JAKARTA — Indigenous people in Indonesia’s easternmost South Papua province have lambasted a court’s decision to reject their lawsuit that seeks to overturn an environmental permit for a palm oil…
*Name changed for the security of sources who feared retributions from authorities KAMPONG THOM, Cambodia — “The company operates as they please. We’ve asked the authorities for help, but they…
JAKARTA — When the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the world's largest association for ethical palm oil production, kicked off the second day of its annual roundtable conference on Nov.…
More than a year and a half since the iron ore mining stopped, the lives of Vanusia Souza dos Santos and her community in the heart of Brazil’s Bahia state…
The Supreme Court in Panama ruled that the contract for the country’s largest copper mine is unconstitutional, requiring it to shut down. Minera Panamá, a subsidiary of the Canadian company…
La Guajira, COLOMBIA — On Oct. 9, Colombia’s first wind farm, Jepírachi, officially reached its end of life after running for almost two decades in Uribia, in the northeastern region…
PHNOM PENH — “Make the bosses rich in Cambodia,” then-prime minister Hun Sen said at the 2012 inauguration of a sugar refinery in Kampong Speu province. “If a country has…
JAKARTA — An independent initiative in Indonesia has ramped up its efforts in mapping Indigenous lands, with 6 million hectares (14.8 million acres) mapped in the past year alone. As…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has recognized community claims to ancestral forests in the Sumatran province of Aceh for the first time in history. In September, the Ministry of Environment…
JAKARTA — Indonesia has just launched its first carbon emissions trading market in a bid to fight climate change. The Southeast Asian country is one of the world's top 10…
BALIKPAPAN, East Kalimantan — Activists have slammed the Indonesian police for rights violations after officers reportedly shot dead a villager and injured at least two others during a protest against…
JAKARTA — Activists have called on the developers of a major tourism project on the Indonesian island of Lombok to immediately remedy the rights violations alleged by local Indigenous communities…
Award-winning filmmaker Ken Burns tells stories that shed light on the complexities and nuances of the United States’ cultural tapestry. This time, Burns has turned his lens on a symbol…
TEKOA PINDÓ MIRIM, Brazil — “If we hadn’t come here, someone non-Indigenous would probably already have occupied this space,” says Neusa Poty. The 35-year-old Guarani Indigenous leader speaks in a…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has recognized the rights of 15 Indigenous Dayak communities to forests on Borneo covering a combined area larger than Jakarta. The nearly 70,000 hectares (173,000…
MONDULKIRI, Cambodia — In a rare win for conservationists and Cambodia’s Indigenous communities, the Ministry of Environment has opted to suspend a planned marble mining operation within a wildlife sanctuary…
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — A flurry of subdecrees released through the end of July and early August show that the Cambodian government has approved he addition of more than a…
JAKARTA — A new foundation has been established to support Indonesian farmers in protecting forests and selling their sustainably produced products to the global market. The foundation, called the Farmers…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government plans this year to recognize community claims to ancestral forests in the Sumatran province of Aceh for the first time in history. The Ministry of…
For the last several years, soldiers have been entering the Colombian Amazon armed to the teeth to fight deforestation, surging ever since the 2016 peace accord between rebel group FARC…
In early April, 35-year-old Indigenous health worker Angelita Prororita Yanomami went missing near Boa Vista, the capital city of the northernmost Brazilian state of Roraima. Two months later, her remains…
When Mauricio Velasco Castro graduated from culinary school in Bogotá, he didn’t look for a job in one of Colombia’s fine dining restaurants or for an internship abroad. Instead, he…
JAKARTA — Reports of human rights violations continue to mount around a major tourism development on the Indonesian island of Lombok, two years since the United Nations first flagged problems…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government’s decision to revoke hundreds of logging, plantation and mining permits across the country is marred with irregularities including companies continuing to operate or engage in…
Drug trafficking, logging, oil palm plantations, oil spills, highways, illegal fishing, expanding Mennonite communities — in the Peruvian Amazon, there’s no shortage of threats against Indigenous peoples or their lands.…
JAKARTA — Suryani grew up in a family of farmers on the island of Java in Indonesia. Her parents are members of a farmer’s union called SPP. The land they…
JAKARTA — The Indigenous Peoples’ Alliance of the Archipelago (AMAN), the main advocacy group for Indigenous communities in Indonesia, has won a 2023 Skoll Award for Social Innovation. Since its…
Funding for the research and writing of this series of articles was provided by Amazon Aid Foundation. “We have to be very skeptical,” says Carlos Latorre, artisanal gold miner and…
Ecuador this month recognized a new reserve in the Amazon rainforest in hopes of protecting Indigenous land from threats like mining and livestock. The Tarímiat Pujutaí Nuṉka Reserve covers 1,237,395…
It’s hard to know exactly what’s happening to the environment in Nicaragua. Data on everything from mining to deforestation to biodiversity loss is nearly impossible to get from the government.…