BEIRUT, Lebanon — Beaches across the planet emptied as COVID-19 spread in 2020, with the first full lockdowns in many places coinciding with sea turtle nesting season. With less noise,…
It’s easier to spot the bristly, gray-brown hide of a Bornean bearded pig (Sus barbatus) ambling through orderly rows of oil palm trees, than amid a dense tropical forest. But…
Indonesia is today home to the last holdout populations of Sumatran rhinos, a species that once ranged across much of southern Asia. Official figures, which paint a more optimistic picture…
Tons of logging debris is choking rivers in Malaysian Borneo, devastating local wildlife and cutting off water supplies to 200,000 urban residents. The logjam, which has been described as a…
Every few years, stretches of Borneo’s towering dipterocarp trees fruit in a synchronized pulse. In those months, the air is rich with brown, winged fruit, which fall and spin to…
A Malaysian timber certification authority has halted its review of a conflict between Sarawak Indigenous communities and a forest license holder after the plywood company Samling Group filed a $1.18…
In her spare time as a research assistant in the forests of Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, Jessica Haysom turned to perusing mammal field guides. She found herself especially intrigued by the…
PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Nine districts in Indonesia have pledged to protect 50% of forests, peatlands and other “important ecosystems” in their jurisdictions by 2030, local leaders announced last week. Spread…
Deep-rooted mistrust in the Malaysian federal and state governments is preventing many Indigenous Penan people from accepting the COVID-19 vaccine. While there have been reports of some individuals traveling up…
HIYUNG, Indonesia — For the village cultivating Indonesia’s most pungent chili pepper, July is a time of prosperity — and potential ruin. That midsummer month is when hundreds of farmers…
Malaysian scientists and activists have called on road planners in the Bornean state of Sabah to reconsider a 13-kilometer (8-mile) stretch of the Pan Borneo Highway that will cut through…
Penan and Kenyah Indigenous communities in Malaysian Borneo will be given a chance to formally air their complaints against a timber company operating in their traditional territory, following the start…
Camera traps bring you closer to the secretive natural world and are an important conservation tool to study wildlife. This week we’re meeting a wild cat that looks like a…
Community-led conservation approaches are working, says Peter Kallang, a Kenyah leader in Sarawak who led a successful campaign to block a mega-dam project.
A timber company operating in Malaysia's Sarawak state has threatened to take legal action against Penan and Kenyah Indigenous communities that are campaigning against the company's certified-sustainable production plantations. For…
A project by the EcoVision Lab at ETH Zurich expects to have every quarter of the tropics mapped and classified by carbon stock by the end of the year, providing…
JAKARTA — To improve ecosystem management in Borneo, look at the population trends of key bird species on the island, researchers say. The scientists from the Center for International Forestry…
The Bornean subspecies of the Rajah scops-owl (Otus brookii) was first described from the montane forests of the Malaysian state of Sabah in 1892. Since then, however, its whereabouts have…
The outlook is bleak for Sumatran rhinos. Decades of poaching and habitat loss have precipitated a steep population decline. Once found across Southeast Asia, from the Himalayan foothills to the…
After a series of coal-slurry spills into the Malinau River in Indonesian Borneo, locals and environmental groups are calling for tougher sanctions, and for national banks to divest from the…
No one was sure exactly what near-term impact the global pandemic would have the world’s forests in 2020. Some expected lockdowns and economic shocks to dampen deforestation rates; others thought…
This is the story of how Indonesia is losing its spots. In a recent paper published in Nature Conservation, researchers found that the archipelagic nation has a significant illegal trade…
Environmentalists in Indonesia's South Kalimantan province have emerged victorious after a three-year legal battle against a company that planned to displace thousands of people and mine coal in a rich,…
In a little more than 20 years, Indonesia has gone from being a minor player in the global coal industry to playing a central role as a key consumer and…
A recorder is fastened to a tree, its microphone pointed downward. It captures a fusion of sound: the high-pitched buzz of cicadas, bird calls, and also the rumbling of a…
Conservationists trying to save the Sumatran rhino from extinction face a critical dilemma: In seeking to build a robust captive-breeding program, should the healthiest, most fertile rhinos be left in…
Over the past two decades, orangutan researcher Marc Ancrenaz watched as a tidal wave of oil palm has engulfed his once-forested research sites in northern Borneo. When he would find…
Three years ago, Panji Gusti Akbar was flipping through the pages of Birds of the Indonesian Archipelago when he came across a photo of a bird with brown wings and…
JAKARTA — A coal-slurry spill into a river in Indonesian Borneo has killed hundreds of fish and forced authorities to shut off water lines to households. The waste-management facility at…
Famed for its caves and karst ecosystems, Gunung Mulu National Park in Malaysian Borneo’s Sarawak state is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, home to more than 81 mammal species, 270…
