Sumatra News

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia — Nearly a year and a half ago, a barge hit by high waves spilled an estimated 7,000 tonnes coal on a beach in Sumatra popular with…

MEDAN, Indonesia — Police in Indonesia have arrested five people over the death of two journalists whose bodies were found at an oil palm plantation, including the alleged owner of…

In 2017, a group of researchers working in Indonesia announced they had identified a new genus of tree-dwelling toads living in forests and caves on the mountaintops of Indonesia's Sumatra…

EAST LAMPUNG, Indonesia — Indonesian authorities will make their first attempt at in vitro fertilization of a Sumatran rhino, aiming to boost the critically endangered species’ gene pool in the…

MEDAN, Indonesia — Two Indonesian journalists who had reported on an illegal oil palm plantation in Sumatra while also allegedly trying to gain control of the crop have been found…

PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Aerial images taken last month in the southern part of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island show wildfires burning through peat forests and producing clouds of toxic smoke. Peatlands in…

BENGKULU, Indonesia — Hearings in a lawsuit filed by residents over a newly built Chinese-funded coal-fired power plant in Sumatra have revealed a litany of irregularities behind the permit that…

PEKANBARU, Indonesia — The Pangkalan Kapas forest on the eastern coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island is central to the livelihoods of local villagers and the survival of the endangered wildlife…

MEDAN, Indonesia — Environmental activists in Indonesia have raised suspicions over the death this week of a human rights defender who was a staunch advocate of communities threatened by oil…

As Indonesia’s forests go up in smoke, the world may be losing a lot more than we currently understand.

As Indonesia prepares to launch a new captive-breeding facility for Sumatran rhinos (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis) in the northern province of Aceh, authorities and conservationists are intensifying efforts to survey and protect…

UPANG CERIA/GELEBAK DALAM, Indonesia — Boat drivers sometimes decide not to work when the smoke is thick on the Musi River out of fear of a dangerous collision. For the…

JAKARTA — Major consumer brands including Nestlé, Kellogg’s and Hershey have been getting some of their palm oil from an illegal plantation inside a protected forest that holds the highest…

TENGGULUN, Indonesia — Around 20 Acehnese men sit cross-legged while smoking clove cigarettes on the terrace of a simple wooden building in this village on the island of Sumatra. The…

PEKANBARU, Indonesia — September 16 was a happy day for Evan Zendrato and Lasma Yani Zega. The young couple gave birth to a boy weighing 2.8 kilograms (6.1 pounds). They…

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia — Aceh is one of those destinations that glimmer chimerically on the horizon, alluring with its newness, but ever receding, ever retreating in memory with the passage…

JAKARTA — A severely injured and malnourished orangutan has been rescued from a plantation near a Sumatra forest where a hydropower project threatens the only known habitat of this particular…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s president has admitted negligence on the part of the government, as top officials engage in a blame game amid the worst spate of forest fires since 2015…

JAMBI, Indonesia — Clouds of haze have blanketed parts of Jambi province on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, as slash-and-burn clearing to make way for oil palm plantations rages on.…

Off the coast of Indonesia’s North Sumatra province, the Malacca Strait was once home to dolphins. In their place, there are now barges filled with coal, brought by sea to…