Attacks on indigenous Kaiowá communities in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul at the start of the year have highlighted a long-running campaign of persecution and growing violence against the group.
The murder of Sister Dorothy in 2005, and resulting international outrage, helped curb violence in Brazil for a time, but crimes against landless peasants and activists are on the rise.
Nearly 4,000 requests have been submitted for mining-related activities on 31 indigenous reserves and 17 protected areas in Brazil, according to recently obtained data from the nongovernmental Socio-Environmental Institute (ISA) and the National Mining Agency.
The construction of the controversial Belo Monte hydroelectric dam in the Brazilian Amazon is the narrative engine that drives Sequestrada, the first full-length film by U.S. cinematographer and sociologist Sabrina McCormick.
DURBAN, South Africa — Lee White was appointed minister of water and forests, the sea and the environment, in charge of sustainable development objectives and the land use planning for…
In an exclusive interview with Mongabay, Marcelino Guedes, a researcher at Brazil’s Amapá Federal University, talks about how important the management of traditional knowledge is for strengthening the forest economy in Brazil to overcome the paradigm that sees standing forest as an enemy of development.
25 environmental and indigenous groups in Brazil have filed a formal inquiry request into Environment Minister Ricardo Salles’ possibly illegal deal with convicted land grabbers.
Joenia Wapichana is the first indigenous woman to be elected a federal representative in Brazil. Last year, she submitted a bill to Congress proposing that funds collected from fines for environmental infractions committed on indigenous lands be returned to native peoples.
Amazon mega-dam was built with 11,233 MW capacity, but has fallen far short, even as deforestation and drought make the goal more remote. The US$9.5 billion dam may never be profitable.
The Estrondo mega-farm exports soy to the EU and China, but it is accused in a mega-land grab; it also has a long record of threatening traditional people.
A researcher at the INPE Center of Land System Science, Antonio Donato Nobre, describes the state of degradation threatening the future of the Amazon rainforest in an exclusive interview with Mongabay.
Brazil started the decade as an example to the world, dramatically curbing Amazon deforestation, but under Jair Bolsonaro the nation is moving toward ecological ruin.
This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. When Indonesian government officials received a credible allegation that the permits underpinning a giant oil palm plantation project in Papua province had…
This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. Indonesian government officials have alleged that permits underpinning a multi-billion dollar plantation project in Papua province were falsified, leading to the criminal…
This story was co-published with The Gecko Project. When Rita Widyasari, the former head of Kutai Kartanegara district in Indonesian Borneo, was sentenced to 10 years in prison last year…
JAKARTA — Anti-corruption investigators in Indonesia have charged two government officials for allegedly taking $1.6 million in bribes to grant permits for oil palm plantations spanning just over half the…
Listed by Brazil’s National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (INCRA) as one of the largest cases of land grabbing in Brazil, the Condomínio Cachoeira do Estrondo Agribusiness venture occupies…
Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary in Cambodia continues to be illegally cleared, according to a new report by the Cambodian Youth Network (CYN). Located in the central plains of Cambodia, Prey…
JAKARTA — Darwan Ali, an Indonesian politician at the center of a palm oil licensing scandal and charged in a separate corruption case, died on Nov. 18 before he could…
Seven men have been charged in connection with a large-scale illegal logging operation just north of Mozambique's Zinave National Park after a zebra poacher who was supplying them with meat…
400,000 rural women are guardians to 25 million hectares of babassu palm forest where the Brazilian Amazon meets the Cerrado savanna, but industrial agribusiness is moving in.
This article was produced in partnership with The Gecko Project. When Mika Ganobal, a 35-year-old civil servant, mounted the top of a van in the ramshackle town of Dobo to…
Amazon cattle, soy and timber producers employ “laundering” tricks to hide illegal deforestation. Easy solutions exist, but political will is weak: experts.
Soybeans from a Belgium-sized swath of unregistered farms across Brazil are being exported to China and Europe via U.S. traders, according to a newly released report that raises concerns about environmental regulations being dodged.
This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. This month Mongabay and The Gecko Project published “Saving Aru,” an article chronicling how the people of Indonesia’s Aru Islands thwarted a…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s anti-corruption agency has charged a former politician from Borneo in connection with a port development project, in a move that could shed light on an earlier scandal…
The Chávez and Maduro administrations have concealed vast amounts of vital scientific data on climate change, deforestation, pollution, mining, water quality and much more, as far back as 2011.
This story was co-published with The Gecko Project. Additional support was provided by Earthsight. (Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) I. The movement begins Late one rainy night in August 2013, a…
Brazil’s failure to monitor cattle from source, to sale, to slaughterhouse, creates an immense deforestation regulatory loophole according to a new report.
JAKARTA — Laode Muhammad Syarif has been spearheading a critical war against corruption in Indonesia for the past four years. Since December 2015, he’s served as a leader of the…
MANILA — Development banks and other investors are fueling the violence against people in the Philippines who are protecting their land and environment from destructive industries, eco-watchdog Global Witness reveals…
As a torrent of demoralizing disasters and doomsday climate studies pour forth, how do we resist despair, where can we find hope – and most important of all – how should we live?
