Panama is holding elections this week for president, vice president and all 71 seats in its national assembly. With questions looming about climate change, water shortages, waste disposal and mining…
Environmental activists in Bolivia say they’ve become the targets of discrimination, death threats and even bombings after speaking out against harmful mining operations in the department of Oruro. The activists,…
Seven grassroots environmental activists were awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize on April 29. Known as the “Green Nobel Prize,” the Goldman Prize honors activists from the six continental regions. This year’s winners…
As dawn began to break in the Peruvian Amazon on March 5, an oil slick spread across the Puinahua River in the district of the same name, engulfing clumps of…
All three legacy-oil pipelines in the Andean Amazon system are old. The Oleoducto Transandino Colombiano (OTC) has been operating for 53 years, followed by the Sistema de Oleoducto Transecuatoriano (SOTE)…
CANCÚN, Mexico — The Mexican government finally opened its huge, controversial train project last December, connecting Cancún and Tulum with the rest of the Yucatán Peninsula. And yet, despite all…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has rolled out what it calls a “biodiversity management master plan” amid mounting criticism of the environmental and social threats posed by the construction of…
When around 70,000 Indigenous Maasai were expelled from their lands in northern Tanzania in 2022, it didn’t happen in a vacuum. For years, the Tanzanian government has systematically attacked Maasai…
Clothing giants H&M and Zara have been linked to large-scale illegal deforestation, land-grabbing, violence and corruption in the Brazilian Cerrado, according to an investigation by Earthsight. Using satellite images, court…
Living deep in the Peruvian Amazon, the Kukama Kukamiria Indigenous community have spent generations with their feet in the Marañón, the river emerging from the Andes that provides the main…
Floodplains are extraordinarily productive because they are the interface between aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. They are remarkably diverse because they integrate a mosaic of lakes, marshes, palm swamps and inundated…
PALMAR SUR, Costa Rica — “Once, we were digging to build a fence for the animals and we discovered by luck some archaeological artifacts,” says Ana Isabel Vargas Ortiz, a…
JAKARTA — Indonesia is experiencing a resurgence in forest clearance due to the expansion of pulpwood and oil palm plantations, reversing years of declining deforestation associated with these two industries.…
Environmental advocates routinely oppose mining and hydrocarbon-development projects because they believe that remote areas of the Amazon should remain pristine. Typically, they organize their opposition during the environmental review process…
PHNOM PENH — A new report published by Human Rights Watch on Feb. 28 details a litany of alleged abuses in the Southern Cardamom REDD+ project, which covers a vast…
In late December 2023, when communities in the southeastern Peruvian province of Cotabambas received a copy of proposed modifications to the Las Bambas copper mine, they were at first surprised,…
PEKANBARU, Indonesia — Almost two years after a joint Mongabay investigation revealed systemic failure by Indonesia’s plantation industry to share gains with community farmers, countless small farmers have yet to…
JAKARTA — A massive nickel mining and processing project on the Indonesian island of Halmahera has cleared thousands of hectares of forest, forcefully displaced local people, and polluted the rivers…
In January 2019, a dam holding back mining sludge at the Córrego do Feijão iron ore mine in Brumadinho, southeastern Brazil, collapsed. Around 10 million cubic meters (2.6 billion gallons)…
A new road connecting eight Indigenous Waorani communities to urban centers in Ecuador’s Pastaza province aims to improve access to the interior of the Amazon and reduce transportation costs. But…
The government in Ecuador is looking for ways to keep open a controversial oil block in the Amazon Rainforest, defying the results of a referendum to close the operation due…
U.S. sanctions imposed in 2022 against Nicaragua’s mining industry were supposed to help combat a bloody wave of human rights abuses against local communities. But several years later, some aspects…
TOLOWA DEE-NI' NATION, California — Three tribes along California's rugged northern coast made history in late September by designating the first Indigenous Marine Stewardship Area (IMSA) in the United States.…
PREAH VIHEAR, Cambodia — “I would like to announce to the public and the journalists that on November 2, the Ministry of Mines and Energy requested [Prime Minister Hun Manet]…
Possible plans to develop large-scale agriculture in Suriname have sparked backlash from Indigenous communities, conservation groups and some members of parliament, who are concerned about deforestation of the Amazon and…
Humanity’s footprint in Ecuador now covers more than 30% of the country’s total area, at the expense of coastal ecosystems, the Andes, and forests across the country. But it’s the…
Colombia’s environmental authorities plan to take new steps this year to restore an important national park hit hard by deforestation and pollution, most of it from illegal gold mining. Farallones…
Mario Rene Xol used to enjoy life in Aldea Tierra Negra, an Indigenous village bordering the Lachuá-Ik'bolay Key Biodiversity Area (KBA) in northeastern Guatemala. Since the arrival of palm oil…
Reporting for this story was supported by the Dom Phillips Grant of the Rainforest Journalism Fund in collaboration with the Pulitzer Center. IQUITOS, Peru — On the Peruvian side of…
On Nov. 17, Ecuador’s highest court ruled in favor of Indigenous and local communities by rejecting a controversial decree that promised to shape how environmental consultations are carried out. Decree…