The illegal and unsustainable wildlife pet trade depends on the appeal of live animals — creatures that people naturally want to care for. Yet behind the allure of a bright-eyed…
Despite concerted efforts to control illegal wildlife trafficking globally, more than 13 million items of wildlife parts were seized and reported in 162 countries in just the last seven years,…
In 2013, a small group of Brazilian forestry engineers ecologists, and other scientists formed a special operations unit. Known as the Grupo de Especialização de Fiscalização (GEF), the unit operates…
Artisanal and small-scale gold mining employs more than 15 million people globally and generates a fifth of global gold supplies. It supports 100 million people indirectly, more than any other…
MEXICO CITY – About two dozen police officers, government officials and a data specialist sat side by side in a command center in northern Bogotá, Colombia’s capital. For two weeks,…
In the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, local communities are leading the charge against environmental crime — and they’re succeeding. Our new peer-reviewed study published in Conservation Biology has found…
A new and alarming pattern of destruction is emerging in the rainforest, challenging Brazilian authorities ahead of COP30.
While supporting conservation research in Mexico’s Sierra Madre Occidental with teams from the U.S.-based Columbia University and San Diego Zoo Global, I assisted in work involving the endangered thick-billed parrot.…
In early February, in downtown Bogotá, Colombia, Luis Alfredo Acosta recited a line in a book from memory: “I am from the rainforest because I smell like the rainforest; I…
Latin American cartels once were masters of the drug trade, but spikes in prices led them into controlling a new venture.
Tiny, translucent and no longer than a finger, juvenile European eels, also known as glass eels, might not look like much. But demand for these slippery creatures, particularly in East…
The wildlife trade, both legal and illegal, depletes biodiversity, with research indicating it results in a staggering two-thirds decline in the populations of some traded species. Which is why, when…
In the Tang dynasty, Chinese merchants began buying rice on credit with a system that relied on trust and trade to sidestep the authorities — and taxes — to deliver…
U.S. canned tuna producer Bumble Bee Foods has asked a court to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that it knowingly benefited from its suppliers’ use of forced labor by Indonesian workers.…
BERLIN — Islamist fighters affiliated with ISIS have left a Mozambican wildlife reserve following a series of deadly attacks that claimed the lives of at least 10 people, including two…
This is the third part of a three-part series on underreported issues involving Canadian mining companies and Indigenous peoples or local communities. Read part one and part two. Ever since…
In 2019, Malawi registered a massive win in the fight against the illegal wildlife trade. Intelligence-driven operations culminated in the arrest of more than a dozen members of the Chinese-led…
In Brazil’s Yanomami Indigenous Territory and across other parts of the Amazon Basin, illegal gold mining has metastasized into a transnational criminal enterprise. What starts with illegal deforestation and mercury poisoning ends…
In February 2025, rangers at Okapi Wildlife Reserve in the Democratic Republic of Congo, in partnership with the Okapi Conservation Project, successfully brought an okapi to Epulu, site of the…
Regulatory agencies use fines as a key mechanism for enforcing administrative law. Fines act as a deterrent, because they discourage individuals and organizations from ignoring regulations; they also serve as…
ASAHAN, Indonesia – On Nov. 11, 2024, Alfi Simatupang, a police officer in Asahan district on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, was arrested along with two soldiers and a civilian…
KATHMANDU — Recently, one morning in Kathmandu, senior lawyer Padam Bahadur Shrestha reclined in his cluttered second-floor office in a neighborhood near Nepal government’s administrative headquarters Singha Durbar. On one…
Starbucks has defended its little-known Swiss subsidiary handling its ethical coffee sourcing after a critical report accused it of “major global tax avoidance.” The report, released by the Centre for…
Agarwood, a fragrant resinous wood commonly referred to as oud, is a prized constituent in incense, perfumes, medicines and ornaments and remains in high demand across East Asia and the…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s efforts to ensure its commodity exports are free of deforestation are ramping up as the European Union Deforestation Regulation, or EUDR, nears enforcement. One of the biggest…
Every year, during the Northern Hemisphere spring and autumn, the skies over Lebanon are dotted with millions of birds on their epic migrations. From soaring Egyptian vultures (Neophron percnopterus) to…
JAKARTA — Prosecutors in Indonesia have charged four judges and two lawyers accused of bribery in a recently concluded trial involving palm oil giants Permata Hijau, Wilmar and Musim Mas.…
A Mongabay investigation that revealed an illegal cattle boom amid a record-high number of killings of Indigenous Guajajara has been cited by Brazilian authorities to remove thousands of head of cattle from the Arariboia Indigenous Territory in the Amazon Rainforest.
Villagers in Cameroon have denounced the use of tear gas by authorities to break up their protest on March 25 against the replanting of oil palm trees by the plantation…
The New Arab and The Shift co-published a set of edited versions of this investigation. As the sun hung low over the Nile, casting golden ripples across the water, we…
Panamanian authorities seized six longliner vessels on Jan. 20 for fishing illegally in protected waters. They also opened an investigation into an additional 10 vessels that surveillance data showed had…
YAOUNDÉ — In the village of Apouh, in southwestern Cameroon’s Edéa municipality, a group of women has remained steadfast in its fight against palm oil giant Socapalm. For several years,…
