A 2007 study estimated that with 40% Amazon deforestation a tipping point could be reached, converting forest to savannah. New factors put that tipping point at 20-25%. Deforestation is now at 17%.
Forest fires are no longer driven mainly by deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, with climate change induced drought now taking a major role.
The bancada ruralista agribusiness lobby is pushing for total deregulation of pesticides, with potentially harmful health and environmental impacts.
A new study finds small-scale deforestation in the Amazon rainforest has been increasing over the past decade, with new hotspots emerging in Bolivia and Peru. The news somewhat dampens Brazil’s…
When a farmer cuts down a tree in the Democratic Republic of Congo, there’s often a reason for it. She’s most likely clearing the land to plant crops — the…
It’s become a trend for big corporations to pledge that their products won’t cause any more deforestation. And while many experts believe in the potential of these “zero-deforestation” commitments to…
President Temer, pressed by the ruralist lobby, attacked indigenous and traditional land rights, conserved lands, and Amazon forests this year, and retreated from Brazil's Paris climate goal – analysis.
Parts of the EU-Mercosur trade deal, leaked by Greenpeace, reveal incentives to radically push Latin American soy and beef production and exports, putting rainforests and global climate at risk.
The latest “Forest 500” rankings are out today from the Global Canopy Programme (GCP), and the main takeaway is that the global companies with the most influence over forests still…
A soon to be finalized Mercosur / European Union trade deal will contain indigenous human rights clauses that may be a last hope for indigenous groups under attack in Brazil.
Brazil is fast-tracking the Ferrogrão grain railway planned for the Tapajós Basin without prior environmental review, and despite protests from indigenous groups.
Cattle ranching can be a scourge to forests, requiring vast tracts of cleared land to produce relatively small amounts of food. It is also the primary cause of deforestation in…
With COP23 well underway, scientists warn that President Temer’s policies could doom the Amazon and Brazil’s Paris goals, while destabilizing the global climate.
In Paris, Brazil promised to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 37 percent by 2025. But the country’s emissions grew by 8.9 percent in 2016, largely due to deforestation.
To avoid impeachment on corruption charges, Brazil’s president has bought Congress and wealthy elite ruralists with a wave of decrees that will destroy the Amazon.
Brazil’s Temer has forgiven 6o percent of $3.5 billion in fines for environmental crimes, so long as perpetrators pay other 40 percent. No new means of enforcement was announced.
Starting around 2004, the deforestation rate in the Brazilian Amazon began a precipitous decline. By 2012, the rate had dropped about 80 percent, reaching the lowest levels recorded since annual…
The president has undermined Brazil’s slavery law, making it very difficult to prosecute the wealthy elites enslaving roughly 155,000 Brazilians, critics say.
Soy-fed chicken sold in British supermarkets and fast food chains — including Tesco, Morrisons and McDonald’s — appear to be driving deforestation in the Bolivian Amazon and Brazilian Cerrado.
Brazilian politicians and economically dominant social classes have for centuries exploited nature as if it was infinite. It is not. The consequences are more than evident.
Conservationists call for total halt to deforestation and implementation of sustainable agroforestry in Brazilian state of Maranhão.
Three South American studies find that severe deforestation in one region can impact faraway forests and continent-wide climate, while intact forests offer more resilience.
Escaped slaves and their descendants have struggled to claim and hold community lands for centuries; now Quilombolas face a new existential threat in the Supreme Court.
Indians decry Temer’s backing of “marco temporal,” which could negate legal indigenous claims to millions of hectares in the Amazon and elsewhere, protestors say.
Last week, scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced the largest-ever recorded low-oxygen "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico. At 22,730 square kilometers (8,776 square miles)…
Brazil’s president approves new criteria for indigenous land demarcation to deny Indians their traditional lands; opens door to elite land thieves, agribusiness, opponents say.
The MST, in a protest against corruption, has occupied six farms of Brazil's elite.
Trees from one of South America’s fastest-disappearing landscapes are ending up as charcoal on the shelves of European supermarkets, according to a report by the NGO Earthsight. The London-based watchdog…
The life’s journey of controversial businessman and politician Blairo Borges Maggi has led him from a small family farm, to ruling over a vast international agribusiness empire. It saw Maggi…
Six years ago, Boston, Massachusetts-based NGO Ceres started tracking resolutions filed by shareholders asking food and beverage companies to report on how they are managing the risks that come with…
