A new report reveals that investing in securing the land rights of Indigenous and tribal communities across Latin America and the Caribbean could cut carbon dioxide emissions at low costs…
A longer Spanish version of this essay appeared in the Journal of Latin American Geography. Indigenous elders play a key role in the protection of their culture and livelihoods. A…
I’ve lost count of the number of times, working as a journalist across Latin America, that I’ve met, spoken to, or heard from or about Indigenous peoples and other local…
Anglo American has up to 86 applications pending to mine on Indigenous lands in the Brazilian Amazon — a practice that is currently prohibited but could soon be allowed under a controversial bill. The company has refused to commit not to mine on Indigenous lands, yet also claims it never intended to do so when it and its two Brazilian subsidiaries filed nearly 300 applications for that very purpose.
The Amazônia Minada reporting project has revealed 1,265 pending requests to mine in Indigenous territories in Brazil, including restricted lands that are home to isolated tribes.
Sonia Castro says her family stayed in self-isolation for two months in the Jambuaçu Territory in Brazil’s Pará state. She recounts how they eventually fell ill, their condition worsening bit…
Environmental monitoring and firefighting saw budgets cut by over a third in two years; agencies endured massive deregulation, with nearly 600 rule changes aimed at undermining conservation, say critics.
The Roraima state bill legalizing garimpo prospecting, if signed into law by the governor, could put the Yanomami reserve and other Indigenous territories at greater risk of invasion and COVID-19 infection.
The old adage of "money talks" is being given a modern data analysis stress test and applied to the assassinations of civil society activists in the global mining sector. In…
Like virtually everything in 2020, COVID-19 defined the year for tropical rainforests. Conservation was particularly hard hit in tropical countries.
Today we have two stories about the impacts of mining and some of the new and innovative ways conservationists are attempting to deal with those impacts. Listen here: Our first…
Brazil’s Ferrovia Paraense (FEPASA) railroad will run from Pará state’s rainforest interior to the Amazon estuary; traditional communities say they haven’t yet been consulted as required by international law.
Brazil has been mined for gold, bauxite, manganese and more. While companies, investors and nations benefit, the Amazon’s people often haven’t, as they’ve lost traditional cultures, livelihoods and health.
Nazareth Cabrera is like a 'manicuera' they say, a sacred drink of the Indigenous Uitoto people that is obtained from the sweet yucca or fareka. Everything that is bitter, she…
Toxic legacy of mining firms — Norwegian-Japanese Albrás, Brazil’s Vale, Norway’s Norsk Hydro, and France’s Imerys Rio Capim Caulim — wreak havoc on livelihoods and health in Amazon communities: Critics.
Their territory is suffering the ravages of COVID-19, invasion by 20,000 illegal miners, mercury pollution, severe deforestation, and “genocidal” government apathy, say the Yanomami people.
Brazil’s mining authority is actively entertaining more than 3,000 requests to mine on Indigenous lands in the Amazon, despite such activity being prohibited under the country’s Constitution, an investigation by…
Mining, both legal and illegal, impinges on more than one-fifth of Indigenous territory in the Amazon, according to a new study from the World Resources Institute (WRI) and the Amazon…
In 2009, traditional Brazilian Amazon communities and Catholic nuns brought the transnational mining company to the negotiating table and galvanized Amazonia’s land rights struggle.
A new study finds that the four fish species most commonly consumed by Indigenous and riverine communities in northern Brazil contain the highest concentrations of mercury, up to four times in excess of WHO recommendations.
A group of more than 100 Peruvian and international non-profit organizations has written a letter to Peruvian President Martín Vizcarra, asking him to deliver emergency support to the Indigenous communities…
While MRN, a mining firm makes big profits working within, and harming, a Brazilian conservation unit, traditional people can be fined for collecting Brazil nuts and fishing sustainably in a nearby protected area.
Gold mining can demolish Amazon rainforest in just a few days. New research finds that the impacted forest does not recover even 3-4 years after a mine is abandoned.
Brazilian NGO flyovers show that indigenous reserves — including Munduruku lands in the Tapajós basin — are being illegally invaded and deforested by miners likely funded and directed by elite land speculators.
Niobium is an important element used as a steel additive in the making of cars, planes, nuclear weapons, and even piercings. Jair Bolsonaro would like to see it actively mined, even in indigenous reserves.
Using the customizable app ForestLink, traditional forest guardians (people living within and around the forest) can send near-real-time, geo-tagged alerts about illegal logging and mining activities to authorities and other…
“Based on the high probability of failure of the proposed tailings dam, the Volta Grande Gold Project should be rejected by the Brazilian regulatory authorities without further consideration.”
The Brazilian riverine communities of Boa Nova and Saracá say they’ve endured decades of environmental harm brought by MRN, the world’s fourth largest bauxite mining company.
With the Amazon fire season looming, 38 transnational firms, including Alcoa, Bayer, Shell, Siemens, Suzano, and Amaggi asked Brazil to act against environmental crimes. Brazil’s vice president has responded with a fire ban — critics say much more is needed.
A federal judge has issued an emergency order giving the Bolsonaro administration just days to evict all illegal miners, and keep them out until the danger of the COVID-19 pandemic is over.
