In a historic 2022 ruling, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights found that the forced eviction of the Indigenous Batwa community from the Kahuzi-Biega National Park was a…
NAGEKEO, Indonesia — The land weighed on Mateus Bhui as he sifted the Rendubutowe soil through his fingers into a traditional container. “To our ancestors: please don’t be angry,” Mateus…
Nov. 1 marked the five-year anniversary of the killing of Indigenous forest guardian Paulo Paulino Guajajara and the attempted killing of fellow guardian Laércio Guajajara in an alleged ambush by loggers in the Arariboia Indigenous Territory in the Brazilian Amazon; the suspects haven’t been tried yet.
MEXICO CITY — Illegal cattle ranching in Central America has led to the spread of a deadly parasite long thought to be eradicated, and conservationists are calling for tighter controls…
José Rafael Lozada had systematically monitored forest plots for almost 25 years in the Caparo Forest Reserve, the last tropical rainforest of Venezuela’s western plains, when about 300 peasant families…
MEXICO CITY — A hotel project in northern Mexico has stalled following a series of legal complaints that it failed to meet environmental standards, which would have protected coastal ecosystems…
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's administration failed to openly discuss the country's nationally determined contribution (NDC) and allocated small budgets for climate transition.
TANGERANG, Indonesia — Joy sat by the seashore on the outskirts of Jakarta patching up his fishing nets, repairing each tear with practiced stitches while a clutch of women shelled…
Many Mura residents, most of whom are concerned about the impact the project will have on the environment and their livelihoods, say the company did not consult them and instead co-opted leaders and falsified documents.
BOGOTÁ, Colombia — While music played in Bogotá's streets and a sense of victory filled the air after a long protest, Ana Graciela received a new appointment on her calendar: the…
SÃO PAULO — After years of delays in protecting the Munduruku Indigenous people from illegal gold mining and mercury use decimating the Tapajós River Basin, Brazil’s independent public prosecutors said…
Cattle and conservation don’t typically mix. For centuries, East African pastoralists like the Maasai trudged across the region’s savannas with their herds, passing by elephants and lions in their search…
Gustina Salim Rambe appeared quietly distraught as a court on Indonesia’s main western island of Sumatra sentenced her to more than five months in prison for speaking out against the…
The technique relies on identifying a wood sample’s chemical signature, which can then be matched against various known soil profiles to narrow down its origin.
Colombia President Gustavo Petro took office in 2022 with ambitious plans to combat climate change and lead a clean energy transition — a major challenge for a country that has…
JBS, the world's largest meatpacking company, has over the last five years been buying cattle from farms that were caught illegally deforesting Brazil's Pantanal wetlands despite the company's claims of environmental responsibility.
Indigenous peoples in Colombia have been granted the authority to protect, manage and conserve biodiversity within their territories according to their knowledge. On Oct. 15, Colombian President Gustavo Petro issued…
JAKARTA — When Joko Widodo took office in 2014 as the president of Indonesia, the world’s third-largest democracy, he was seen as a transformative leader who came from a modest…
Joan Carling has made it her life’s mission to fight for the rights of her fellow Indigenous peoples. She has led anti-mining campaigns in the Philippines and faced death threats.…
As global leaders, experts, activists and Indigenous voices meet this October in the Colombian city of Cali at the U.N. Biodiversity Conference, COP16, missteps and successes within President Gustavo Petro’s environment agenda are watched closely.
A new atlas by human rights groups assessed tree cover and biodiversity hotspots on lands belonging to Afro-descendant peoples in 15 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. The Rights…
Almost 20% of the Kayapó Indigenous Territory has burned in this year’s Amazon drought, the worst ever recorded in Brazil.
Pará's state capital, Belém, which will host COP30 in 2025, may elect a mayor unconcerned about climate change.
Titled quilombo territories — traditional Brazilian communities originally formed by runaway enslaved people — have significantly lower deforestation rates, making them crucial for conserving Brazil's natural biomes.
AMBON/SURABAYA/JAKARTA, Indonesia — Criminal investigations of environmental advocates in Indonesia continue to undermine civil society in the world’s third-largest democracy, with two anti-mining activists the latest to be hauled before…
AGUÁN VALLEY, Honduras — In the years after 2018, during periods when the threats subsided and the paramilitary gunmen didn’t show up, nights in the village of Panamá were peaceful.…
BATAM, Indonesia — A major Chinese solar panel manufacturing development on an Indonesian island saw renewed clashes in September between a company allegedly controlled by an Indonesian household name and…
The Brazilian state of Pará has agreed to sell millions of carbon credits to multinational corporations, including Amazon, Bayer and Walmart Foundation, but many challenges loom.
Global collagen and meat industries are continuing to foster rampant deforestation and contribute to the rights violations of Indigenous communities in Paraguay’s Gran Chaco, one of South America’s last climate-critical…
At just six years old, Nemonte Nenquimo understood that there were two worlds. The first one was where her oko (a big house where she lived in the rainforest) existed.…
Researchers in Brazil are lobbying to register archaeological sites as national monuments, which would confer a new layer of protection status to parts of the rainforest.
JAKARTA — Indigenous Papuans say they’ve been caught off guard by helicopters flying over their villages and excavators tearing down their forests in their area, all while accompanied by the…
