Grainrail: ‘2nd revolution in Brazilian agribusiness’ and Amazon threat
Soy farmers see Grainrail as salvation; traders ADM, Bunge, Cargill and Amaggi see it as profit; but the Amazon railway could harm habitat and indigenous communities.
Environmental headlines
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African wood industry: 10,000 micro-businesses need support for sustainable trade
Wood processing micro-businesses in several east, central and west African countries say they have a widespread need for more support and access to resources. Their rallying call for help is…
Indonesia’s Aceh sees harshest penalty yet for a wildlife crime
A court in Indonesia’s Aceh province has sentenced two men to four years behind bars for attempting to sell a tiger skin, in the toughest ever penalty handed down for…
Illegal cheetah trade continues through Instagram, 4sale, YouTube
Cheetahs continue to be illegally traded through social media platforms, according to a new analysis published by the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), a non-profit research and lobby organization based in Namibia.…
Environmental delegation blocked from entering Bolivian national park
ISINUTA, Bolivia — After being held for five hours by members of the Indigenous Council of the South (CONISUR), a commission from the International Rights of Nature Tribunal abandoned an…
The iNaturalist species data sharing platform reaches one million users
The iNaturalist species data- and image-sharing platform reached a milestone earlier this month with its one millionth observer. The platform consists of a mobile app and corresponding website that help…
Illegal wildlife trade’s ‘dirty money’ targeted by big banks
LONDON — A broad alliance of 30 global banks and financial institutions have pledged to stop wildlife trafficking by pressuring the pocketbooks of criminal syndicates. Tracking the flow of “dirty…
Secrets revealed: Researchers explore unique, isolated forest in Mozambique
There isn’t much primary forest left in eastern Africa. In Mozambique, there’s officially none, according to 2015 numbers from the Food and Agriculture Association (FAO) of the UN. But a…
Guyana deforestation rate hits 7-year low, officials say
GEORGETOWN, Guyana — Guyana recorded its lowest rate of deforestation last year since 2010, when the South American country established a national Monitoring Reporting and Verification (MRV) program. According to…
‘The posterchild for entangled marine mammals around the globe:’ Q&A with author of ‘Vaquita’
Earlier this year, Mongabay reported that there might be as few as 12 vaquita left in the world, down from 30 in 2017. The vaquita population has been driven to…
Bolivian coca crops follow a planned highway through indigenous lands
Matilde Noza says she has never chewed a coca leaf. Noza, an indigenous woman, lives in the Nueva Galilea community of the Isiboro Sécure National Park and Indigenous Territory, better…
In other news: Environmental stories from around the web, October 19, 2018
Tropical forests Insect numbers plummet in Puerto Rico, alarming scientists (The Independent, Gizmodo, Nature, The Scientist). Cameroonian authorities have approved the country’s first combined marine-terrestrial national park (Rainforest Trust). The…
Women’s work in Senegalese conservation includes exorcising demons
This is the third story in Mongabay’s three-part profile of the Kawawana ICCA. Read the others: Senegal: After reviving fish and forests, Jola villages tackle new threats Watching the wildlife…
Tropical deforestation now emits more CO2 than the EU
To stay under 2 degrees Celsius of warming and thereby stave off the worst effects of climate change, more funding must be allocated to forest-focused global warming mitigation strategies. That’s…
Vietnamese environmental blogger ‘Mother Mushroom’ suddenly released from prison
HO CHI MINH CITY – In a surprise move, the Vietnamese government released Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh, the environmental blogger known as Mother Mushroom, from prison on Wednesday. Quynh, 39,…
Audio: Racing to save the world’s amazing frogs with Jonathan Kolby
On this episode, we discuss the global outbreak of the chytrid fungus, which might have already driven as many as 200 species of frogs to extinction, but there have been…
Politics and peace: The fate of Colombia’s forests (commentary)
Juan Manuel Santos will be forever remembered as the president who ended one of the world’s longest armed conflicts, establishing a peace deal with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia…
Jair Bolsonaro: looming threat to the Amazon and global climate?
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.
Cambodia accuses Vietnam of complicity in illegal cross-border logging
HANOI — Cambodia has asked Interpol to investigate Vietnam after accusing its neighbor of knowingly accepting fraudulent permits for rare, illegally logged rosewood timber for transport across their shared border.…
In a first, DRC communities gain legal rights to forests
Five communities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and the more than 10,000 residents who call them home, now have legal control of the forests on which they depend.…
Special series
Endangered environmentalists
- Peru cracks down after environmental defenders’ murders
- Murder of activist in India highlights growing risk to environmental defenders
- Number of murdered environmental activists rose once again in 2017
Indonesias forest guardians
- Papuan chef Charles Toto serves up sustainability and environmental protection in a platter
- In eastern Indonesia, a forest tribe pushes back against miners and loggers
- Faith in the forest helps Indonesia’s Dayaks keep plantations, loggers at bay
Amazon infrastructure
- Purus-Madeira: the Amazon arc of deforestation marches north
- Bolsonaro pledges government shakeup, deregulation, Amazon development
- China increasingly involved in Brazil’s ambitious Amazon rail network
Asian rhinos
- Jaw-dropping footage: conservationists catch Javan rhino in mud wallow
- For Javan rhinos, the last holdout may also be a deadly disease hotspot
- ‘At capacity’? A Nepali park reckons with its rhinos
