space up the street, walking them through the steps of a federal leasing process that was already moving forward, fast. BOEM’s visit, even as the governor’s office convened space for community voices, felt less like consultation and more like choreography. The agency’s message was, in essence, we hear you, but we are moving forward. Meeting with the governor (center, in red) about the proposal, from left: Ekolu Lindsey, director of Maui Nui Makai Network; Sheila Sarhangi, director of Pacific Islands Heritage Coalition; Bobbi-Jo Dobush, independent ocean policy consultant, Salt Horizon LLC; American Samoa Governor Pula’ali’i Nikolao Pula; Solomon Kahoohalahala, Indigenous Hawaiian elder, Maui Nui Makai Network; Jackie Dragon, senior oceans campaigner, Greenpeace USA; Arlo Hemphill, Greenpeace USA&#8217;s campaign lead on deep sea mining. Image courtesy of Greenpeace USA. BOEM received more than 76,000 public comments, most warning of environmental&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/american-samoa-said-no-to-deep-sea-mining-washington-heard-faster-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/american-samoa-said-no-to-deep-sea-mining-washington-heard-faster-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316722</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Traditional protection proves more successful for clams in American Samoa</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/traditional-protection-proves-more-successful-for-clams-in-american-samoa/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/traditional-protection-proves-more-successful-for-clams-in-american-samoa/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Mar 2026 05:27:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sonam Lama Hyolmo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/27091942/Giant-Clam-Tridacna-maxima-in-American-Samoa-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316429</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Oceania, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Culture, Ecosystems, Environmental Law, Indigenous Peoples, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Molluscs, Oceans, Research, Sustainability, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional People, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[For coastal Indigenous communities in American Samoa, giant clams are deeply rooted in fa‘a Sāmoa (the Samoan way of life) and local food systems. According to the findings of a study published in PeerJ, it is village-based protections like fa‘asao (fishery closures) that have helped conserve giant clams lying in the islands’ shallow water coral [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[For coastal Indigenous communities in American Samoa, giant clams are deeply rooted in fa‘a Sāmoa (the Samoan way of life) and local food systems. According to the findings of a study published in PeerJ, it is village-based protections like fa‘asao (fishery closures) that have helped conserve giant clams lying in the islands’ shallow water coral reefs. The authors found that the highest clam densities and species are located in remote sites and areas under traditional village enforcement, outperforming federally designated no-take zones on the most populated island. The authors examined giant clam population trends, clam densities and distributions, and species composition across six islands — Tutuila, Aunuʻu, Ofu, Olosega, Taʻū and Muliāva — from 1994/5 to surveys conducted between 2022-24. While the highly populated island of Tutuila had the lowest clam densities with 83.5 individuals per hectare (33.8 per acre), remote islands like Taʻū and Muliāva showed higher densities up to 812 to 1,166 per hectare (328 to 471 per acre). On Tutuila, which had multiple types of management zones, subsistence and remote sites had the highest densities of giant clams, followed by remote areas, then village protected areas. Federal no-take sites held the lowest mean density of clams overall on the island. “By restoring local stewardship, cultural accountability, and respect for customary marine tenure values, community-led systems like fa‘asao have strengthened marine ecosystem conservation through village-based fishery closures,” Dimary Ulberg, an Indigenous Samoan and program manager of the Community-based Fisheries Management Program (CBFMP) at the Department of Marine and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/traditional-protection-proves-more-successful-for-clams-in-american-samoa/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316429</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The ocean’s enforcement gap</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/the-oceans-enforcement-gap/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/the-oceans-enforcement-gap/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Mar 2026 22:33:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rhett Ayers Butler]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/09225852/greenpeace-GP1SXQFJ-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=315393</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Founder's briefs]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, Indonesia, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and Palau]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Analysis, data, Environment, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Infrastructure, Marine, Marine Protected Areas, Monitoring, Oceans, Ports, Protected Areas, Remote Sensing, Satellite Imagery, and Technology]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[On paper, the sea is increasingly protected. Governments have designated vast marine protected areas (MPAs) and pledged to conserve 30% of the ocean by 2030. Maps shaded in reassuring blues now circulate widely. Yet the reality offshore often looks much the same as before. Industrial vessels still trawl through restricted waters, longliners set gear near [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[On paper, the sea is increasingly protected. Governments