Colombia’s coffee industry well placed but wary as EU deforestation rule looms
CIÉNAGA, Colombia — A handful of men swarm around a coffee collection center in the city of Ciénaga, shouldering burlap sacks of coffee as they move in and out of…
Farming News
Indonesia farmers count the costs as rains wash out Java durian harvest
BANYUMAS, Indonesia — The first two months of the year would ordinarily see Ganjar Budi Setiaji hurrying around Plana village’s durian orchard, here in the hilly Javanese district of Banyumas.…
Profitable cash crop trend in Bangladesh’s hills affects regional ecology
The hill people of Bangladesh have been moving to profitable cash crops for the last couple of decades, dropping traditional agricultural practices. However, the economic gain soon turned into ecological…
From chemistry to regeneration: Agriculture’s next transformation has begun (commentary)
Agriculture is on the cusp of its most profound transformation in a century. Just as the Green Revolution shifted farming from sun and soil to synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, we…
Indonesia says intervention in notorious Sumatran national park part of new ‘model’
PELALAWAN, Indonesia — A radical new policy to relocate people living in a notoriously deforested national park on Sumatra has moved hundreds of families to date, with Indonesian officials presenting…
Farmers fear displacement, drought, flooding tied to Cambodia’s Funan Techo Canal
This is the second of two stories about the potential impact of Cambodia’s planned Funan Techo Canal. Read part one, about consequences for coastal communities and wildlife, here. TAKEO, Cambodia…
In Kenya’s Jomvu Creek, women help restore a vanishing coast through crab farming
MOMBASA COUNTY, Kenya — Five minutes’ walk up the hilly road from the mangroves lining the tidal flats of Jomvu Creek, the sharp scent of sea water fills the air.…
The long struggle of women farmers to halt a zinc mine in North Sumatra
SILIMA PUNGGA-PUNGGA DISTRICT, Indonesia — Rainim Purba first heard the rumor in 1996. Back then, in her mid-30s, villagers were saying a zinc mining company was going to operate near…
Growing native plants to heal land at Indigenous owned nursery in British Columbia
CRANBROOK, British Colombia | At the Nupqu Native Plant Nursery in the Canadian province of British Columbia, sulfur buckwheat seedlings fill Styrofoam trays. It’s October, the end of the growing…
Hopes and fears as Guinea exports iron ore from Simandou mines
On Dec. 2, 2025, Guinea celebrated a milestone when a ship loaded with iron ore departed from the newly constructed port of Morebaya on the Atlantic coast. The shipment of…
Brickmaking keeps eating farmland as Bangladesh misses clean-build goal
In 2019, Bangladesh set a target to end the use of traditional bricks and switch to concrete blocks in all government construction works by June 2025. Aimed at preventing the…
Africa mulls gap in climate adaptation finance for agriculture
The agriculture sector’s adaptation to climate change in Africa remains severely underfunded, say stakeholders after the U.N. climate talks came to a conclusion in November 2025. Despite an increase in…
Mekong sand mining risks collapse of SE Asia’s largest freshwater lake, study finds
Rampant sand mining in the Mekong River is directly weakening critical seasonal river flows that sustain Southeast Asia’s largest freshwater lake, new research indicates. The Mekong’s annual wet season flood…
Malaysian companies dominate PNG forest-clearance permits: report
Papua New Guinea’s rainforests, which span 28.2 million hectares (69.6 million acres), are among the most biodiverse in the world, hosting an estimated 5-8% of all species. The country also…
Banned for years, dangerous pesticides persist in Nigerian farming
The sun rises over lush farm fields of on the outskirts of Lagos. For more than 20 years, a farmer named Joe has tilled the land, coaxing life from the…
IDB financed meat & poultry company that polluted Indigenous Ecuador lands: Report
In Peripa, an Indigenous Tsáchila village in Ecuador, there are still traditional healers, but medicinal plants are disappearing. Rivers no longer heal — instead, they make people sick. In the…
Fighting for food sovereignty at COP30: Interview with GRAIN’s Ange-David Baïmey
At the COP30 climate summit currently underway in Belém, Brazil, adapting to climate change impacts is a major focus of discussions. This is particularly the case for delegates from Africa,…
From waffle gardens to terraces, Indigenous groups revive farming heritage in America’s deserts
In 1985, with two young daughters and little money, Roxanne Swentzell, a Native American sculptor and ceramic artist, returned from her studies in Portland, in the U.S. state of Oregon,…
Witch Hunt: Virulent fungal disease attacks South America’s cassava crop
As smallholder farmers in French Guiana walked their fields in 2023, they noted a disturbing pattern. Their healthy cassava plants, once green and thriving, had begun to turn yellow. Leaves…
AI system eavesdrops on elephants to prevent deadly encounters in India
When elephant biologist Seema Lokhandwala, with the Elephants Acoustic Project, visited a village near Balipara in India’s Assam state, as part of her fieldwork in December 2015, she witnessed firsthand…
Guava yields in South Asia shrink due to unpredictable heat & rainfall
Guava farmer Haralal Halder, in his 45 years of farming profession in coastal Bangladesh, had never experienced a drought-like spell with soaring temperatures during April-May period, the flowering season, until…
