In southeast Alaska, people and bears alike come to the shore of the Chilkat River to catch salmon beside evergreen trees and mountains with snow-covered stony summits. Five species of…
Around 15 million people across the globe are working at artisanal and small-scale gold mining sites, nearly a third of them women and children. Instead of operating advanced equipment supplied…
In 2015, researchers in Brazil started a project to address a tricky challenge: Reducing exposure to mercury contamination in the region of the Tapajós River, a major tributary of the…
Bolivia’s failure to combat illegal gold mining generated a heated national debate last year. Numerous news sites published investigations into deforestation, pollution and corruption tied to the mining industry, while…
This story was produced with the funding support of the Rainforest Journalism Investigations Network (RIN) of the Pulitzer Center. WAIKAS, Brazil — From up above, long, massive, yellowish stains tear apart…
BATOURI, Cameroon – At Kambélé III, an artisanal mining site in the commune of Batouri, located 415 kilometers (268 miles) east of Yaoundé, Cameroon's capital, male, female, teenage, and child…
Artisanal gold mining is driving the global demand for mercury, with 2,058 metric tons of the toxic metal contaminating water, land and air every year, according to a recent report…
LA PAZ — Mercury, even at room temperature, will slowly transition from its silver liquid state into a dangerous vapor that, when inhaled, can leave a person with permanent brain…
LA PAZ — Gold is Bolivia’s second-biggest export, valued at more than $1 billion annually and employing hundreds of thousands of people in the country. But much of that gold…
An environmental think tank in Cameroon has raised the alarm over the pollution of rivers in the country’s east and north. The Centre for Environment and Development (CED) says two…
Thirty years ago, Brazil issued a decree officially recognizing the ancestral land of the Yanomami people as an Indigenous territory. The new designation made the area, located deep in the…
Years of artisanal mining along the Madre de Dios River and its tributaries have left their marks, both seen and unseen. Miners, swarming to the region in a modern-day goldrush,…
On February 11, 2022, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro published a decree establishing the Program for Supporting the Development of Artisanal Mining (Pró-Mape), which aims to “stimulate” this type of mining…
For Indigenous tribes living in Alaska’s remote Yukon-Kuskokwim region, southwest of the state, the future is bleak and uncertain. Tribal councils worry that plans to construct a 6,474-hectare (15,990 acres)…
Illegal mining in protected areas in the Brazilian Amazon saw as much as a fivefold increase since 2010, a gold rush driven largely by surging prices in international markets. Over…
SOUTH RUPUNUNI, Guyana — In a Facebook post this past November, Guyana’s Ministry of Natural Resources announced that it had issued a special mining permit to a group of small-scale…
BOGOTÁ — In Colombia’s Chocó department, renowned by environmentalists for its abundant biodiversity, Afro-Colombian communities collect gold from rivers as part of an ancestral way of life. “When we talk…
This story is the result of a reporting collaboration between Mongabay Latam and Rutas del Conflicto. In 2000, in the midst of Colombia’s vast Amazon rainforest, two elder members from…
A recent investigation has found dangerously high levels of mercury among women from different Indigenous communities in four Latin American countries. This chemical element is a neurotoxic substance that presents…
Earlier this month, Madagascar’s government suspended a controversial gold-mining operation in Vohilava commune in the country’s southeast. Many local people welcomed the news, which comes after years of tension over…
A new study finds that the four fish species most commonly consumed by Indigenous and riverine communities in northern Brazil contain the highest concentrations of mercury, up to four times in excess of WHO recommendations.
Gold mining can demolish Amazon rainforest in just a few days. New research finds that the impacted forest does not recover even 3-4 years after a mine is abandoned.
Soaring gold prices, brought on by the economic meltdown and COVID-19 uncertainty, have led to a rapid, largely un-policed, expansion of illegal gold mining in the Amazon.
Shark fin soup is said to be the food of emperors, but a new study finds this “luxury” dish may not be so favorable to the person who eats it.…
Scientists who spent five years studying the impact of illegal mining in Peru’s southeastern Madre de Dios department recently explored that impact in La Pampa, a geographic area in the…
Leaders of several indigenous communities have lodged a complaint with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, or OECD, that a Netherlands-based oil company fouled the environment in Peru's slice…
SÃO FÉLIX DO XINGU - As João Inácio de Assunção’s small boat sliced through the clay-colored waters of Rio Fresco in northern Brazil, he recalled a different time when the…
Snaking its way through Colombia’s northwestern department of Choco, for centuries the Atrato River has been the lifeblood for Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities living along its banks. But decades of…
This story originally appeared on Mongabay Latam as part of a special series on threats facing isolated indigenous peoples in Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela. Other stories in the series…
This story originally appeared on Mongabay Latam as part of a special series on threats facing isolated indigenous peoples in Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela. Other stories in the series…
