A pioneering rice farm in Vermont has embraced the agroecological technique known as "aigamo method," which introduces ducks into rice fields to offer natural weed and pest control, along with…
Mario Rene Xol used to enjoy life in Aldea Tierra Negra, an Indigenous village bordering the Lachuá-Ik'bolay Key Biodiversity Area (KBA) in northeastern Guatemala. Since the arrival of palm oil…
JURUTI, Pará — As we approach the airport in Santarém, Pará, astonishment echoes loudly throughout the plane as its passengers see the extent of the drought below. Through the tiny…
BATUTEGI FOREST, Indonesia — Like millions of small farmers across Indonesia, Sri Atmiatun’s family has shouldered higher fertilizer prices, cost-of-living hikes, and increasingly extreme weather in recent years. The river…
In the Ecuadorian Amazon, uncontrolled illegal fishing with agrochemicals and explosives is causing long-lasting damage to aquatic ecosystems, while representing a real danger to human health, a recent study has…
LAMJUNG DISTRICT, Nepal — When the dark, heavy clouds loom over the lush hills of Ghanpokhara, Ratna Gurung knows it's time to bring in the sun-dried foxtail millet. Before the…
JAKARTA — Since its inception in 2017, the Jakarta-based Sustainable District Association, or LTKL, has brought together district governments and other stakeholders to take collective action toward greater sustainability, mainly…
Agriculture is a core area of Mongabay's coverage both because the world must find more sustainable ways to feed its human societies and because how it's currently practiced is generally…
Producing the best wine grapes is an art: vintners need to meticulously manage soil and water conditions, deal with pests, and curate pollinators. Monitoring their vines year-round, growers carefully adjust…
WOODSTOCK, Vermont — As the sun rises, the ethereal song of a wood thrush echoes through Bourdon Maple Farm’s 55-hectare (135-acre) forest in Woodstock. A bright scarlet tanager wings about…
LIMBUNG, Indonesia — Sarijan struggled to understand why they had come to arrest him. His mother tongue was Javanese, and he could parse only bits and pieces of Indonesian as…
Some of the world’s largest soy producers have announced improved commitments to stopping deforestation in vulnerable biomes throughout South America. But despite the improvements, the commitments might still not be…
The agricultural producers of the Amazon have access to radically different levels of credit depending upon national policies, the willingness of each country’s financial services industry to engage rural populations…
The government of Suriname has made plans to appropriate a massive stretch of the Amazon Rainforest for projects related to agriculture and livestock. If finalized, the deal could allow unprecedented…
LIMBUNG, Indonesia — Tall brush has taken over the land that Sarijan farmed for decades here on the island of Borneo. At the height of Indonesia’s 2019 wildfire crisis, the…
Sustainability initiatives have been organised for most of the agricultural commodities of the Pan Amazon, including palm oil, soy and beef, but also for coffee and cacao. Several of these…
As the government of Laos continues to prioritize a hydropower-heavy agenda to generate export revenues while striving toward greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets, it may be overlooking soaring carbon emissions…
COVAS DO BARROSO, Portugal — In the hills of Barroso high in northeastern Portugal, the water gushes down small channels built many centuries ago, winding through a mosaic of pastures,…
JAKARTA — Environmental activists have slammed one of Indonesia’s biggest palm oil producers for a report that they say glosses over its alleged violations and ignores concerns raised by local…
IIJIMA, Japan – Since the last ice age, a butterfly species called the Reverdin’s blue (Plebejus argyrognomon, known as miyamashijimi in Japanese), has survived in the nation’s grasslands maintained by…
JAKARTA — Indigenous people in Indonesia’s easternmost South Papua province have lambasted a court’s decision to reject their lawsuit that seeks to overturn an environmental permit for a palm oil…
Water is essential for all forms of life. It also underpins food security, economic prosperity and public health. This is especially so in Thailand, a country transited by some of…
The most lucrative agricultural system in the Amazon is neither soy nor palm oil, but coca leaf, which is cultivated for both legal and illegal markets. There are two species,…
Many of our staple food products are highly dependent on industrial agriculture and global supply chains, but small farmers in the Amazon continue to produce foodstuffs for their families, local…
The municipality of Feijó in Acre state is the first in Brazil to receive a certification of origin for its açaí berries, raising hopes that the economy centered around the fruit will grow in value.
Situated in western Nigeria, some 70 kilometers (113 miles) east of Nigeria’s commercial city of Lagos, Oluwa Forest Reserve is facing severe pressure from smallholder farmers and big plantations. On…
JAKARTA — When the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the world's largest association for ethical palm oil production, kicked off the second day of its annual roundtable conference on Nov.…
LA CEIBA, Colombia — Nine years ago, Delio de Jesús Suárez Gómez made a pact with wild bees. The arrangement didn’t come easy, given that neither party knew each other…
Plonked between the formidable Owen Stanley mountains to its west and the Solomon Sea to the east lies Oro, a remote province in Papua New Guinea east of the capital…
At almost 1.4 million hectares (3.4 million acres), a little smaller than the U.S. state of Connecticut, Kerinci Seblat National Park is the second-largest park in Indonesia, and a jewel…