Learning to live with — and love — bears and eagles in Colombia’s cloud forest
Mayra Parra presses play on her laptop, and the video on the screen comes to life for the Perez family in the town of Abriaquí, Colombia. As a spectacled bear…
Can the EU’s deforestation law save Argentina’s Gran Chaco from soy?
Large-scale soy production for European markets has long been associated with deforestation in South America’s forests, including in the continent’s second-largest, but lesser-known, forest, the Gran Chaco in Argentina and…
License to Log: Cambodian military facilitates logging on Koh Kong Krao and across the Cardamoms
This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network where Gerald Flynn was a fellow. *Names have been changed to protect sources who said they feared reprisals from…
Boosted with fresh donations, Amazon Fund reboots stalled projects
With Lula taking office early this year, the fund was resumed and should get new donations from the U.K. and the United States.
Sumatra’s young primate whisperer brings bullhorn to macaque conservation
SIBAGANDING, Indonesia — After Abdulrahman Manik's father passed away in 2019, the young man inherited a duty to protect wild monkeys here in the north of Sumatra Island. Years later,…
The state of the Amazon: Chapter 1 of “A Perfect Storm”
The Amazon, home to the largest tropical forest on the planet, is an irreplaceable natural asset with enormous biodiversity and a critically important component in global carbon and water cycles.…
Survival and economics complicate the DRC’s bushmeat and wild animal trade
READER ADVISORY: This story contains images of dead animals that some viewers may find disturbing. LODJA, Democratic Republic of Congo — Disaster struck Héritier Mpo’s tiny NGO in the central…
Forest behind bars: Logging network operating out of Cambodian prison in the Cardamoms
This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network where Gerald Flynn was a fellow. *Names have been changed to protect sources who said they feared reprisals from…
Climate change is no joke for Australians, says award-winning comedian Dan Ilic
Dan Ilic’s comedic podcast, “A Rational Fear,” has been hosting journalists, comedians, and politicians that dissect issues and policy related to climate change and the environment for a decade. Over…
Book: A perfect storm in the Amazon
Today, Mongabay launches a digital version of the book, A Perfect Storm in the Amazon, by Timothy J. Killeen, an academic and expert who, since the 1980s, has studied the…
Overlooked and underfoot, mosses play a mighty role for climate and soil
It's easy to miss the mosses, the ubiquitous green, silver and brown carpets that drape across nature's surfaces, from forest to fen. It’s also easy to underestimate just how big…
‘Anthill tiger’: Putting one of Africa’s rarest wildcats on the radar
Every night, somewhere unseen across the vast, semidesert and dry savanna habitat of Southern Africa, the continent’s deadliest cat emerges to hunt. Black-footed cats (Felis nigripes) are ideally suited for…
Congo Basin communities left out by ‘fortress conservation’ fight for a way back in
The concept of a “pristine wilderness” is a flawed one, researchers argue, but this pervasive idea — one where human absence is required in order to preserve land — occupies…
Targeting 3% of protected areas could accelerate progress on 30×30 goals, says Global Conservation’s Jeff Morgan
Last December, delegates from nearly 200 governments adopted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework at the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP15) in Montreal, Canada. This agreement aims to conserve 30 percent…
Dams and plantations upend livelihoods in Ethiopia’s Lower Omo River Valley
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — The peoples of the Lower Omo River Valley in southwestern Ethiopia have never had an easy task in ensuring their own survival. Hot and dry, with…
Organic farming, and community spirit, buoy a typhoon-battered Philippine town
KIDAY, Philippines — Gloomy skies don’t dampen the spirit of Virginia Nazareno as she happily waters organic vegetables on an April morning in Kiday, a sitio or hamlet on the…
Crud-to-crude: The global potential of biofuels made from human waste
Last year, a car fueled by human waste toured the European countryside, covering more than 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles). It was the culmination of To-Syn-Fuel, a pathfinding project using technology…
Honey production sweetens snow leopard conservation in Kyrgyzstan
SHAMSHY, Kyrgyzstan — “I was only 9 when I first saw a snow leopard with my father. He was a ranger bringing injured animals found in the mountains to the…
‘It gives life’: Philippine tribe fights to save a sacred river from a dam
DARAITAN, Philippines — Members of the Indigenous Dumagat-Remontado, young and old alike, stood out against the greenery in their traditional red loincloth and tapis. On a scorching Good Friday morning,…
Indonesia’s new capital ‘won’t sacrifice the environment’: Q&A with Nusantara’s Myrna Asnawati Safitri
JAKARTA — The ongoing development of Indonesia’s new capital city, Nusantara, in eastern Borneo has raised alarm bells among environmentalists and human rights defenders around the world as the region…
In a Bolivian protected area torn up for gold, focus is on limiting damage
LA PAZ — At dawn in Apolobamba, in the Bolivian highlands, groups of vicuña and alpaca — some sheared, some shaggy — amble around looking for scrub to graze on,…
Brazil’s President Lula recognizes six Indigenous lands, and says more to come
SÃO PAULO — Last Friday, Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva signed documents officially recognizing six Indigenous lands across the country. After years of stalling due to opposition by…
Small farmers in limbo as Cambodia wavers on Tonle Sap conservation rules
KORK THLORK, Cambodia — Vorn Keo, perched on the edge of a green wooden boat, navigates through the flooded forest of Tonle Sap Lake and across the boundary into a…
Madagascar: What happens to villagers when a graphite mine comes knocking?
AMBOHITSY HAUT, Madagascar — Etsizakay, 40, stood amid the rugged knolls of his village, Ambohitsy Haut, and pointed right. “That’s where my brother is buried,” he said. “There ahead are…
Professional services abound for Amazon land grabbers seeking legitimacy
Engineers and realtors from southern Pará take advantage of their knowledge to abet land grabbers.
Mongabay Explores the Congo Basin: The ‘heart of the world’ is at a turning point
The Congo Basin contains the world’s second-largest rainforest at a staggering 178 million hectares (just under 440 million acres). It is also one of the biggest carbon sinks on the…
Meet the 2023 Goldman Environmental Prize Winners
Six grassroots environmental activists received the Goldman Environmental Prize on April 24. Known as the "Green Nobel Prize," the Goldman Prize honors environmental activists from the six continental regions. The…
We need to show that planetary wins are possible, says Dax Dasilva
In 2021, Canadian technology entrepreneur and activist Dax Dasilva launched "Age of Union" with a $40 million donation to support high impact conservation projects. Operating on the conviction that conservation…
Counterintuitive conservation: Fire boosts aquatic crustaceans in U.S. savannas
As a field biologist, Keith Perchemlides has often watched flames dance around tiny ponds that mark the remains of a vast wetland that once covered a large part of southwestern…
Guyana gets ‘Drilled’: Weighing South America’s latest oil boom with Amy Westervelt
The South American nation of Guyana, whose economy traditionally has relied on tourism, agriculture, and fishing, has begun business with oil giant ExxonMobil to make a massive offshore oil drilling…