have designated vast marine protected areas (MPAs) and pledged to conserve 30% of the ocean by 2030. Maps shaded in reassuring blues now circulate widely. Yet the reality offshore often looks much the same as before. Industrial vessels still trawl through restricted waters, longliners set gear near vulnerable habitats, and sanctions for violations are sporadic. The problem is not a shortage of rules. It is the unevenness of enforcement. Creating an MPA is politically attractive. It signals ambition at relatively modest cost, especially when the protected waters lie far offshore. Policing those areas is harder. Patrol vessels are expensive to operate, legal cases can drag on, and fisheries agencies are rarely flush with funds. In many countries, officials face a dilemma: announce new protections and earn international praise, or spend scarce resources enforcing existing ones and risk confrontation with powerful domestic interests. Frozen tuna are transferred from the Hung Hwa 202, a Taiwanese longliner, to the Hsiang Hao, a Panama-flagged reefer operating out of Tokyo, Japan, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise and crew are investigating distant water fishing fleet practices in the Mid-Atlantic during September and October 2019. Photo credit: © Tommy Trenchard Evidence presented in a widely-cited 2014 Nature paper suggests that compliance depends less on the size of protected areas than on whether rules are visible and credible. Studies comparing MPAs across regions consistently find that ecological benefits correlate with enforcement capacity. A&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/the-oceans-enforcement-gap/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-315393</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>PNG’s New Ireland coastal waters causing fish deaths, human sickness</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/pngs-new-ireland-coastal-waters-causing-fish-deaths-human-sickness/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/pngs-new-ireland-coastal-waters-causing-fish-deaths-human-sickness/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Mar 2026 23:58:37 +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/20/2026/03/20233533/GVL8903-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=316077</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Oceania and Papua New Guinea]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Climate, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Diseases, Food, Indigenous Peoples, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Pollution, and Toxicology]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[For several months, the waters around New Ireland province in Papua New Guinea have been causing illness, skin irritation and the death of sea life, according to communities living along the east coast of the island. In December 2025, residents say they began noticing that fish and other marine life were turning up dead along [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[For several months, the waters around New Ireland province in Papua New Guinea have been causing illness, skin irritation and the death of sea life, according to communities living along the east coast of the island. In December 2025, residents say they began noticing that fish and other marine life were turning up dead along the shoreline, according to a coalition that is organizing a relief effort. John Aini, the founder of the Indigenous marine conservation organization Ailan Awareness, who is from New Ireland province, said the flesh of these fish was discolored, the eyes of some had popped out of their sockets and others had visible damage to their brains. New Ireland sits along the northeastern fringes of Papua New Guinea between the Bismarck Sea to the west and the expanse of the Pacific Ocean to the east. The crisis threatens “multiple” communities whose cultures are deeply entwined with the ocean environment, according to a statement from the coalition, and some 750 people have experienced symptoms including burns, respiratory problems and gastrointestinal sickness. Tidal movements also threaten to infiltrate and foul freshwater creeks that are critical sources of drinking water. And yet, the origins of the crisis are a mystery. A map showing the locations of the most affected communities in New Ireland. Image courtesy of Ailan Awareness. “Families can no longer rely on the ocean for food,” Martha Piwas, a community leader from the east coast of New Ireland, said in the statement. “Mothers cannot feed their children&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/pngs-new-ireland-coastal-waters-causing-fish-deaths-human-sickness/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-316077</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Vanuatu communities move to protect taro, an ancestral climate-resilient crop (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/vanuatu-communities-move-to-protect-taro-an-ancestral-climate-resilient-crop-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/vanuatu-communities-move-to-protect-taro-an-ancestral-climate-resilient-crop-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Jan 2026 18:50:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Monica Kidd]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/26182316/Richard-Rojo3-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=313365</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Oceania, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and Vanuatu]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Agriculture, Agroecology, Analysis, Climate Change, Commentary, Disasters, Food, food security, Islands, Plants, Storms, Subsistence Agriculture, Sustainability, and Sustainable Development]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The packed-earth trail winds through the dense and tangled forest of Vanuatu, the ocean crashing just meters to our right. Richard Rojo’s feet don’t mind the stones and stumps, and he carries a bush knife and a repurposed rice sack. It’s a path well-trodden