The year in rainforests 2021
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…
Bornean communities locked into 2-million-hectare carbon deal they don’t know about
Leaders in Sabah, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, have signed a profit-sharing deal to market carbon and other natural capital from more than 2 million hectares (4.9…
Study shows ‘encouraging’ results of China’s bid to protect coastal wetlands
A new study has found that China’s coastal wetlands have undergone significant recovery within the last 10 years after several decades of loss and destruction. An international team of researchers…
Deforestation notches up along logging roads on PNG’s New Britain Island
The loss of forest in an island province in Papua New Guinea (PNG) surged in August, according to satellite data. The target of these forays is likely timber, at least…
Amazonian ecosystems and peoples on the brink – it is time for a new vision (commentary)
A code red for humanity. These were the words of the UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, summarizing the strong messages of the latest IPCC report on climate change. Among the most…
Deforestation threatens tree kangaroo habitat in Papua New Guinea
The forests of northwestern Papua New Guinea are home to a group of wide-eyed and reclusive marsupials known as tree kangaroos. As their name suggests, they spend a lot of…
Inland mangroves reveal a tumultuous climatic past — and hint at our future
Exequiel Ezcurra was dubious when he first heard about the possibility of mangroves on the San Pedro Mártir River in southern Mexico from Carlos Burelo-Ramos, a botanist at Mexico’s University…
Africa’s montane forests are more carbon-dense than even the Amazon
A new study promises to give Africa’s mountain forests a leg up in the eyes of climate scientists. They store nearly 150 metric tons of carbon dioxide per hectare, according…
Climate change threatens traditional extractive communities in the Amazon
A study analyzed 56 extractive reserves in the Brazilian Amazon to assess how climate change will affect 18 of the main plant species collected from the rainforest.
Lessons from Brazil’s São Paulo droughts (commentary)
The year 2021 is a La Niña year, and La Niña events typically lead to droughts in southeastern Brazil where São Paulo, the world’s fourth largest city, is located. La…
Building back Miami’s Biscayne Bay: Do natural solutions hold hope?
MIAMI — Along the Miami shoreline, luxury high-rises and condominiums run parallel to Biscayne Bay, one of South Florida’s most biodiverse ecosystems, characterized by its once abundant coral reefs, seagrass…
Farmers in the Amazon could earn 9 times more and prevent ecosystem collapse
The smart money is on the Amazon forest. Agroforestry can replace cattle, generate new wealth, create jobs and develop new economic zones that insulate pristine forest from deforestation risk. Investors…
In Pennsylvania, agroforestry holds a key to cleaning up waterways and Chesapeake Bay
From her porch on Village Acres Farm in Mifflintown, Pennsylvania, Angela Brubaker can see the curved rows of trees in the new riparian buffer along Lost Creek. The tree tubes…
Momentum is building for a ‘robust’ biodiversity framework: Q&A with Elizabeth Mrema
2020 was supposed to be the year for evaluating the past decade’s progress in meeting biodiversity conservation targets and setting the agenda for the next decade. But then the pandemic…
Rivers can be climate change solutions, too (commentary)
This past December marked the 5th anniversary of the landmark Paris Agreement. Soon after, the Biden Administration rejoined the Paris Agreement as one of their first actions in office. And…
Developing nations pay for rich countries’ hunger for healthy, exotic food
Luísa Carvalheiro says she remembers a time when açaí was just a humble berry, a staple for the Amazon's Indigenous communities. That was before the inky purple berries became all…
An economic case for competing in the XPRIZE Rainforest contest (commentary)
In 2019, XPRIZE Rainforest opened its doors and challenged the world to develop new biodiversity assessment technologies by offering a $10 million prize for the best one. The consequent mobilization will extend…
Researchers urge better protection as wetlands continue to vanish
Swamps, sloughs, marshes, bogs, fens; water purification, flood control, wildlife nurseries, nutrient providers, carbon sinks: wetlands have many names and serve many environmental purposes. But for centuries they have been…
Lasers reveal steep decline in ecosystem function of degraded Amazon forests
Every year, growing swaths of the Amazon rainforest are degraded by logging, fragmentation, and human-sparked fires. New research using airplane-based laser scanning of trees shows that degraded forests are hotter,…
‘Nature is next’: Q&A with Finance for Biodiversity’s Simon Zadek
2020 was supposed to be the year that governments, business leaders and civil society came together to report back on the past decade's worth of progress on addressing the biodiversity…
In mangrove restoration, custom solutions beat one-size-fits-all approach
