Social Justice News

Brazil is on the verge of electing a president who, supported by a new Congress, could escalate Amazon deforestation and pull out of the Paris Climate Agreement: analysis.

In the early 21st century, Brazil greatly reduced Amazon deforestation. A Jair Bolsonaro presidency would again put forests and the global climate at risk: study.

Interviewed by Mongabay in 2016, Aluisio Sampaio is the most recent victim in a growing wave of Amazon violence against socio-environmental activists.

The imminent election this month of far right Jair Bolsonaro as Brazil’s new president poses threats to the environment, indigenous people, and the global climate.

More than 30 scientists and leaders in environmental conservation are calling for the Norwegian Nobel Committee to award Jane Goodall with the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize. Citing the 84-year-old primatologist’s…

The Kaxuyana-Tunayana indigenous reserve on the Pará and Amazonas state border has been approved for demarcation – though when that step will be implemented is unknown.

Brazilian eucalyptus growers are moving into the Cerrado biome, raising concerns over land theft from traditional communities and over the loss of native vegetation.

Two-thirds of federal deputies seeking re-election to Brazil’s Congress this October supported bills harmful to the environment, indigenous peoples, and rural workers.

Traditional communities in Brazil’s savannah, lacking land deeds, have been displaced by large-scale soy growers, and forced to resettle in impoverished cities like Campos Lindos.

Raid rescues 18 workers from Minas Gerais farm holding good practice seals. Starbucks denies buying beans there in recent years, though its certifier approved the farm.

Five candidates lead the polls for Brazil’s presidency, with a vote 7 October. Mongabay offers some of what’s known, and what’s not, about their environmental positions.

Brazil’s Paiter-Suruí indigenous group has suspended indefinitely its previously highly successful forest conservation and carbon storage and offset project due to an invasion by illegal diamond miners.

Some ruralist politicians, up for election next month, own or associate with firms guilty of crimes; push attacks on the environment and indigenous groups; sell goods to U.S. / EU.

Brazil is a leading global consumer of chemical pesticides – many banned in the EU and U.S. This not only puts farmworkers at risk, but consumers of Brazilian food the world round.

“We used to go into the forest to tap copaiba oil but we had no good way of selling it. The regatão [traveling river trader] paid us whatever he liked…

Brazil’s rural poor were once well served by social programs that offered urgently needed income, food, water and hope. But those programs have seen recent deep cuts, hurting rural communities.

AREIA, Pará state, Brazil — “I’m only leaving here when I’m dead. And I hope it won’t be after a gunman has killed me,” said peasant farmer Osvalinda Maria Marcelino Pereira,…

APG and Robeco are two of the most recent companies to sign on to the Cerrado Manifesto, which calls for an end to deforestation in Brazil's Cerrado biome.

Traditional communities in Bahia, Brazil, have won a court case against Agronegócio Estrondo, an agribusiness company, which illegally seized lands from the communities.

The unintended consequences of a U.S./China trade war could shift Chinese soy purchases from the U.S. to Brazil, leading to rising Amazon deforestation, and a hazardous climate change tipping point.