United Nations News

LONG LAMAI, Malaysia — The tallest tajem trees have slash marks clear up to the canopy. Each diagonal cut released some of the tree’s heart-stopping sap to tip someone’s darts,…

Jaguar numbers at specific study sites in Central and South America are rising, based on surveys over the past decade and a half by the Wildlife Conservation Society. Elizabeth Bennett,…

A new study finds that putting a price on carbon could drastically reduce the amount of deforestation in the tropics by 2050: $20 per metric ton (about $18/short ton) could…

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…

Around the world, there’s a push for rapid infrastructure development, and nowhere is that truer than in Southeast Asia. Roads, seen by the World Bank as a “blunt instrument” for…

The General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution on Sunday to convene negotiations for an international treaty to protect the marine environments of the high seas. Vast areas…

Representatives of more than 150 civil society organizations gathered in Brasilia on Tuesday (19 September) to protest over the speech made by Brazilian president Michel Temer on Monday (18 September)…

Mounting evidence reminds us how human actions have begun changing the climate and forced an awareness of global warming’s impact on the quality of human life. That awareness will be…

The ivory trade in Central Africa appears to be diminishing, according to a new report from TRAFFIC, a U.K.-based watchdog NGO. But that finding might be misleading, say the authors,…

Religious leaders from around the world are meeting for the first time with conservationists and scientists in Norway this week to develop the ethical case for protecting tropical forests. “There…

Whales, dolphins, sea turtles and fish living off the coast of Gabon now enjoy similar protections to those designed to safeguard the Central African nation’s gorillas, elephants and other land-dwelling…

Kaisa Kosonen, a political advisor on climate action for Greenpeace in Germany is prepping for the mid-year United Nations climate conference in Bonn, running May 8-18. But she pauses to…

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s extensive forests seem like a bright spot in an otherwise-troubled country. With forests covering an area larger than Colombia, DRC has managed to sidestep the…

Forests hold extraordinary potential to check climate change, if they’re kept standing and allowed to siphon off planet-warming carbon. But sorting out how big that role can be – and…

  (Leia essa matéria em português no The Intercept Brasil. You can also read Mongabay’s series on the Tapajós Basin in Portuguese at The Intercept Brasil) The Tapajós River Basin…

JAKARTA – Ahead of the recent UN climate summit in the Moroccan capital of Marrakesh, Indonesia shifted the burden for cutting its greenhouse gas emissions from its energy sector to…

YANGON - Myanmar’s forests are rich. They are rich in variety, in natural resources, and in wildlife. But they are also rich in danger. “Myanmar’s forests are more in crisis…

United Nations treaty aimed at preventing illegal fishing will enter into force this Sunday, June 5, with 29 countries and the European Union as parties to it. Illegal, unreported, and…

BONN, Germany – Finding a workable compromise that allows a long-lived UN program to both reduce carbon emissions while also protecting the lives and lands of indigenous and impoverished people…

f you go more than 200 miles off the coast anywhere on Earth, you end up in the high seas, the largely ungoverned portion of the ocean that covers 43…

ndigenous peoples in Brazil are at risk from an alarming uptick in violence as well as from natural-resource development projects that threaten their existence. That's what United Nations Special Rapporteur…

ambodian authorities released a leader of the Chong indigenous group from prison on March 3. Ven Vorn, imprisoned since October, was convicted of harvesting forest products without authorization and sentenced…

overnments have been establishing enormous marine protected areas (MPAs) spanning hundreds of thousands of square kilometers where fishing is restricted. And the United Nations last June began work developing an…

The Norwegian government has extended its multi-billion dollar forest protection initiative. At the Paris climate convention on Friday, Norwegian Minister of Environment and Climate Tine Sundtoft said the country would…

Just a week after Shell scrapped its artic drilling plans, the climate has another reason to celebrate. Following the recent flood of national climate change commitments, or Intended Nationally Determined…

Editor's note: the upcoming COP21 is expected to be the most important meeting for a very long time for both forests and climate, potentially establishing a framework for taking action to address…

The United Nations today announced 21 winners of the 2015 Equator Prize, a prestigious award that recognizes community-led environmental initiatives. The winners, selected from a pool of 1,461 nominations across…

The high seas are often called the Wild West of the ocean. These vast oceanic tracts begin 200 miles from shore and fall under no nation's jurisdiction. And while there…

A rainforest in Borneo. Photo credit: Rhett Butler. Negotiators at U.N. climate talks in Bonn, Germany, have produced a draft agreement on the technical provisions of a plan to reduce…

Water filter chamber at a Palyja treatment plant in Jakarta. Photo: ANTARA/Dhoni Setiawan With the tide of privatized water in Indonesia as close to turning since the dictator Suharto was…