The Sundarbans, the world's largest mangrove forest, is a natural wonder that supports millions of people. It's a shield against powerful storms and provides resources for countless families. But this…
JAKARTA — A dispute simmering for years has erupted into conflict between villagers and a palm oil company on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi over the latter’s failure to abide…
SANTIAGO — The recent screening of a Mongabay video before Chile’s Supreme Court has intensified international scrutiny of the killing of 26-year-old Indigenous leader Paulo Paulino Guajajara in Brazil 2019 — a case for which no one has yet gone on trial in Brazil.
The rising recruitment has gone hand in hand with an increase in coca production and deforestation in the region, which in some provinces has grown exponentially.
An analysis of two carbon credit projects in the Brazilian Amazon has found that they may be connected to illegal timber laundering.
The number of individual birds found at the Yasuní Biosphere Reserve has dropped by half, according to a study published earlier this year.
Air pollution levels over Alberta’s tar sands are many times higher than industry-reported figures, according to researchers, raising questions over potential health risks to downwind Indigenous communities.
KAMBIAYIN, Indonesia — Eka Karlina repeats a mantra to her Dayak Pitap ancestors as she runs her fingers through the soil, combing the field in Kambiayin village for weeds. “Hopefully…
This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network. LUBUMBASHI, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) — On Oct. 13, 2023, on National Road 39, a police…
SEPINTUN, Indonesia — Past generations of Dahwas’s family lived off the food and fuel growing all around them, traversing Sumatra's forest unobstructed whenever cultural norms required the seminomadic Suku Anak…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s largest deforesting company has continued to clear peatland despite an order by the government for the firm to stop clearing rainforests. The company in question is pulpwood…
Civil society groups in Southeast Asia are calling for greater public participation and transparency in the drafting process of a regional declaration on environmental rights, as well as stronger levels…
TSUM VALLEY, Nepal — “In the future, when war, strife and difficult times come,” said Thrisong Deutsen, an eighth-century Tibetan king, “will there be a safe place where people can…
Bar owner João Carlos da Silva was on April 15 sentenced to 18 years in prison for the murder of Indigenous land defender and teacher Ari Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau four years earlier.
JAKARTA — Fear among Indonesia’s ruling class of losing control of natural resources to Indigenous people is why the country’s parliament continues to delay passing a long-awaited bill on Indigenous…
The “People of the Sun,” as the Xokleng Indigenous people of Brazil call themselves, are no strangers to conflict and violence. In the early 20th century, as the southern region…
Legislation in effect since Jan. 1 has banned fishing in Mato Grosso state rivers for five years, with heavy opposition from environmental defenders and traditional fishers.
In Mato Grosso do Sul state, around 100 Indigenous individuals from the Guyraroká community of the Guarani-Kaiowá people are confined to an area of 50 hectares (123 acres) on the…
Marcel Gomes, the executive secretary at investigative journalism outlet Repórter Brasil, is one of this year’s prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize winners.
The number of fires shows no signs of easing as Brazil’s Roraima faces unprecedented blazes, and several Amazonian countries, including Guyana, Suriname and Venezuela, registered record-high outbreaks in the first quarter this year.
JAKARTA — Civil society advocates representing more than 2,000 customary communities in Indonesia have initiated last-ditch legal challenges over parliament’s failure to pass an Indigenous rights bill during the 10-year…
For months, residents in the Himalayan foothills of Uttarakhand have been fighting for the introduction of land laws that would prevent agricultural land from being sold to people from outside…
Monarch butterflies are returning to gardens across the United States, but a few months ago, I stood in a mountain forest in Mexico where the monarchs spend the winter. They…
The new extractive reserves allow resident populations to engage in traditional and sustainable extractive practices such as fishing and hunting, while keeping out big businesses, such as commercial aquaculture or logging.
The Philippines’ southern region of Mindanao has a history of war and armed conflict going back more than 400 years. The contemporary conflict’s origin in this region of 26.3 million…
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…
The World Bank’s independent watchdog, the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO), has finalized its investigation into a complaint filed five years ago, alleging grave human rights violations by communities living near…
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has deployed military troops, light tanks, missile-equipped patrol boats, and armored carriers to the Guyanese border in what appears to be a brazen threat to claim…
MANILA — The Chocolate Hills of Bohol Island in the central Philippines are a sprawling geological wonder, shaped by nature millions of years ago. Given their recognition as a UNESCO…
The threatened fish of the Mekong River are inching closer extinction, according to a new report that cites piling pressures on the waterway. Though the situation is serious, conservationists say…
MASVINGO, Zimbabwe — At the end of November last year, Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa and Sinomine Resource Group chair Wang Pingwei walked into a lithium processing plant, construction hats firmly…
This story is part of a Mongabay series on female environmental defenders in the Amazon. Read about the lives and work of Soraida Chindoy, Alis Ramírez, and Etelvina Ramos. On…
