CAPE TOWN — Seabird ranger Eduard Drost was busy with a routine inspection in an African penguin colony off the South African coast in 2021 when he noticed a troubling…
SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt — The first big news of the COP27 climate conference was a forest promise: UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced a 26-nation partnership to conserve woodland…
The world’s three forest giants — Brazil, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) — have signed a joint statement calling for the negotiation of new payment mechanisms to…
As the thorny question of climate responsibility and funding for damages takes center stage at the COP27 summit in Egypt, one aspect of climate finance remains understudied: climate research funding.…
When luxury safari hotel Shompole Lodge opened in Kenya in 2000, it was an overnight sensation. For $630 a night, guests could gaze at elephants and zebras while soaking in…
After five months of waiting, the Indigenous pygmy peoples of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have secured a major victory. Earlier today, the president of the DRC, Felix…
Healthy ecosystems are often noisy places: from reefs to grasslands and forests, these are sonically rich thanks to all the species defending territories, finding mates, locating prey, or perhaps enjoying…
African cocoa plantations have seen massive growth in recent years on its path to help feed the world’s veracious appetite for a popular delicacy – chocolate. The Ivory Coast, the…
Two African penguin chicks have emerged from their nest beneath a boulder at a site in South Africa where conservationists have used lifelike decoy penguins and broadcast penguin calls to…
Congo Basin impact of new FSC rule will depend on governance YAOUNDÉ — Until recently, forestry companies that had cleared natural forests for plantations since the Forest Stewardship Council was…
For over 35 years, I have been working on the frontlines of African wildlife conservation and have witnessed significant breakthroughs in tackling poaching, human-wildlife conflict and habitat loss. Yet it…
It’s a stunning landscape with a prophetic name: Lisima lya mwono, or “the source of life” as it’s known in the language of the local Luchaze people. But that’s not…
With 350 million people facing food insecurity on the continent, most African nations face a quandary: how to vanquish hunger and meet the climate challenge. The continent is warming faster…
Madagascar is said to be one of the top biodiversity hotspots in the world. About 80% of Madagascar’s unique biodiversity, numerous species found nowhere else on Earth, depends on its…
South Africa approves platinum mine despite community concerns GA-NGWEPE, South Africa — South Africa’s minister of mineral resources and energy has approved a platinum mine in the Vhembe Biosphere Reserve,…
Should African countries use natural gas to power their economies until they can build more climate-friendly renewable electrical grids? The question has been at the heart of an acrid debate…
Activists have accused an association of banks claiming to adhere to principles safeguarding people and the environment of “greenwashing.” Two signatories of the Equator Principles are currently advising East African…
On October 18, 2022, Ugandan President H.E. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni delivered a keynote address during African Energy Week which took place in Cape Town, South Africa between October 18 and…
Logging near Cameroon national park raises red flags over permits YAOUNDE — Agroindustrial company Cameroun Vert S.A., or Camvert, is again clearing forest near Campo Ma'an National Park, raising questions…
More than 14 years after being forcibly relocated from their ancestral villages to make way for mining in one of the world’s largest diamond-producing projects, residents of Arda Transau in…
Asian companies made their entry in force in the 1990s, in Cameroon, Gabon and Equatorial Guinea. In Southeast Asia, companies intensively and unsustainably logged the dipterocarp forests, the tall, straight-trunked…
Groups demand end to Chinese gold mine operating inside DRC reserve ITURI PROVINCE, Democratic Republic of Congo — Civil society groups have condemned what they say is illegal gold mining…
DAKAR — The construction of a highway linking the Senegalese capital, Dakar, to Saint Louis, the principal city in the north of the country, will encroach heavily on forest reserves,…
The Gura Ferda forest in southwest Ethiopia is a beautiful example of a forest and local people living in harmony, says biodiversity and protected area specialist Julian Bayliss. Bayliss, who…
Studying primates in the wild has historically been a tough task. Alexander Piel knows the challenges too well. Since 2005, the biological anthropologist has been studying primates in countries like…
In the first nine months of this year, poachers have killed 190 rhinos in state-run protected areas in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province. That’s one rhino killed every 35 hours. Most…
NDJI, Cameroon – Batchenga, 65 kilometers (40 miles) northeast of Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, is slowly reopening. After serving as a ramp at the start of a national road linking the…
Gorillas and chimpanzees living in a remote part of the Congo Basin hang out together and some, like humans, even establish “relationships with benefits,” a new study reveals. Observations of…
Once common in East Africa, there is now only one known viable dugong population found in this entire region. With just a few hundred left in the waters around the…
Australian firm Invictus plans forest protection projects covering more than 300,000 hectares, or 741,000 acres, of indigenous forest in western Zimbabwe, which the company says will more than offset emissions…