for Rojo, who’s lived here in the village of Tasmate on [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The packed-earth trail winds through the dense and tangled forest of Vanuatu, the ocean crashing just meters to our right. Richard Rojo’s feet don’t mind the stones and stumps, and he carries a bush knife and a repurposed rice sack. It’s a path well-trodden for Rojo, who’s lived here in the village of Tasmate on Vanuatu’s remote west coast of Espiritu Santo Island as a subsistence farmer and fisher all his 40-ish years. I walk-jog to keep up with him as he talks to me over his shoulder, idly whacking at an occasional vine with his knife. We’ve been traveling together a few days now in his open boat up and down this coast, on a reporting trip with the Sunset Santo Environmental Network (SSEN) team so I can see for myself the way villages here are threatened by climate change. We walk for about 10 minutes as I pepper Rojo with questions. We pass towering trees covered with epiphytic plants and wade across a river before popping out into a clearing the size of a few soccer pitches. Coconut palms edge the far side and, in front of us, earthen berms enclose a shallow rectangular pool maybe 5 by 50 meters (roughly 16 by 164 feet). Inside are rows and rows of chest-high plants with heart-shaped leaves: Colocasia esculenta, or water taro. Rojo sets down his knife and bag and wades into the pool. “I will go replace some that are dying like this one,” he says, finding his&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/vanuatu-communities-move-to-protect-taro-an-ancestral-climate-resilient-crop-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-313365</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Deep-sea &#8216;hotels&#8217; reveal 20 new species hiding in Pacific Ocean twilight zone near Guam</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/deep-sea-hotels-reveal-20-new-species-hiding-in-oceans-twilight-zone/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/deep-sea-hotels-reveal-20-new-species-hiding-in-oceans-twilight-zone/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>31 Dec 2025 18:20:28 +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/20/2025/12/31181314/Screenshot-2025-12-31-at-12.12.53-PM-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312446</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Guam and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Green, Happy-upbeat Environmental, New Discovery, Oceans, Species Discovery, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A transparent goby fish drifted through the darkness, its skeleton visible through paper-thin skin. Nearby, a sea slug wore yellow polka dots like a party dress, while an orange fish with bulging eyes hid among the coral. No human had ever seen these creatures — until now. They live in the ocean&#8217;s &#8220;twilight zone,&#8221; a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A transparent goby fish drifted through the darkness, its skeleton visible through paper-thin skin. Nearby, a sea slug wore yellow polka dots like a party dress, while an orange fish with bulging eyes hid among the coral. No human had ever seen these creatures — until now. They live in the ocean&#8217;s &#8220;twilight zone,&#8221; a dim underwater world between 55 and 100 meters (180 and 330 feet) deep, where light fades and strange life thrives. Hidden in the depths off the coast of the Pacific island of Guam, these animals make their homes on unusual structures that scientists had quietly placed on the seafloor years earlier. In November, Luiz Rocha and his team at the California Academy of Sciences finally returned to collect what those structures had been gathering for eight years: a treasure trove of life never before seen by humans. A few of the species (not to scale) found living in the &#8220;twilight zone&#8221; near Guam. Some are likely new to science, others have not been seen before at this depth. Photos courtesy of California Academy of Science. &#8220;I&#8217;ve wanted to be an explorer ever since I was a kid,&#8221; Rocha told National Geographic, &#8220;and there&#8217;s nothing better for an explorer than going to a place that nobody has ever been, finding a species that nobody has ever seen before.&#8221; The monitoring devices, called ARMS (Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures), are stacks of square PVC plates that act as artificial reefs, like mini-condos for critters. Sea creatures settle on them&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/deep-sea-hotels-reveal-20-new-species-hiding-in-oceans-twilight-zone/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312446</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Elizabeth Erasito, custodian of Fiji’s parks and places</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/elizabeth-erasito-custodian-of-fijis-parks-and-places/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/elizabeth-erasito-custodian-of-fijis-parks-and-places/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Dec 2025 04:04:38 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Rhett Ayers Butler]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/29140809/Elizabeth-Erasito-v2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312222</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Founder's briefs]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Fiji, Pacific Islands, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Environment, Green, Islands, and Obituary]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The work of conservation in small island states is rarely abstract. It is shaped by land that is limited, institutions that are thinly resourced, and pressures that arrive from far beyond national borders. Decisions about forests, rivers, reefs, and historic sites are often framed as technical choices, but they are more often political ones, balancing [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The work of conservation in small island states is rarely abstract. It is shaped by land that is limited, institutions