Malaysian farmers demand transparency over proposed seed quality bill
This is Part 2 of a two-part series on proposed changes to Malaysia’s seed laws. Part 1 published Sept. 29 here. In a farmland surrounded by oil palm and rubber…
In DRC’s Kivu region, the moringa tree offers valuable health benefits
Moringa, most often associated with its native region of India, is also a valuable plant found thousands of miles away in the Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo.…
Women in Mexico step up to protect the island farms traditionally inherited by men
This story is a collaboration between The Associated Press and Mongabay. MEXICO CITY, Mexico — Jasmín Ordóñez looks out at the water as the wooden boat she is in crosses…
Fears of major locust swarms wane in the Sahel but agencies step up monitoring
NAIROBI — In May and June, the Food and Agriculture Organization’s commission for controlling desert locust outbreaks in West and Northwest Africa warned that heavy rainfall and vegetation in North…
Malaysian small-scale farmers worry about rights under proposed seed law changes
This is Part 1 of a two-part series on proposed changes to Malaysia’s seed laws. Part 2 reports more on Malaysia’s seed quality bill. On an August Sunday morning, a…
Burkina Faso’s women farmers reviving the land with fertilizer trees
CASSOU, Burkina Faso — With her daba in hand, her back bent from decades in the fields, Maan — meaning “grandmother” in the local Nuni language of Burkina Faso’s Centre-Ouest…
Maluku coconut growers cry crisis as Indonesia land-grabs feed energy transition
SOUTH WASILE, Indonesia — Rudy said South Wasile district police officers visited his home with PT Arumba Jaya Perkasa staff three times in June to recommend he take the company’s…
EUDR implementation comes laden with potential unintended consequences
Set to enter into force Dec. 30, 2025, the European Union’s deforestation-free products regulation (EUDR) aims to halt the bloc’s contribution to global forest loss. Experts Mongabay spoke to agree…
Brazil’s land registry holds farmers accountable, but enables deforestation
The CAR is an obligatory land registry for all rural properties in Brazil. The CAR was created because the national rural land registry (Sistema Nacional de Cadastro Rural (SNCR) developed…
Ethiopian initiatives try to mainstream traditional and resilient enset crop in diets
ARBA MINCH, Ethiopia — On a late May morning, as the chill of dawn gives way to sunlight warming the hills of Hareba village in southern Ethiopia, 56-year-old Almaz Achamo…
Amazon jambu blends tradition and science for numbing flavors and healthcare
Brazil's bioeconomy efforts are unlocking surprising global applications for a homegrown plant known as a local remedy and seasoning.
Special series
Forest Trackers
- Satellite data show burst of deforestation in Myanmar rare earth mining hotspots
- Narco airstrips beset Indigenous communities in Peruvian Amazon
- 15 illegal narco-trafficking airstrips found near Peru Indigenous communities
- Satellite data show bursts of deforestation continue in Indonesian national park
Oceans
- Mongabay shark meat exposé wins national journalism education award in Brazil
- Indigenous concerns surface as U.S. agency considers seabed mining in Alaskan waters
- Methane chasers: Hunting a climate-changing gas seeping from Earth’s seafloor
- Scientists call for stronger action to save Indonesia’s vanishing seagrass meadows
Amazon Conservation
- Researchers eye jaguar conservation wins under Brazil Indigenous stewardship project
- ‘World’s largest’ carbon credit deal in the Amazon faces bumpy road ahead
- New conservation model calls for protecting Amazon for its archaeological riches
- Brazil dredges Amazon rivers to ease drought isolation, raising environmental concerns
Land rights and extractives
- What’s happening with the global treaty to trace critical minerals?
- In the race for DRC’s critical minerals, community forests are on the frontline
- Lithium mining may threaten a precious resource — water: Voices from the land (commentary)
- Indigenous guardians successfully keep extractives out of Ecuador’s Amazon forests
Endangered Environmentalists
- José Albino Cañas Ramírez, a defender of Indigenous territories, aged 44
- A killing with precedent: Kaiowá man’s murder fits a pattern in Brazil
- Environmental & rights activists flee and hide as M23 captures DRC’s cities
- Environmental journalist in Cambodia shot and killed by suspected logger
Indonesia's Forest Guardians
- On a Borneo mountainside, Indigenous Dayak women hold fire and defend forest
- Fenced in by Sulawesi national park, Indigenous women make forestry breakout
- In Borneo, the ‘Power of Mama’ fight Indonesia’s wildfires with all-woman crew
- Pioneer agroforester Ermi, 73, rolls back the years in Indonesia’s Gorontalo
Conservation Effectiveness
- How effective is the EU’s marquee policy to reduce the illegal timber trade?
- How sharing and learning from failures can transform conservation (commentary)
- Is planting trees as good for the Earth as everyone says?
- Failure in conservation projects: Everyone experiences it, few record it
Southeast Asian infrastructure
- Flores’ geothermal ambitions collide with justice, culture & local resistance
- An ‘ocean grab’ for a property megaproject leaves Jakarta fishers grounded
- Study: Indonesia’s new capital city threatens stable proboscis monkey population
- Indonesia’s new capital ‘won’t sacrifice the environment’: Q&A with Nusantara’s Myrna Asnawati Safitri
