As a group of plants, weeds are unloved by some people. However, this dislike is not universal. Weeds are colonizing, pioneering plants, with special botanical and ecological attributes that allow…
Floods, heatwaves, droughts, and wildfires – a changing climate is bringing with it ever more frequent and destructive so-called “natural” disasters, often impacting the most vulnerable areas and communities of…
As climate change intensifies across the world, humanitarian responses must urgently adapt to “cascading crises” with unprecedented consequences that put millions at risk of famine and death, a group of…
The answer is, it depends. A multitude of conditions must be analyzed, and forests properly managed long-term, if they’re to curb climate change-intensified flooding, landslides, and even stand up to a tsunami.
MINDANAO, Philippines – In the wake of deadly floods and landslides caused by Typhoon Nalgae last month, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has ordered tree planting be included in flood…
The Caribbean island is currently being convulsed by a wave of civil unrest and gang violence, immediately triggered by soaring gas prices. But a dire environmental crisis underlays and feeds Haiti’s socioeconomic and political disorder.
Moisés Oliveira de Carmo tells of the day in 2020 when he watched a chain of flames spread sideways at the edge of his farm, melding together to create a…
DHAKA — Wasim Ali, 45, lived in one of the 55,000 houses destroyed by the deadly Super Cyclone Amphan in May of 2020. The tropical storm whipped up a tidal…
Morocco fire forces evacuation of 15 villages and sparks fears that hundreds of endangered Barbary macaques may have been killed.
Much of Bangladesh lies in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna Basin, where the three rivers meet in the world’s largest delta before washing out in the Bay of Bengal. The Meghna Basin covers…
JENNINGS MOUNTAIN, St. Vincent and the Grenadines — The destruction was terrible, but the silence was even worse. Yvette Pereira had just walked up the road to the farm she…
If locusts return by the millions this September, as forecasted, South African farmers hope to follow their movements via a state-of-the-art tracking system, allowing for targeted elimination with pesticides.
On Feb. 28, a landslide of earth and waste from mines in Myanmar's Hpakant township engulfed dozens of miners and scavengers looking for jade in this remote, mountainous region. Official…
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa declared a national emergency on April 18 as the death toll from floods in KwaZulu-Natal province climbed over 440, with dozens of people still missing.…
Only aerial footage captures the true scale of the horror: Houses have been flattened, roads ruined, and everything looks like it’s been covered in a film of dark-brown syrup. A…
Scholars and political leaders worldwide are fretting over the complex connections between climate and insecurity. Many social scientists theorize that climate disruption is a “conflict multiplier.” To residents of the…
In 2017, Hurricane Maria, a Category 5 storm, struck Puerto Rico. The hurricane dried up four basin mangrove forests in the island’s northeast, leaving behind an urgent need for restoration,…
ABUJA, Nigeria — On Feb. 3, the Trinity Spirit, a floating production, storage and offloading vessel, caught fire off the coast of Nigeria. Seven of 10 crew members were killed.…
Cyclone Batsirai rammed into Madagascar’s coast on Feb. 5, bringing further devastation to a country already reeling from the effects of another tropical storm, Ana, that struck on Jan. 22. Batsirai,…
PALAWAN, Philippines — When park ranger Allan Daganta travels to work from his home in a village just outside Palawan's Puerto Princesa Subterranean River National Park (PPSRNP), he’s usually welcomed…
Three years after the collapse of a mining dam forced them from their homes in Brazil’s Minas Gerais state, a small community of Pataxó and Pataxó Hãhãhãe Indigenous peoples face…
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…
In 2020, fires tore across the Pantanal, the world’s largest wetland region that spans across Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay. By the time the year drew to a close, the fires…
A major fire has burned more than 1,000 hectares, or nearly 2,500 acres, of grassland in the Guassa Community Conservation Area of Ethiopia. While any long-term impacts are yet to…
Crude oil from a blowout has been pouring into creeks in the Niger Delta since Nov. 5, with the well's owner, Nigerian energy firm Aiteo, unable to contain the spill…
PENYARINGAN, Indonesia — Stretching across Bali’s southwest coast and up into the mountainous hinterland is Jembrana, one of the least populated of the Indonesian island’s nine administrative districts. Its name…
In a world wracked by wildfires, deadly storms, and the now too-familiar drumbeat of dire climate warnings, statistical descriptions of the future humanity faces can seem at once too sterile…
Fires have destroyed at least 18,000 hectares of vegetation (44,480 acres) in central Brazil’s savanna region and now threaten a national park that’s home to rare species such as jaguars,…
Our pollution of the planet with heavy metals, plastics, industrial chemicals, pesticides and more is pushing Earth systems to the limit, and us closer to crossing a dangerous planetary boundary we don’t understand.
On Feb. 8, 2019, two weeks after the collapse of a dam holding mining waste killed 272 people and left a trail of destruction in Brumadinho, in the Brazilian state…
