The reconstruction of Brazil’s BR-319 (Manaus-Porto Velho) highway (Figure 1) and its associated hidden projects are not yet a fait accompli, but the danger has reached a critical moment. In…
COLÍDER, Brazil — Not too long ago, the plot of land that Maria Ivonete de Souza inherited was barren, the soil hardened by years of cattle ranching. When the family…
When Chilean President Gabriel Boric instructed the Ministry of Public Works (MOP) to complete the final section of a highway connecting the southern cities of La Unión and Corral in…
A recent study found that high-altitude ecosystems in the Andes, known as the páramo, managed by eight communities in Ecuador have led to a reduction in soil and vegetation decline,…
In January 2020, Luis Carlos Galeano was traveling with his family through the Claro River Basin in Colombia’s mountainous Antioquia department when his wife, Viviana Aguirre, pointed out a tree…
The sharecropping system that defined land tenure in the Ecuadorian highlands prior to agrarian reform was known as the ‘huasipungo’, a Quechua word that describes the relationship between landlords and…
The government in Ecuador is looking for ways to keep open a controversial oil block in the Amazon Rainforest, defying the results of a referendum to close the operation due…
Playing back hours of footage from a camera trap set in Espinilho State Park in the south of Brazil in August 2023, Fábio Mazim and his team banked on possible…
Echoing the harrowing imagery of a Ku Klux Klan onslaught, a chilling episode unfolded on Sunday, January 21, showcasing the brutal reality of Brazil’s rural hinterland. In Bahia, two Indigenous…
A new amendment to Peru’s forest and wildlife law is being criticized by opponents as unconstitutional and a step backward in forest protection after it came into effect Jan. 10…
MEXICO CITY — The trafficking of valuable fish bladders found in Mexico appears to be on the rise online and on social media, and it’s having a ripple effect on…
Chile’s salmon-farming industry, a major driver of the economy, has lashed out at new rules restricting its operation in protected areas, but environmental groups say the change is necessary, given…
The first year of the new presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was a tale of two Brazils: In the Amazon, federal agents were finally cracking back down on…
Several palm oil and cacao companies operating in the Peruvian Amazon have systematically contributed to clearing at least 13,000 hectares (32,000 acres) between 2012 and 2021 in the country’s most…
Update 2/23/2024: Delegates to COP-14 approved Brazil's proposal to protect these species under Appendix II. The Amazon is the largest, most biologically diverse basin in the world. Its rainforest, the…
The agrarian reform process in Peru began in 1964. Originally a cautious effort targeting the more egregious examples of peasant exploitation, it was dramatically expanded by a left-wing military government…
Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s recent announcement of a new court system to resolve land ownership conflicts in rural areas of the country has drawn a mixed response from advocates of…
MONTERÍA, Colombia — “Look at the rooms in our house,” says Remberto Gil, 45, during a sweltering day last September. “During this time of the year, they are typically overflowing…
U.S. sanctions imposed in 2022 against Nicaragua’s mining industry were supposed to help combat a bloody wave of human rights abuses against local communities. But several years later, some aspects…
In June 2023, where the Caquetá River leaves Colombian territory and enters Brazil, no more than 35 kilometers (21.7 miles) from the border, Custodio Yucuna Tanimuca came across a group…
BUÍQUE, Pernambuco, Brazil — In the Brazilian backlands, the jurema is a most willful tree: When you think it's dead, it sprouts again. You can cut it, tear it down,…
Brazil’s “Transversal Environmental Agenda,” released on 25 January 2024, contains many good things for the government to be doing, but it misses the opportunity to implant what a transversal agenda…
The political movement that brought Evo Morales to power incorporated a latent conflict between highland and lowland Indigenous communities. The lowland nations are intent on recuperating their ancestral territories, which…
A new fund, announced Oct. 30, plans to support the territorial land management visions of four Indigenous organizations in Bolivia’s Madidi Landscape. It has so far attracted $650,000 in initial…
A powerful strain of the avian flu has swept through seal colonies in southern Argentina, wiping out many juveniles and raising concern about a spread to other species. The flu,…
Bolivia was a leader in the agrarian reform movement in South America. A defining moment in its modern history was the national revolution of 1952, which started as an uprising…
Pensar Agro (“thinking agribusiness”), or IPA, lobbied hard for newly passed legislation like the so-called time frame bill that undermines Indigenous land rights and opens up the territories to mining.
The 2022 documentary “The Territory” won an Emmy award this January, shining a light on the Uru-eu-wau-wau Indigenous people and the invasions, conflicts and threats from land grabbers in their territory in the Brazilian Amazon from 2018 to 2021.
The stories people tell about bats seem to come from novels, comics or science-fiction movies. They’re able to emit and hear sounds in frequencies inaccessible to other species. Some undertake…
Salvadorans will go to the polls next week to choose a president and 60 members of the Legislative Assembly. Most of this election cycle has focused on security issues and…