Tambopata National Reserve is a haven for plants and wildlife, not to mention ecologists eager to understand the mysteries of the forest in this corner of the Peruvian Amazon. “It’s…
Indians decry Temer’s backing of “marco temporal,” which could negate legal indigenous claims to millions of hectares in the Amazon and elsewhere, protestors say.
Mining of vast diamond reserves, plus three new dams which could power the mines, would likely harm Indians on Roosevelt and Aripuanã rivers.
Brazil’s president approves new criteria for indigenous land demarcation to deny Indians their traditional lands; opens door to elite land thieves, agribusiness, opponents say.
Many dozens of major infrastructure projects — including highways, dams and mines — have been given the green light in the Brazilian Amazon in recent years, and hundreds more are…
Last week saw a busy, but contradictory, stream of actions likely to impact Amazonian forests. Brazilian president Michel Temer — supposedly at the urging of supermodel and environmentalist Gisele Bündchen…
In the late 1970s, Raimunda Gomes da Silva and her husband, João Pereira da Silva, moved to Tucuruí in Pará state. João went to work on the dam being built…
(Leia essa matéria em português no The Intercept Brasil. You can also read this Mongabay article in Portuguese at The Intercept Brasil) he Amazon is the sort of wild place where…
CHOCÓ, Colombia - Rivers, forests and its inhabitants are inseparably connected in Colombia's Chocó department on the country's northwest coast. The gravity of the contamination that has begun to affect…
Indigenous leaders and activists gathered in Quito, Ecuador, last Thursday, March 9, to denounce the Ecuadorian government for its complicity in allowing international mining companies to take over indigenous territory. The…
A Brazilian judge dealt a blow to the Belo Sun mining company’s plans to open the largest goldmine in Brazil this week. The proposed mine is slated for the Volta…
An Amazonian catfish -- the dorado catfish -- makes the world's longest known freshwater migration, a new study has confirmed. Clocking more than 7,200 miles (~11,600 kilometers), the dorado catfish (Brachyplatystoma rousseauxii)…
Sometimes for a scientist, the disconnected pieces of years of research come together in a single, “really awesome” point in time. For ecologist Greg Asner, where it happened was about…
In the Cordillera del Cóndor mountains of southern Ecuador, a copper mining project has incited numerous confrontations between Chinese mining company EXSA and the Shuar indigenous community, which both claim…
A conflict is brewing in the southern Ecuadorian Amazon. Specifically, in the rural towns of the San Juan Bosco and Limón Indanza, located in the Cordillera del Cóndor mountains in…
Few places on Earth escape the reach of humankind, and those areas are dwindling, according to a new study. Between 2000 and 2013, the world lost a Venezuela-sized expanse of…
In the popular imagination, the Amazon is often seen as a wild, mostly unpopulated place. But, it’s not jaguars and piranhas that stand as the chief dangers here; it’s the…
The price of oil controls much of what happens in Venezuela, determining the nation’s economic health, policies and politics. In 1995, when that price fell to just 16 dollars per…
Northern La Paz - Fifteen years ago, ex-miner Pedro Espinoza decided to leave behind gold mining and go to live in the middle of a forest in the Yiquimuni area,…
In a new report, the Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP), via data from the early warning deforestation alert system produced by the University of Maryland's GLAD (Global Land…
ish kills, mercury contamination, the extinction of known aquatic species (along with others still not known to science), plus the physical and economic ruin of indigenous and traditional river communities.…
ven before the controversial Belo Monte hydroelectric power station — the third largest in the world — began operation in April of this year, the harm the project was doing…
he Brazilian Amazon has a long history of conflict between illegal gold miners and indigenous people, which has often resulted in extreme violence against remote tribes. 2015 saw a dramatic…
Amid collections of museum specimens, biologists have discovered eight new species of “whip spiders” from the genus Charinus -- arachnids with thin, long, whip-like legs. This discovery nearly doubles the…
Illegal gold mining is ravaging vast swaths of Peruvian Amazon. In November 2015, a report released by the Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP) showed that illegal gold mining operations had entered…
The lower Las Piedras River, in the far west Amazon rainforests of the Madre de Dios region of southern Peru, is an incredibly biodiverse area — but it’s also the…
he Amazon’s freshwater ecosystems are at risk because current policy and existing protected areas fail to protect the connectivity of the water cycle, scientists warn. The new study, published in…
Recently released satellite images show that illegal gold mining activities have now encroached upon Tambopata National Reserve, an important protected area in the southern Peruvian Amazon.
A gold mining project proposed near the Belo Monte dam site in the Amazon rainforest has been suspended by a Brazilian court, reports Reuters. The suspension was handed down to…
Video of illegal gold mining operations that have turned a portion of the Amazon rainforest into a moonscape went viral on Youtube after a popular radio and TV journalist in…