that are thinly resourced, and pressures that arrive from far beyond national borders. Decisions about forests, rivers, reefs, and historic sites are often framed as technical choices, but they are more often political ones, balancing development promises against damage that cannot easily be reversed. In Fiji, those tensions were especially visible in the management of protected areas and heritage sites. National parks were expected to serve several purposes at once: conservation, public access, cultural continuity, and economic opportunity. They were also expected to endure storms, fires, invasive species, and illegal extraction, frequently with too little staff and money. Holding those contradictions together required patience, administrative skill, and a tolerance for slow progress. One of the figures who spent much of her working life doing exactly that was Elizabeth Erasito. She joined the National Trust of Fiji in 1997 and rose to become its director, a position she held for more than two decades. Under her leadership, the Trust managed a small but symbolically important network of parks and historic places, from coastal dunes to forest reserves and archaeological sites. Her focus was less on expansion than on making protection function in practice. Elizabeth Erasito. From the National Trust. She spoke plainly about constraints. Monitoring, she argued, mattered more than declarations. In public remarks she described the need for practical tools to track encroachment, fires, invasive species, and illegal sand mining.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/elizabeth-erasito-custodian-of-fijis-parks-and-places/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312222</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>George Teariki-Mataki Mateariki, the Birdman of Atiu, has died, aged 67</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/george-teariki-mataki-mateariki-the-birdman-of-atiu-has-died-aged-67/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/george-teariki-mataki-mateariki-the-birdman-of-atiu-has-died-aged-67/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>29 Dec 2025 14:00:35 +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/20/2025/12/29135729/birdman-george-bw-George-Teariki-Mataki-Mateariki-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312218</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Founder's briefs]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Cook Islands, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and Polynesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Green, Islands, Obituary, Saving Species From Extinction, Solutions, Species recovery, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In small island states, conservation has often depended less on formal institutions than on vigilance: watching harbors, checking traps, noticing what does not belong. The work is repetitive, practical, and easily overlooked. It rarely comes with titles or funding cycles that last longer than a season. Yet in places where a single invasive species can [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In small island states, conservation has often depended less on formal institutions than on vigilance: watching harbors, checking traps, noticing what does not belong. The work is repetitive, practical, and easily overlooked. It rarely comes with titles or funding cycles that last longer than a season. Yet in places where a single invasive species can erase centuries of evolution, that kind of attention determines whether a bird persists or disappears. The Cook Islands learned this lesson the hard way. By the late 20th century, several endemic birds were reduced to remnant populations, pushed to the margins by introduced predators and the slow erosion of habitat. Rescue efforts combined outside science with local knowledge, but success depended on whether those plans were enforced daily, at airstrips, wharves, and forest edges, long after visiting researchers had left. One of the people who made that enforcement real was George Teariki-Mataki Mateariki, who died on December 17, 2025. Known widely as Birdman George, he was neither an academic nor a policy advocate. He described himself as “a naturalist from the bush,” and he meant it literally. He learned by growing up on Atiu, by listening to elders, and by paying attention to birds closely enough to know when something was wrong. Atiu, a raised coral island without mass tourism or large resorts, became central to the recovery of the Rarotongan flycatcher, or kakerori. By the early 1990s only 29 remained, all on Rarotonga, where ship rats had overwhelmed them. When conservationists decided to create&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/george-teariki-mataki-mateariki-the-birdman-of-atiu-has-died-aged-67/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/george-teariki-mataki-mateariki-the-birdman-of-atiu-has-died-aged-67/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312218</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Pacific fisheries summit gives a boost to albacore &#038; seabirds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/pacific-fisheries-summit-gives-a-boost-to-albacore-seabirds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/pacific-fisheries-summit-gives-a-boost-to-albacore-seabirds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Dec 2025 19:56:32 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/16193919/BANNER-2-a.