In 2007, Ecuador’s then-president, Rafael Correa, announced an ambitious plan to prevent oil drilling in Yasuní National Park, one of the world’s most biodiverse areas and home to the Indigenous…
Ecuador this month recognized a new reserve in the Amazon rainforest in hopes of protecting Indigenous land from threats like mining and livestock. The Tarímiat Pujutaí Nuṉka Reserve covers 1,237,395…
Since the 1990s, communities of the Intag Valley of Ecuador have been leading a conservation campaign to protect the remaining cloud forests in this highly biodiverse region of the planet,…
INTAG VALLEY, ECUADOR — Hundreds of moths land on a white sheet, lit like a false moon in the still, dark forest. Elegant silver ones, fist-sized moths with spots on…
A resplendent rainbow fish, a frog that looks like chocolate, a Thai tarantula, an anemone that rides on a back of a hermit crab, and the world's largest waterlily are…
“My son was covered in burns, poor boy – he just died,” says María Grefa, a Kichwa from Sinchiurco, a community in the northern Ecuadorian Amazon. The tragedy took place…
Scientists say they have solved the mystery behind the periodic disappearance and reappearance of the white-lipped peccary (Tayassu pecari) across huge areas of central and South America. A new study…
Deforestation is pushing the Amazon rainforest dangerously close to its tipping point, and the effects could soon be felt across the globe. A new report from the World Wildlife Fund…
We have two fascinating conversations about forests in the Americas for you on this podcast episode: the first is the story of how the Shuar Indigenous community in Ecuador recently…
Plot out all the Indigenous territories in the Amazonian region of Colombia, Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia, and you’ll get an idea of just how important conserving these lands is for…
Deep in Ecuador’s northern Amazon rainforest live the Tagaeri and Taromenane Indigenous nations, the last two communities in the country who have never set foot outside of the jungle. They…
Diseases affecting domestic animals, such as canine distemper, are increasingly infecting tropical wildlife, including wild felids, presenting a threat to biodiversity; so far solutions are few and funding is scarce.
On a mountaintop in Ecuador, a researcher spotted some spots. The polka-dotted frog, it turned out, was new to science and has now been named Hyloscirtus sethmacfarlanei in honor of…
Scientists warn that the Amazon is hurtling toward a tipping point, beyond which it would begin to transition from lush tropical forest into a dry, degraded savanna, unable to support…
The world’s largest rainforest makes its own weather. Up to half of all the rainfall in the Amazon comes from the forest itself, as moisture is recycled from the trees…
Giant tortoises (Chelonoidis spp.) have trundled across the Galápagos Islands for perhaps 3 million years. Over that time, they’ve evolved to survive with little food or water in the islands’…
This story is a reporting collaboration between Mongabay Latam and La Barra Espaciadora. At 6 p.m. on Tuesday, March 6, 2018, in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Benner Valencia picked up his…
National protests overwhelmed Ecuador in June, with Indigenous groups mobilizing in nearly every province of the country and President Guillermo Lasso announcing a state of emergency that restricted travel and…
“We receive reports of murders, crimes and threats every day,” says Esneda Saavedra, counselor for the rights of Indigenous peoples, human rights and peace with the National Indigenous Organization of…
An Indigenous community in Ecuador has finally obtained national protections for part of its territory after decades of fighting off deforestation and pollution in its mega-diverse rainforests. Ecuador’s National System…
Researchers have described six species of ferns new to science from the tropical forests of Panama, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, all in the genus Danaea. “The described species are no tiny…
Alexandra Narváez and Alex Lucitante, two young Indigenous leaders from the A’i Cofán community of Sinangoe, located in the Ecuadoran Amazon, have been awarded the 2022 Goldman Environmental Prize for their…
The route connecting the provinces of Loja and Zamora Chinchipe in Ecuador is a series of roads surrounded by green, leafy and picturesque mountains. Near the city of Zamora, signs…
For years, Ruth Alipaz has been fighting against the Chepete-El Bala hydroelectric project. The project involves the construction of two reservoirs that together would flood at least 66,200 hectares (163,500…
Seven grassroots environmental activists will receive the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize today, on May 25. Known as the Green Nobel Prize, the Goldman Prize honors environmental activists from each of…
On some days, a strong smell of oil wafts through the Indigenous Kichwa community of October 12, located in Peru’s Amazonian region of Loreto. Residents going outside to see what…
Pressure from investors and conservationists has forced Home Depot to reevaluate how it does business, following findings that some of the plywood it sells may be coming from mega diverse…
In the world’s largest rainforest, wildlife crawls, hops, flies and prowls through every nook and cranny. Most animals are adept at hiding from humans, though, so finding them can be…
Over the past four decades, there have been more than 400 reported oil spills in the Peruvian Amazon. In Ecuador, the Amazon suffered from 1,202 spills between 2011 and 2021,…
Patricia Gualinga takes a deep breath and pictures herself inside the rainforest in Sarayaku, Ecuador. “It’s hard to describe the smell of such pure air when you’re in the rainforest”,…