The vast tangled mangrove forests that sweep along so many tropical coasts are one of the world’s most biodiverse ecosystems. They also play crucial roles in protecting coastlines from erosion…
IPBES report details path to exit current ‘pandemic era’
Avoiding the loss of human life and the economic fallout caused by future pandemics will require a seismic change in our approach to the causes of the emergence of disease-causing…
We’re not protecting enough of the right areas to save biodiversity: Study
The past decade began with promise, as nearly every country on the planet made commitments to protect large areas of land, safeguarding global biodiversity amid the ongoing sixth mass extinction.…
‘Tamper with nature, and everyone suffers’: Q&A with ecologist Enric Sala
Early on in his new book, The Nature of Nature: Why We Need the Wild, marine ecologist and National Geographic explorer-in-residence Enric Sala offers a warning about our ability to…
In defense of bats in a COVID world (commentary)
Much is being said lately about wild animals and epidemics. And it is true, the majority of viral emergent epidemics start in animals and are passed on to humans, in…
Everything you need to know about the Amazon rainforest: an interview with Mark Plotkin
As Earth's largest rainforest, the Amazon is the planet's single greatest repository of biodiversity, houses the largest number of uncontacted indigenous tribes, and is home to the world's mightiest river.…
Investing in Amazon Rainforest Conservation: A Foreigner’s Perspective (commentary)
Last December, I flew to Brazil to learn everything I could about Amazon conservation. As a global citizen, I wanted to understand more about deforestation and how I can help.…
Will the next coronavirus come from Amazonia? Deforestation and the risk of infectious diseases (commentary)
The only positive effect of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic is that it has generated public awareness of the risks of emerging diseases. One may hope that this will result in…
Extreme El Niño drought, fires contribute to Amazon insect collapse: Study
Dung beetle species populations are moving toward collapse in parts of the Brazilian Amazon apparently due to climate change-driven drought, fires, and other human disturbances.
US economy will take biggest hit if we continue with business as usual: report
New research finds that if humans carry on with business as usual and the environmental degradation that results, we will pay a steep price — quite literally. Researchers with WWF,…
Special series
Forest Trackers
- Endangered chimps ‘on the brink’ as Nigerian reserve is razed for agriculture, timber
- Agricultural frontier advances in Nicaraguan biosphere reserve
- ‘Rampant forest destruction’ wracks reserve as cattle ranching advances in Brazilian Amazon
- ‘Unprecedented’ fires in Madagascar national park threaten livelihoods and lemurs
Oceans
- As climate change melts Antarctic ice, gentoo penguins venture further south
- In hot water: Ocean warming hits another record high on climate change
- Guinea-Bissau turtle hatchery addresses unusual problem of too many eggs
- The thick of it: Delving into the neglected global impacts of human waste
Amazon Conservation
- Young environmentalists ‘plant the future’ in Colombia’s Amazon
- Josefina Tunki: ‘If we have to die in defense of the land, we have to die’
- Global ayahuasca trend drives deforestation in Brazil’s Acre state
- Oil highway bears down on uncontacted Indigenous groups in Ecuador’s Yasuní
Land rights and extractives
- Amazon to Alps: Swiss gold imports from Brazil tread a legal minefield
- Analysts point to logging and mining to explain Solomon Islands unrest
- Philippine groups slam ‘cruel Christmas gift’ as open-pit mining ban is lifted
- Josefina Tunki: ‘If we have to die in defense of the land, we have to die’
Endangered Environmentalists
- Death threats and friction with military force Guatemalan rangers to flee
- Amazon mining threatens dozens of uncontacted Indigenous groups, study shows
- The Kichwa woman fighting drug traffickers and loggers in the Peruvian Amazon
- Rights groups demand end to Cambodia’s persecution of green activists
Indonesia's Forest Guardians
- From Flores to Papua: Meet 10 of Indonesia’s mangrove guardians
- Why I stand for my tribe’s forest: It gives us food, culture, and life (commentary)
- Reforesting a village in Indonesia, one batch of gourmet beans at a time
- Restoring Sumatra’s Leuser Ecosystem, one small farm at a time
Conservation Effectiveness
- Young forests can help heal tropical aquatic ecosystems: Study
- How sharing and learning from failures can transform conservation (commentary)
- Is planting trees as good for the Earth as everyone says?
- ‘Bad science’: Planting frenzy misses the grasslands for the trees
Southeast Asian infrastructure
- In Laos, a ‘very dangerous dam’ threatens an ancient world heritage site
- Bali’s new highway project sparks concerns about agriculture and conservation areas
- Deforestation notches up along logging roads on PNG’s New Britain Island
- Plantations and roads strip away Papua’s forests. They’re just getting started