-AP24050529396021-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311477</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[China, Cook Islands, Japan, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Pacific Ocean, Polynesia, South Korea, and Taiwan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Oceans, Overfishing, Politics, and Saltwater Fish]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Much of the world’s albacore tuna catch, which usually ends up in a can, comes from the southwestern Pacific Ocean, where fishery managers just passed a new set of conservation rules. The parties to the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), a multilateral body that sets fishing rules for an area that covers nearly [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Much of the world’s albacore tuna catch, which usually ends up in a can, comes from the southwestern Pacific Ocean, where fishery managers just passed a new set of conservation rules. The parties to the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), a multilateral body that sets fishing rules for an area that covers nearly 20% of the planet, adopted a harvest strategy for South Pacific albacore at their annual meeting, held Dec. 1-5 in Manila, the Philippines. Harvest strategies set near-automatic scientifically advised catch limits or other control measures in response to fluctuating fish stock levels; they’re considered a best practice in fisheries management because they reduce commercial or political influence. South Pacific albacore is one of two albacore (Thunnus alalunga) stocks in the WCPFC; the other is North Pacific albacore, which isn’t fished as much. “This is a great move for the WCPFC,” Dave Gershman, a senior officer for international fisheries at The Pew Charitable Trusts, a U.S.-based think tank, told Mongabay after attending the meeting. “This is a critical step to ensure the sustainability and stability of the top Pacific albacore fisheries.” Gershman noted that the harvest strategy was a “long time in the making” and had been “discussed for many, many years.” The parties discussed, but didn’t adopt, new rules on transshipment, or the ship-to-ship transfer of fish and other goods at sea, a practice that’s been linked to illegal and unsustainable fishing and other illicit activity. Glen Joseph, director of the fishing ministry of the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/pacific-fisheries-summit-gives-a-boost-to-albacore-seabirds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/pacific-fisheries-summit-gives-a-boost-to-albacore-seabirds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311477</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Malaysian companies dominate PNG forest-clearance permits: report</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/malaysian-companies-dominate-png-forest-clearance-permits-report/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/malaysian-companies-dominate-png-forest-clearance-permits-report/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Dec 2025 05:54:08 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sonam Lama Hyolmo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/01/25103418/tree-kangaroo-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310979</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, New Guinea, Oceania, Papua New Guinea, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Birds, Conservation, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Farming, Forests, FPIC, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Logging, Rainforests, Trees, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Papua New Guinea’s rainforests, which span 28.2 million hectares (69.6 million acres), are among the most biodiverse in the world, hosting an estimated 5-8% of all species. The country also has one of the world’s highest rates of communal land ownership, with around 97% of land legally recognized as being customary tenure. Despite the ecological [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Papua New Guinea’s rainforests, which span 28.2 million hectares (69.6 million acres), are among the most biodiverse in the world, hosting an estimated 5-8% of all species. The country also has one of the world’s highest rates of communal land ownership, with around 97% of land legally recognized as being customary tenure. Despite the ecological significance of the country’s forests, and the existence of laws to ensure customary landowners retain control of what happens on their traditional lands, Papua New Guinea also hosts a major timber trade — frequently topping global lists of tropical log exporters — with the profits concentrated in the hands of foreign corporations. A recent report from RimbaWatch, a Kuala Lumpur-based research and advocacy organization, examined in detail how land-conversion permits facilitate the clearance of PNG’s forests, and what role the companies linked to Malaysia play in the ongoing timber trade. The report focused on Forest Clearing Authorities (FCAs), which are permits issued by the Papua New Guinea Forest Authority (PNGFA) that allow large-scale conversions — exceeding 50 hectares (123 acres) — of natural forests for agricultural or other land-use development projects. The stated purpose of these licenses is to create sustainable jobs and income for the country’s people via development projects, but critics say that, in practice, these licenses  have been used to facilitate large-scale logging. As of 2024, one-third of the timber exported from the country came from companies operating on an FCA permit. RimbaWatch found that 65 out of 67 active FCAs are&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/malaysian-companies-dominate-png-forest-clearance-permits-report/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310979</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The vanishing pharmacy: How climate change is reshaping traditional medicine</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/natures-vanishing-pharmacy-how-climate-change-is-reshaping-traditional-medicine/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/natures-vanishing-pharmacy-how-climate-change-is-reshaping-traditional-medicine/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Dec 2025 05:39:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/10/19060634/Yarsa-gunbu-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311312</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Brazil, Ghana, Global, Himalayas, Panama, Philippines, Samoa, and Tibetan Plateau]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Green, Indigenous Peoples, and Traditional