In a remote corner of the Brazilian Amazon, federal police agents hovered in helicopters above a massive gash in the rainforest canopy. Below them, gaping craters and muddy pools of…
NORTH PENAJAM PASER, Indonesia — When an expectant mother is around three days from entering labor, the Suku Balik prepare a container out of coconut palm containing fruit, tobacco and…
Summer in the Northern Hemisphere has brought record-shattering heat waves and unchecked wildfires that shroud urban centers in smoke. These climate impacts endanger human health, and they also intensify the…
LOS BAÑOS, Philippines — Built on wooden stilts and tied to endemic bangkal trees (Nauclea orientalis) are the homes of the Manobo Indigenous tribe, seemingly floating on the waters of…
SERAM ISLAND, Indonesia — Zainudin Kelsaba traversed across the eastern Seram highland and stopped at an ancient outcrop grown over by trees and scrub. “The mountain is our home,” Zainudin…
In June, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) announced Monica P. Medina as its new President and CEO. Medina is the first woman to take the helm at WCS and brings…
Despite being among the best safeguards against deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest, Indigenous lands saw a sharp increase in deforestation over the past decade, according to a study published recently…
Rangelands cover more than 40% of the African continent and about half of Namibia. Large portions of Namibia’s rangelands are communal, serving as shared pastures for livestock and wildlife. These…
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) produces around 70% of the global supply of cobalt and it is also Africa’s leading producer of copper. Despite the billions of dollars in…
The mining giant has secured permission to build a second railroad track that cuts through Amazon's Mãe Maria Indigenous Territory, prompting complaints from Indigenous leaders who say Vale applied maneuvers they consider unethical and that the extension will cause greater environmental damage.
The Amazon Rainforest is the largest in the world and a key player in regulating global water and carbon cycles. It also happens to be home to sophisticated criminal networks…
A new investigation shows that farms located in the Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau Indigenous Territory in the Brazilian Amazon supplied two JBS meatpacking plants that sell beef to brands of the French supermarket giant.
This July marks the deadline by when the Asian Development Bank (ADB) – which describes itself as Asia and Pacific’s Climate Bank – committed to achieving full alignment with the…
Anyone living near the Paraopeba River, which runs through the state of Minas Gerais, remembers what happened to its waters. Along its 510-kilometer (317-mile) stretch, the river still passes through…
In early April, 35-year-old Indigenous health worker Angelita Prororita Yanomami went missing near Boa Vista, the capital city of the northernmost Brazilian state of Roraima. Two months later, her remains…
A bill eyeing to strip uncontacted Indigenous people in Peru of lands and protections was officially scrapped at the end of June. This legislative proposal, called a “step backward” by…
It will take an investment of more than $500 billion by 2050 to implement a new economy, but the costs of not doing this “could be much higher,” say the study authors.
GUASSA COMMUNITY CONSERVATION AREA, Ethiopia — On an early misty morning in July, Worku Mekonen, 39, one of the scouts at the Guassa Community Conservation Area in Ethiopia’s central highlands,…
A recent study found that locally managed marine areas in Fiji strengthened the mechanisms believed to advance conservation efforts but ultimately led to few social, economic or even ecological benefits.…
When Mauricio Velasco Castro graduated from culinary school in Bogotá, he didn’t look for a job in one of Colombia’s fine dining restaurants or for an internship abroad. Instead, he…
At the end of April, about 60 Munduruku Indigenous people from several villages in Pará traveled more than 2,800 kilometers (1,740 miles) to Brasília to participate in the 19th Acampamento…
Colombia has nearly 60 million hectares (147.5 million acres) of natural forest covering over half its territory, much of it in the Amazon basin. As a “megadiverse” country, possessing around…
The Nioaque Indigenous Territory in Brazil’s Mato Grosso do Sul state is home to some 2,000 Terena people living in four villages. The territory spans some 3,000 hectares (7,400 acres)…
Perhaps the most notorious industrial farming institution is the concentrated animal feeding operation, or CAFO, in which livestock are raised in crowded conditions that require the heavy use of antibiotics…
The alerts of illegal mining in the Yanomami Indigenous Land have zeroed for the first time since 2020, according to satellite monitoring by the Brazilian Federal Police.
Over the past decade, communities affected by transnational palm oil and rubber company Socfin’s plantations have raised complaints with local authorities and in international media. Socfin recently initiated an investigation…
Harvard-trained ethnobotanist and host of the popular podcast Plants of the Gods, Mark Plotkin is no stranger to psychedelic plants. But many people across the world, particularly in countries where…
Land legally designated or owned by Indigenous, Afro-descendant and local communities increased by 102.9 million hectares (254 million acres), larger than the size of Egypt, between 2015 and 2020, according…
Indigenous peoples are disproportionately impacted by extractive industries and mining for clean-energy minerals is linked to a myriad of abuses, according to new research. Indigenous peoples are affected in just…
On the eastern edge of Victoria, British Columbia, abutting the Salish Sea, sits Uplands Park, spanning about 30 hectares, or 74 acres, amid the bustling municipality of Oak Bay. Although…
