Traditional Knowledge News

The community of Deus é Pai (“God is our Father”) sits by the Tefé River in Brazil’s Amazonas state. As children play in a creek on a sunny afternoon, a…

Some 50,000 wild species provide for many of the world’s people, according to a recent report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). But today, those…

He’s called Bilibeu, Saint Bilibeu, or even Bilibreu. Carved of wood and painted with tar, this saint is said to bring fertility to the earth, to animals, and to women.…

MARAMCHE, NEPAL— The monsoon clouds that arrive in Nepal in the first week of June herald the start of the rice-planting season. The country's hills, valleys and plains turn green…

Today we’re taking a look at two stories that show the effectiveness of combining traditional Indigenous ecological knowledge and Western science for conservation and restoration initiatives. Listen here: Earlier this…

When plant systematist Elliot Gardner first began collecting samples of a fruit-bearing tree in Malaysian Borneo, he thought he was looking at just one species. Western taxonomists had long considered…

Gcina Dlamini blows through a whistle fashioned from a piece of dried fruit in the forest near his home in the town of Lavumisa in Eswatini, the Southern African kingdom…

Eliupendo Laltaika spent much of his childhood in the village of Nainokanoka, in the northern part of Tanzania's Ngorongoro Conservation Area, herding cattle with his older brother. Sometimes they would…

BLANTYRE, Malawi — A harvest of just four sacks of maize, each weighing 50 kilograms, or 110 pounds, means only four and a half months of food security for Ellena…

On this episode we discuss Indigenous peoples’ long relationship with — and stewardship of — marine environments through the lens of aquaculture. Listen here: Coastal cultures have often enjoyed abundant…

MUARA JAMBI, Indonesia — In a wood-plank house on the banks of the Batang Hari River, a dukun, or traditional healer, named Siti Hawa, 62, handles a grass-like plant topped…

Our footsteps intermingled with the sounds of rain dripping through the canopy as my eyes examined the surrounding green vegetation, which was usually so vibrant, but was now subdued as…

RIPÁ, Brazil — One muggy morning last December, eight women and their chief drove out of the Indigenous Xavante village of Ripá across a forested savanna in the Brazilian state…

In February 2020, lightning struck Figure of Eight Island in Western Australia’s Recherche Archipelago, igniting a fire that burned through most of its vegetation in just a few days. While…

There’s no one way to describe Noah Idechong. Born in the small Pacific island country of Palau, Idechong has donned different hats over the past 40 years. He’s been a…

Caribou are proudly displayed on Canada's 25-cent coin, but in the wild, their populations are on the verge of annihilation. Carmen Richter from the Saulteau First Nations is working to change that. She's…

Deforestation due to leather production, alarm over COVID-19’s spread to fur farms, and animal rights activism are all inspiring a booming fashion industry using plant leaves, fruits and microorganisms to imitate animal skins and fur.

On Sunday mornings, my mother would grate coconut meat. She would squeeze the milk from the grated shreds, then cook the coconut milk in a saucepan over a medium heat.…

Traditional and Indigenous peoples in the Arctic are joining with scientists to successfully rewild mining-degraded peatlands and other sites.

Today’s installment of the Mongabay Newscast is a special Earth Month episode in which we highlight the growing recognition of the role Indigenous peoples play as the world's top conservationists.…

SHOUF BIOSPHERE RESERVE, Lebanon — Late afternoon light falls across Talal Riman’s weathered face as he stands under the ancient cedars he’s tended for almost three decades in Lebanon’s Shouf…

At low tide, on many a craggy corner of Aotearoa New Zealand’s coastline, you can find clusters of large, oval, emerald-and-gold bivalves, encrusted with barnacles and sucked tightly onto the…

BIKITA, Zimbabwe — Nothing seems to happen at the right time for Maria Mazambara, a communal subsistence farmer in Bikita, one of Zimbabwe's southernmost rural districts. “The seed we get…

Traditional fishers scattered in isolated communities along Madagascar’s 4,800-kilometer (3,000-mile) coastline are grappling with falling fish stocks and competition from industrial trawlers, mostly owned by foreigners. As a young woman,…

Small islands, big seascapes: that’s how many Pacific Ocean nations are characterized. Aotearoa New Zealand, a country about the size of the U.K. but with the world’s fourth-largest maritime area,…

COLCHESTER COUNTY, Canada — Standing on the snow-covered banks of the Shubenacadie River in Canada’s eastern province, Nova Scotia, Alanna Sylbiloy tosses a wire trap into the icy water flowing…

Today we look at two Indigenous conservation initiatives in the United States. Listen here: The importance of Indigenous stewardship and traditional ecological knowledge is increasingly recognized as vital to the…

As a best-selling author, the co-founder of the award-winning Amazon Conservation Team, and an acclaimed public speaker, Mark Plotkin is one of the world’s most prominent rainforest ethnobotanists and conservationists.…

For the uninitiated, the first mouthful of the Hawaiian red algae known as limu kohu (Asparagopsis taxiformis) may be an unpleasant one: intensely iodine-rich and bitter, with all the marine…

HUMBANG HASUNDUTAN, Indonesia — Indonesia has an enormous variety of plants with medicinal properties, and traditional herbal medicines such as jamu are still widely used by both urban and rural…