Knowledge]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Gyatso Bista remembers the sacks of kutki. As a child learning to become a healer in Nepal&#8217;s kingdom of Lo Manthang, Bista would watch as heaps of the bitter-tasting herb, prized for treating fever, coughs and liver problems, arrived on horseback from the surrounding mountains. Bista is one of the few remaining practitioners of Sowa [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Gyatso Bista remembers the sacks of kutki. As a child learning to become a healer in Nepal&#8217;s kingdom of Lo Manthang, Bista would watch as heaps of the bitter-tasting herb, prized for treating fever, coughs and liver problems, arrived on horseback from the surrounding mountains. Bista is one of the few remaining practitioners of Sowa Rigpa, an ancient Tibetan healing system used for more than 2,500 years. He remembers harvests of up to 40 kilograms (88 pounds) of the high-altitude herb. But now, the kutki (Picrorhiza scrophulariiflora) has all but vanished. &#8220;Now you barely find 5 kilograms [11 pounds],&#8221; Bista said. What Bista has witnessed in his village reflects a global crisis. More than 80% of the world&#8217;s population relies on traditional medicine for their primary health care. Yet across every inhabited continent, plants that form the backbone of traditional healing are in decline, pushed out by rising temperatures, shifting rainfall, deforestation and overharvesting. Meconopsis grandis, also known as the Himalayan blue poppy, is among many other species are gradually on the verge of extinction. Image by Conall via Flickr(CC BY 2.0). &#8220;For many common illnesses, these traditional remedies are really our first aid,&#8221; Mingay Dakias, a member of the Manobo-Dulangan Indigenous community in the southern Philippines, told Mongabay. &#8220;We usually rely on these treatments first.&#8221; A recent global review published in Frontiers in Pharmacology found that of 367 medicinal plant species studied over the past two decades, climate change has reduced suitable habitats for 106 species. Another 94 species&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/natures-vanishing-pharmacy-how-climate-change-is-reshaping-traditional-medicine/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311312</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Another threat to reefs: Microplastic chemicals may harm coral reproduction</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/another-threat-to-reefs-microplastic-chemicals-may-harm-coral-reproduction/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/another-threat-to-reefs-microplastic-chemicals-may-harm-coral-reproduction/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Dec 2025 18:16:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Kari Goodbar]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/05181248/Goodbar-Photo-6-plastic-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310668</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Hawaii, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Green, Invertebrates, Microplastics, Oceans, Plastic, Pollution, Waste, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As the sliver of a new moon shines over Kāneʻohe Bay, Oʻahu, millions of tiny orbs ascend from a reef and swirl in the water column. These spheres are bundles of coral eggs and sperm responding to lunar cycles and chemical cues in the water that tell them when to fertilize and where to settle [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As the sliver of a new moon shines over Kāneʻohe Bay, Oʻahu, millions of tiny orbs ascend from a reef and swirl in the water column. These spheres are bundles of coral eggs and sperm responding to lunar cycles and chemical cues in the water that tell them when to fertilize and where to settle down for their next phase of development. The Hawaiian archipelago’s position near the Pacific Garbage Patch means these bundles often share the water column with microplastics, nefarious little particles that may interfere with these natural chemical cues. Most previous research on corals and microplastics has focused on the effects on adult corals of ingesting or absorbing plastic particles. Few studies have addressed larval stages of coral development or the impact of water contaminated with plastic residue, known as leachate. A coral head in Kāneʻohe Bay, Oʻahu. Image courtesy of Ocean Image Bank/Toby Matthews. The effects of leachate on coral reproduction are complex, according to coral biologist Keiko Wilkins, a researcher at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Her most recent study, published in Frontiers in Marine Science, details how leachate affects two different phases of coral reproduction. “The effects that we’re seeing on the fertilization and the effects that we’re seeing on the larvae settling are very different,” Wilkins said. Corals reproduce sexually through one of two methods: spawning or brooding. Spawning coral species release eggs and sperm into the water for external fertilization, while brooding species release larvae that have already fertilized internally. Plastic&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/another-threat-to-reefs-microplastic-chemicals-may-harm-coral-reproduction/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310668</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Botanists decode secret life of rare plants to ensure reintroduction success</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/botanists-decode-secret-life-of-rare-plants-to-ensure-reintroduction-success/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/botanists-decode-secret-life-of-rare-plants-to-ensure-reintroduction-success/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>25 Nov 2025 16:42:38 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Katarina Zimmer]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/25114255/11-MAGNOLIAFRUIT-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310116</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Easter Island, Global, Mauritius, Philippines, and South Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Extinction, Forestry, Forests, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Plants, Reintroductions, Research, Restoration, Saving Species From Extinction, Solutions, Trees, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[It was 2006 and Ismail Ebrahim, a botanist with the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI), was worried. While surveying one of the last remaining patches of renosterveld shrubland in South Africa’s Paarl region, near Cape Town, he and his team of citizen scientists found a small, yellow-flowered daisy species: Marasmodes undulata. It had long [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[It was 2006 and Ismail Ebrahim, a botanist with the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI), was worried. While surveying one of the last remaining patches of renosterveld shrubland in South Africa’s Paarl region, near Cape Town, he and his team of citizen scientists found a small, yellow-flowered daisy species: Marasmodes undulata. It had long been thought extinct, with the last 200-strong population observed at the same location near the town of Paarl in the 1980s. Now, Ebrahim’s team had discovered an even smaller population, numbering just 27 individuals. The citizen scientists had to act quickly to stave off species oblivion. Competing vegetation was choking out the small daisies, so Ebrahim’s team took the calculated risk of setting fire to the site to level the playing field and stimulate seedling growth for the fire-adapted daisy. But no M. undulata reappeared at first, and those popping up in subsequent years disappeared. “Every time we went back to the site, we found less plants,” Ebrahim recalls. Why put so much focus on conserving a diminutive shrubland flower? Among the diverse inhabitants of the renosterveld, few species are more easily overlooked than M. undulata, which botanist Donovan Kirkwood, the curator of the Stellenbosch University Botanical Garden affectionately called the “ugly duckling daisy” before his untimely death in August. But just like other renosterveld plants, M. undulata belongs there, forming part of an ecosystem that becomes more sensitive to collapse with every species that is lost. Like a Jenga tower block, the little daisy&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/botanists-decode-secret-life-of-rare-plants-to-ensure-reintroduction-success/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/botanists-decode-secret-life-of-rare-plants-to-ensure-reintroduction-success/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310116</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Expedition charts Cook Islands seafloor, amid scrutiny over mining motives</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/expedition-charts-cook-islands-seafloor-amid-scrutiny-over-mining-motives/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/expedition-charts-cook-islands-seafloor-amid-scrutiny-over-mining-motives/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Nov 2025 20:46:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/06115614/Sea-cucumber-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=308942</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Cook Islands, Oceania, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Critical Minerals, Deep Sea, Deep Sea Mining, Ecosystems, Environment, Exploration, Mapping, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Mining, Oceans, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Thousands of meters below the ocean’s surface, a camera attached to a remotely operated vehicle captured a ghostly white creature gliding above a plain of polymetallic nodules — mineral-rich rocks that resemble blackened potatoes. The animal’s orchid-shaped fins undulated as it cruised through the water, while its spindly tentacles trailed behind. This otherworldly creature was [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Thousands of meters below the ocean’s surface, a camera attached to a remotely operated vehicle captured a ghostly white creature gliding above a plain of polymetallic nodules — mineral-rich rocks that resemble blackened potatoes. The animal’s orchid-shaped fins undulated as it cruised through the water, while its spindly tentacles trailed behind. This otherworldly creature was a bigfin squid (genus Magnapinna), an organism that scientists have spotted fewer than two dozen times, and one that has never been physically captured. Adam Soule, a geologist and oceanographer who directs the U.S.-based Ocean Exploration Cooperative Institute, the organization leading the expedition on a vessel known as the E/V Nautilus, said the bigfin squid sighting generated a rush of excitement. (The Ocean Exploration Cooperative Institute and its U.S.-based partner organization, the Ocean Exploration Trust, are operating via a 10-year grant worth $200 million from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA). &nbsp; “One of the cool things about the Nautilus is that there&#8217;s a lot of people following online, watching in real time and sending in comments,” Soule told Mongabay. “And they were amazed. They were really excited, as was everyone on the ship.” The footage of the bigfin squid was filmed at a depth of more than 5,000 meters (16,400 feet) in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of the Cook Islands, a small Pacific island nation located between American Samoa and French Polynesia. The entire Cook Islands EEZ, which spans 1.9 million square kilometers (about 734,000 square miles), also operates as&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/expedition-charts-cook-islands-seafloor-amid-scrutiny-over-mining-motives/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-308942</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Report urges full protection of world’s 196 uncontacted Indigenous peoples</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>27 Oct 2025 14:22:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sue