Indigenous leaders from Africa, Asia, and Latin America attended the UN climate talks in Paris last December to present research showing that traditional indigenous territories in the Amazon Basin, the…
U Ye Aung spent most of his adult life in a war zone. For over 60 years his village of Kalaikyi served as the frontline in one of Myanmar’s longest…
Forests are vital ecosystems that provide crucial habitat to wildlife and help regulate everything from regional hydrological cycles to the global climate. But conservationists, forestry officials, and other decisionmakers often…
Community Forest Management (CFM) is an increasingly popular approach to conserving forests worldwide, due to the fact that involving the local community that uses and lives within the forests helps…
n May 2013, the journal Conservation Biology published an editorial describing 10 conservation methods that emerged since the late 1970's as fads, “approaches that are embraced enthusiastically and then abandoned.”…
Other stories in Mongabay’s series on the Maya Biosphere Reserve: Killing of Guatemalan activist in the Maya Biosphere Reserve raises alarm Successes and many challenges in Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve…
Other stories in Mongabay’s series on the Maya Biosphere Reserve: Killing of Guatemalan activist in the Maya Biosphere Reserve raises alarm Successes and many challenges in Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve…
Other stories in Mongabay’s series on the Maya Biosphere Reserve: Killing of Guatemalan activist in the Maya Biosphere Reserve raises alarm Communities lead the way in rainforest conservation in Guatemala…
t age 70 Ngai Mutuoboro may not possess the vibrancy of his youthful days, but he can still pack a punch when it comes to environmental conservation. The elder from…
Forty women, a few small children, and one adventurous dog pile into pick-up trucks parked in the town square. It is an early Saturday morning in March in the small…
uatemalan communities engaged in sustainable forestry in the Maya Biosphere Reserve have rallied some high-profile supporters. Musicians from multiple Grammy Award winning pop group Maroon 5 have spoken out for…
ambodian authorities released a leader of the Chong indigenous group from prison on March 3. Ven Vorn, imprisoned since October, was convicted of harvesting forest products without authorization and sentenced…
A proposed superhighway in southeast Nigeria has prompted calls from locals and the international community to stop what they claim is a land grab in the middle of a celebrated…
In 2013 the Tanzanian government granted a Dubai-based company permission to set up a wildlife corridor that would serve as a hunting safari destination on 1,500 square kilometers of savannah.…
The Nganyi forest shrine in Esibila village, in Western Kenya may not appear on any geographical map as an important icon. But the forest, which lies on just one acre…
Research has shown that land held by indigenous and local communities tends to be more effectively protected from human-driven changes like deforestation than land managed by governments or private entities.…
By mapping such community lands, LandMark aims to “make clear that these lands are not vacant, idle or available to outsiders,” according to a statement by the World Resources Institute…
ew places offer a glimpse of Indonesia’s forlorn environmental track record like Meru Betiri, a 58,000-hectare national park tucked away in the southeast corner of Java island. The park is…
Every day at noon Bahar and Nasirah set out on foot into the South Sulawesi backcountry. The couple moves instinctively through single-stem plants, gathering chilies and pumpkin, knowing as each day…
One night in June 2013, the rev of a car engine caught the ear of Markus Ilun, an indigenous leader in the remote Indonesian village of Punan Adiu. He was…
Deep in the mountains of eastern Bali sits a traditional Aga village, whose inhabtants – legendarily the island’s first – still reside and abide by ancient ways. Long before Indonesian…
On this rare occasion, the longhouse in Sungai Utik, a Dayak Iban settlement in Indonesian Borneo, was extremely busy. Every one of the 28-door dwelling’s inhabitants was home, gathered for…
One March morning on the island of Sulawesi, not long after Yerri Otoluwa was appointed acting head of Rumbia village, two men she didn’t know arrived on her doorstep. “Can…
Jemi Delvian was astonished the first time he stood in the dipterocarp forest of Indonesia’s Pahmungan village. The lead singer of Hutan Tropis, the Sumatran punk rock band that cares…
When the children of Mendiro hamlet would hear the year 1998 in school, chances were it heralded a lesson on Indonesia’s violent lurch to democracy after the devastating financial crash…
lthough it is administratively part of Palangkaraya in Central Kalimantan, the village of Mungku Baru is far from the city in both distance and development. Cell phone signal is scarce,…
Rice paddies in Bali. Photo: Rhett Butler Indonesian civil society groups and experts welcome President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's campaign promise to redistribute nine million hectares of land to farmers –…
