JAKARTA — Subsidiaries of some of the world’s biggest palm oil companies have been found guilty by Indonesia’s anticompetition watchdog of restricting sales of cooking oil amid acute shortages last…
JAKARTA — A government audit on Indonesia's palm oil industry found that 9 million hectares (22.2 million acres) of concession holders — an area three times the size of Belgium…
JAKARTA — Illegal oil palm plantations spanning an area one and a half times the size of London have been amnestied under an Indonesian government program that critics say incentivizes…
Mining is one of the top drivers of deforestation globally, with huge swaths of forest being cleared for excavation pits, access roads and workers’ settlements. Yet details about mining’s environmental…
MEXICO CITY — A court in Mexico has eliminated a major financial resource for fighting climate change, raising doubts about how willing the country will be to invest in future…
A court in Ecuador ordered oil companies to stop the hazardous practice of burning natural gas at extraction sites because it was a major driver of cancer and other illnesses…
Bolivia’s failure to combat illegal gold mining generated a heated national debate last year. Numerous news sites published investigations into deforestation, pollution and corruption tied to the mining industry, while…
JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has sentenced palm oil billionaire Surya Darmadi to 15 years in prison for his role in the biggest corruption case in the country’s history.…
JAKARTA — Anticorruption activists in Indonesia have criticized as too lenient the sentences handed down by an Indonesian court against officials at the center of a cooking oil shortage that…
JAKARTA — Indonesia's Supreme Court has ruled President Joko Widodo not liable in the disastrous fires in 2015 that devastate large swathes of rainforests and peatlands in the country, despite…
BERLIN — Indonesian officials have slammed the European Union’s proposal of a regulation that they say negates more than a decade of progress by the Southeast Asian country to comply…
While forest advocates had high hopes, the EU parliament voted this week not to declassify woody biomass as a renewable energy source, paving the way for more EU, U.S., and Canadian forests to be turned into wood pellets and burned.
JAKARTA — An ambitious and long-anticipated plan by Indonesian lawmakers to revise the country’s criminal code, inherited from the Dutch colonial era, could make it much more difficult to prosecute…
JAKARTA — More than 100 Indigenous people in Indonesia’s Papua region are calling on the local government to revoke all the permits of a palm oil company that’s continuing to…
JAKARTA — Jakarta’s recent episode of world-beating air pollution has highlighted what activists describe as belligerent inaction by the Indonesian government to address the source of the problem, even in…
JAKARTA — Residents of a remote island in eastern Indonesia have won a lawsuit against a company planning to mine gold on their island, after having an earlier legal challenge…
JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has dismissed lawsuits filed by two palm oil companies against a district head who revoked their permits over various violations. The May 23 rulings…
JAKARTA — The office of the Indonesian ombudsman says it has found indications of maladministration in the government’s decision to revoke hundreds of logging, plantation and mining permits across the…
JAKARTA — A court in Jakarta has rejected a lawsuit by a remote island community against a gold-mining operation that overlaps onto their villages, in a ruling deemed “problematic” by…
JAKARTA — Indonesian coal mining company Bayan Resources has challenged the government's decision to revoke its permits and effectively shrink its concession area. The legal challenge is the latest in…
Urban development projects surrounding a protected lake in Paraguay are threatening the recovery of local ecosystems and raising questions about the government’s ability to circumvent conservation mandates. Wetlands around Lake…
A ruling by Mexico’s Supreme Court this month canceled two controversial mining concessions in Indigenous communities, which have been fighting to stop the projects for nearly two decades. The Nahua…
JAKARTA — A sting by anti-corruption officers in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province has uncovered evidence that a powerful local official allegedly used slave labor on his oil palm plantation. Agents…
JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has rejected a bid by two palm oil companies to have their permits restored after they were scrapped by local authorities for a litany…
PEKANBARU, Riau — Anti-corruption investigators in Indonesia’s palm oil heartland have arrested a local official for allegedly taking bribes from a palm oil company in exchange for extending its business…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s highest court has upheld a ruling declaring a palm oil company not responsible for fires in its concession, in a verdict that boils down to the company…
JAKARTA — A court in Jakarta has found the Indonesian government, including President Joko Widodo, negligent in a citizen lawsuit filed against the poor air quality in the capital. In…
JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has acquitted six villagers in a dispute against a tapioca factory, ruling that the criminal charges, allegedly brought at the behest of the company,…
JAKARTA — Activists in Indonesia have filed a legal challenge to controversial mining legislation passed last year and widely seen as undermining environmental protections to the advantage of mining companies.…
Liberia’s Nimba county lies about an eight-hour drive north of the capital, Monrovia. In the dry season, the road leading into the far-flung region kicks up swirling clouds of red…