Branford]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/27113221/Photo-9-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=308336</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Asia, Brazil, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Latin America, Pacific Islands, Peru, South America, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Conservation, Culture, Development, Diseases, Drug Trade, Environment, extractives, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Logging, Mining, Oil Drilling, Rainforests, Uncontacted Tribes, and Violence]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[“My children died. My mother died. My husband died. My brothers, my sisters, my aunts and uncles. I saw the bones sticking out of their rotting corpses inside the longhouse. We were too weak to bury them. I was left alone with my two baby brothers. All my family died, and all we got in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[“My children died. My mother died. My husband died. My brothers, my sisters, my aunts and uncles. I saw the bones sticking out of their rotting corpses inside the longhouse. We were too weak to bury them. I was left alone with my two baby brothers. All my family died, and all we got in return were a few machetes.” This story comes from a Matis Indigenous woman living in Brazil and speaking to an anthropologist in the 1990s. Her people were almost wiped out in the years after they were initially contacted by outsiders in the 1970s. Loggers and wildcat miners brought in diseases, mainly influenza, against which the Matis had little resistance. Testimonies like this one from the Matis Indigenous woman convinced Survival International of the urgent need to campaign to safeguard the collective rights of the Indigenous, tribal and uncontacted peoples of the world, whom the human rights organization says must be left alone and fully protected. On Oct. 27, the NGO published a 300-page report, Uncontacted Indigenous Peoples: at the Edge of Survival, documenting the past and looming threats posed by contact and offering up the experiences of numerous Indigenous peoples whose lives have been uprooted, disrupted and forever changed by contact. It states: “In particular, the rush by extractive industries and agribusiness to seize the resources of uncontacted peoples risks their total annihilation.” A Tupá Matis Indigenous person near the Itui river in the Javari Valley, Brazil. The Matis were devastated by western diseases after&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/report-urges-full-protection-of-worlds-196-uncontacted-indigenous-peoples/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-308336</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Nickel mining threatens Raja Ampat ecosystems, communities &#038; conservation: Report</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/nickel-mining-threatens-raja-ampat-ecosystems-communities-conservation-report/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/nickel-mining-threatens-raja-ampat-ecosystems-communities-conservation-report/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Oct 2025 01:43:07 +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/20/2025/09/12105323/Copy-of-DJI_20241223084456_0019_V-min-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307396</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, Southeast Asia, and West Papua]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporations, Critical Minerals, Deforestation, Electric Cars, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Mining, Nikel, Renewable Energy, and UNESCO World Heritage Site]]>
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							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — In a new report, marine activists are demanding restoration efforts from nickel miners and the Indonesian government for affected areas of Raja Ampat while also urging authorities to enforce the ban on mineral extraction in coastal and small island regions. The recently published paper combines geospatial analysis with field evidence to reveal mounting [&#8230;]]]>
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							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — In a new report, marine activists are demanding restoration efforts from nickel miners and the Indonesian government for affected areas of Raja Ampat while also urging authorities to enforce the ban on mineral extraction in coastal and small island regions. The recently published paper combines geospatial analysis with field evidence to reveal mounting ecological risks from expanding nickel mining in Raja Ampat, known as the “Crown Jewel of Marine Biodiversity.” The research maps how concessions overlap with vital coral reefs, forests and community territories within the UNESCO Global Geopark. The findings point to growing pressure on both ecosystems and the livelihoods of Indigenous and local people across the archipelago. “Our research shows that nickel mining in Raja Ampat creates a domino effect of destruction, from direct forest clearing to sediment runoff that suffocates coral reefs to the displacement of marine species that local communities depend upon,” Timer Manurung, chair of the environmental organization Auriga Nusantara, which collaborated with mining watchdog Earth Insight in the research, said in a press statement published Sept. 25. Nickel mining on Manuran Island. Image courtesy of Auriga Nusantara. The research, supported by recent field photos, has revealed how more than 22,000 hectares (54,000 acres) of nickel mining concessions continue to threaten the UNESCO Global Geopark in Raja Ampat. Using the latest geospatial analysis, the researchers mapped overlaps between mining concessions and critical ecosystems, showing risks to 2,470 hectares (6,100 acres) of coral reefs and 7,200 hectares (17,800 acres) of forest, as well as&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/nickel-mining-threatens-raja-ampat-ecosystems-communities-conservation-report/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307396</doi>				</item>
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