Likely the world’s most popular garment, jeans use huge amounts of water to grow irrigated cotton, a major factor in destroying the Aral Sea. Today, the industry, though making sustainability pledges, still does much harm.
Diseases affecting domestic animals, such as canine distemper, are increasingly infecting tropical wildlife, including wild felids, presenting a threat to biodiversity; so far solutions are few and funding is scarce.
Although Bangladesh’s waterways carry tremendous economic and geostrategic significance for both Bangladesh and India, environmental management issues have rendered most of these routes useless. Bangladesh and India signed a protocol…
In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic consumed humanity’s attention, our species ran through 4.5 trillion doses of myriad pharmaceuticals. In India alone, one drug, paracetamol — a pain reliever used to treat…
Water management experts have derided as “a drop in the ocean” an agreement between Bangladesh and India to share water from the Kushiara River, a minor waterway out of the…
Nestled in a verdant valley in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, about a four-hour drive southwest of Bengaluru, the agroecology learning center Amrita Bhoomi is one of dozens of…
In the sprawling Himalayas, amidst snow-peaked mountains, is a vast swathe of evergreen forest home to majestic tigers, elusive clouded leopards, charismatic hornbills, mystical giant squirrels, enchanting butterflies and bizarre…
An international team of scientists studying the distribution and threats facing some of South and Southeast Asia’s most economically important tree species has confirmed that current environmental protections fail to…
COLOMBO — For decades, the small population of Indian pangolins found in Sri Lanka has faced a single consistent threat: the domestic meat market. Pangolin meat is considered a delicacy…
KATHMANDU — When Nepali ornithologist Hem Bahadur Katwal reviewed the existing literature to prepare a proposal for his Ph.D., he came across a subject barely explored, not just in Nepal,…
Three people known for their work with sloths, fishing cats and giant armadillos were announced this week as winners of the 2022 Future for Nature (FFN) Award, given annually to…
Inside an opulent shopping mall in the Thai capital Bangkok, a casually clad man meets a potential customer. They discuss how to bring live tortoises into the country to sell…
COLOMBO — Travel bloggers and butterfly enthusiasts Paulmathi Vinod and Vinod Sadasivan were at Dhanushkodi Beach in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state for some bird-watching on Feb. 14. It hadn’t…
The reintroduction of gray wolves to Yellowstone National Park in 1995 triggered a cascade of knock-on effects. The wolves kept herbivores like elk in check and on the move, reducing…
With humans sending probes to Mars and the sun, one might think we’ve already explored the full extent of our own planet. But scientists say we’ve only begun to find…
In the village of Nongtraw in India's northeastern state of Meghalaya, one of the world’s wettest regions, honey is a sought after resource by the Khasi Indigenous community. They go…
Ambitious targets by Asian countries to restore tens of millions of hectares of degraded land by 2030 could be foiled by one fundamental problem: a lack of good-quality and genetically…
Researchers have found a snake species never before described by science — on Instagram! During the COVID-19 lockdowns in India, Virendar Bhardwaj, a master’s student at Guru Nanak Dev University,…
Researchers have described 12 new gecko species from India’s Western Ghats mountains, 10 of which are found nowhere else on Earth. One particularly stealth gecko, described as “nearly impossible to…
Jorhat, INDIA - A lone hoolock gibbon jumps from one tree branch to another before taking a big final leap across the railway tracks that fragment its forested home into…
This month, the leaders of nation states from around the world have been gathered in New York City to attend the 76th Session of the United Nations General Assembly. Covid,…
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.
Scientists have debated the evolution of the world’s five living rhinoceros species ever since Charles Darwin addressed the question in a treatise in the mid-1800s, predating On the Origin of…
DELHI NCR — Sunil Harsana says he always knew there were paintings in the caves near his home in Mangar, a village on the outskirts of India’s capital, New Delhi.…
Swinging lithely from branch to branch high up in the forest canopy, a family of hoolock gibbons hoots vigorously to guard its territory against intruders. A type of small ape…
Planting trees is often described as an important way to restore degraded landscapes and fight climate change. But does it always work? This month, the team at Mongabay brings you…
There’s a tree-planting frenzy everywhere you look. In August 2019, the state of Uttar Pradesh in northern India announced that more than a million Indians had planted 220 million trees…
PUNE, India — A 58-page, undated “vision document” produced by an Indian government think tank outlines a concept for the “sustainable development” of Little Andaman Island. The rainforested and sparsely…
In March 2019, Buzzfeed News published the first of a series of articles tying international conservation giant WWF to violent and severe human rights abuses allegedly committed by park rangers…
More than 21 years ago I established Mongabay out of my love for nature and wildlife. Today the endeavor has grown far beyond what I could have ever imagined with…
