Conversion of rainforest to oil palm plantations in Malaysia. Photo by Rhett A. Butler Human population growth and associated food demand will likely take a heavy toll on tropical ecosystems…
The survival of primary forests depends on many overlapping interactions. Among these interactions include tropical gardeners, like the bonobo (Pan pansicus) in the Congo Basin, according to a new study…
Forest canopy on the sky island of Nyungwe, Rwanda. Photo by: Michele Menegon. The montane rainforests of East Africa are little-known to the global public. The Amazon and Congo loom…
John Lukas will be speaking at the Wildlife Conservation Network Expo in San Francisco on October 12th, 2013. On June 24th of last year, MaiMai Simba rebels, led by an…
Global Witness has called in question conclusions reached in a study on logging in Central Africa's rainforests. The group, which has published a series of investigative reports on abuses by…
Deforestation has fallen in Congo Basin countries over the past decade despite a sharp increase in the rate of forest clearing in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to…
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), a body that certifies forest management practices, has revoked all certificates granted to the Danzer Group, a multinational logging company, over alleged human rights abuses…
What happens to animals when their forest is cut down? If they can, they migrate to different forests. But in an age when forests are falling far and fast, many…
Although the term "giant mole rat" may not immediately inspire love, the mole rats of Africa are a fascinating bunch. They spend practically their entire lives underground building elaborate tunnel…
Forest elephants in the Mbeli River, Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park, Congo. Photo by: Thomas Breuer. Elephants are vanishing. The booming illegal ivory trade is decimating the world's largest land animal, but…
Forest elephant in Gabon More than 60 percent of Africa's forest elephants have been killed in the past decade due to the ivory trade, reports a new study published in…
Roger Peet (in blue shirt) posing with Forest Rangers. Photo courtesy of Roger Peet. Last year, Roger Peet, an American artist, traveled to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to…
Logging in Borneo. All photos by Rhett A. Butler Two environmental activist groups blasted the World Bank over its reported decision to block a probe into its support of industrial-scale…
Deforestation by forest type/classification in DRC, 2000-2005 and 2005-2010. The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has its first Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) project validated and verified…
For many animal families, diversity and abundance rises as one moves away from human-impacted landscapes, like agricultural areas, into untouched places, such as primary rainforests. However, a new study in…
Professor Baboko teaching a geography class at the Djolu Technical College of Rural Development. Photo courtesy of: Ingrid Schulze. This summer, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is expected to…
José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva speaking at a TEDx Amazon in 2010, just a few months before he and his wife were assassinated for their activism. On May 24th, 2011,…
Deforestation in the Congo Basin. Click image to enlarge. Deforestation in the Congo Basin has increased sharply since the 1990s, reports an extensive new assessment of forests in the six-nation…
A portion of Virunga National Park swaddled in clouds as seen by Google Earth. Permits for controversial oil exploration in Virunga National Park have been released after request by NGO…
Screenshot of new website of community mapping in central Africa's forests. A new initiative to place community mapping of central African rainforests online could prove key to local rights in…
Bunda Bokitsi. Photo by: Zoological Society of Milwaukee (ZSM). The effort to save wildlife from destruction worldwide has many heroes. Some receive accolades for their work, but others live in…
A new report finds that conservation giant WWF may demand too little when working with logging companies. Screenshot of WWF website. Arguably the globe's most well-known conservation organization, the World…
2.5-billion-ha carbon map shows forests store 250B tons of carbon Forest carbon stock. Click image to enlarge Tropical forests across Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia stored 247 gigatons of…
Two separate protests against logging companies by local communities have turned violent in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), leaving at least one dead. According to Greenpeace, one of the…
Forest elephant. Photo by: Carlton Ward Junior. An interview with Ahimsa Campos-Arceiz and Stephen Blake. Warning: graphic images below. It seems difficult to imagine elephants delicately tending a garden, but…
Clearing of peatlands in Indonesian Borneo. Photo copyright Greenpeace. One of the world's top consultancies, McKinsey & Co., is providing advice to governments developing "Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation"…
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has suspended oil exploration in Africa's oldest national park, Virunga, until a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is conducted. The move ends oil companies, Soco…
Outline of Yellowstone National Park, the world's first modern protected are, as seen by Google Earth. Yellowstone was opposed by many when it was first created including logging and mining…
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has legalized 15 logging concessions that were previously listed as illegal under an effort to clean up the industry of widespread corruption. The environmental…
An interview with Dr. Matt Hansen, co-director of SDSU’s Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence In recent years there has been an explosion in the number of satellite-based monitoring applications…
