A photo of an odd-looking amphibian drew attention on Twitter last week, where it was described as a “smooth lil fella”, compared to a melted tootsie roll candy, and likened…
Years of artisanal mining along the Madre de Dios River and its tributaries have left their marks, both seen and unseen. Miners, swarming to the region in a modern-day goldrush,…
QUITO — Its a sad moment for any Indigenous community when spiritual leaders, those who hold the knowledge of sacred ceremonies and traditions, pass away from this world. But Sabino…
On February 11, 2022, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro published a decree establishing the Program for Supporting the Development of Artisanal Mining (Pró-Mape), which aims to “stimulate” this type of mining…
Major investment managers including BlackRock and Capital Group are among more than a dozen U.S. and Brazilian institutions heavily financing mining companies that are destroying Indigenous reserves and their inhabitants’…
Tropical rainforests are more resilient than previously thought, a new study shows, with a high capacity for natural regeneration in areas that are only slightly degraded adjacent to patches of…
Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon last month was the highest of any January dating back to 2008, reports Brazil's national space research agency INPE. According to data released today, 430…
Forest degradation due to environmental causes (such as drought) and human causes (such as fragmentation) released three times as much carbon as deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon between 2010 and 2019, say researchers.
As a best-selling author, the co-founder of the award-winning Amazon Conservation Team, and an acclaimed public speaker, Mark Plotkin is one of the world’s most prominent rainforest ethnobotanists and conservationists.…
Felipe “Pipe” Henao is a young environmentalist from the small town of Calamar in southeastern Colombia. At the meeting point of the Amazon and Orinoco basins, it’s an area of…
Illegal mining in protected areas in the Brazilian Amazon saw as much as a fivefold increase since 2010, a gold rush driven largely by surging prices in international markets. Over…
Pesticides have been dropped from planes and even helicopters with the aim of evading IBAMA, the Brazilian environmental agency, for years as a method to clear remote and hard-to-reach areas…
PUTUMAYO, Colombia — When Jonh Jairo Mueses-Cisneros was approached by leadership at Corpoamazonia about turning Colombia’s southwestern department of Putumayo into a bird-watching hotspot more than 10 years ago, he…
Once the epicenter of the global trade in gold, illegal mining is once again surging across the Amazon. Its extraction and trade is not only fueling corruption, money laundering and…
With about 80% of its forests still untouched, Acre is one of Brazil’s least-deforested Amazonian states. Bordered by Peru on the west, it represents just 1.7% of Brazil’s huge land…
“All of a sudden, in one little lump, this project leaked into my mind,” Thomas Lovejoy recalled to writer David Quammen for the book The Song of the Dodo, about…
Josefina Tunki is a mother, even though she doesn’t have any biological children. In 2019, she became the first president of the Shuar Arutam People (Pueblo Shuar Arutam, PSHA, in…
SANTA HELENA DO INGLÊS, Brazil — In a small clearing at the edge of the rainforest, two rows of solar panels gleam in the scorching late-morning sun. In a shed…
Between rising deforestation in the Amazon, new financial and political commitments to reduce deforestation, and growing interest in “nature-based solutions” like conservation and reforestation, 2021 may prove to be a…
In 2021, Mongabay’s investigative journalism set out to hold powerful figures accountable for deforestation and pollution, and the mistreatment of vulnerable communities trying to protect local ecosystems. Using data-driven analysis…
For the Amazon, 2021 was yet another year under the pandemic where the onslaught against nature never seemed to end. Deforestation continues, surging at year’s end Deforestation continued in the…
The lush rainforest stretches for miles across the Terra do Meio Ecological Station, in Brazil's northern state of Pará. Near the edge of the vast protected reserve, a makeshift road…
2021 was a year where tropical forests featured more prominently in global headlines than normal thanks to rising recognition of the role they play in addressing climate change and biodiversity…
Thomas E. Lovejoy III, a prominent and influential conservation biologist who helped catalyze a global movement to save the Amazon rainforest and served as an advisor to a wide range…
RIO BRANCO, Brazil — The intensification of forest fires in the Brazilian Amazon is increasingly impacting the health of local populations, with a marked effect on the region’s Indigenous peoples.…
An initiative in the northern Brazilian Amazon is helping a group of rural women reclaim their riverine culture and traditions while also empowering them economically. The Sementes do Araguari Association,…
"Where does your ayahuasca come from?" is a question many drinkers of the psychoactive Amazonian brew would just as soon not ask of their suppliers. But Thiago Martins e Silva,…
As of July 2021, deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon rose 22% over the previous year. High levels of deforestation across the entire Amazon region are bringing the rainforest to a…
With humans sending probes to Mars and the sun, one might think we’ve already explored the full extent of our own planet. But scientists say we’ve only begun to find…
At the COP26 climate summit last month, when Brazilian Environment Minister Joaquim Leite announced the country would update its climate goals to include zero illegal deforestation by 2028 (replacing the…
