The constituency for the conservation of the Pan Amazon is broad-based and diverse. Academics and civil society organizations have been successful in framing conservation of the Amazon as an issue…
A giant anaconda, a vampire hedgehog, a dwarf squirrel, and a tiger cat were among the new species named by science in 2024. Found from the depths of the Pacific…
The year 2024 saw significant developments in tropical rainforest conservation, deforestation, and degradation. While progress in some regions provided glimmers of hope, systemic challenges and emerging threats highlighted the fragility…
This story was produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center Rainforest Reporting Grant. YURIMAGUAS, Alto Amazonas, Peru — The boat sets sail early in the morning. The plan is to…
"You're engulfed in waves of steam and sweating buckets and there's no cool water anywhere," Kenneth Feeley, a professor at the University of Miami, tells Mongabay. He’s describing the Boiling…
Major banks, including Citibank and JPMorgan Chase, are still failing to implement the full scope of U.N. human rights principles, a new report has found. The report by finance watchdog…
Zooming in on the Peruvian jungle, many hectares of deforestation can be seen amid the thick vegetation, like huge scars hidden among the foliage. They’re dispersed between the forests in…
Policies designed to occupy and populate the Peruvian Amazon began about seventy years ago with the construction of a trunk highway connecting Pucallpa on the Ucayali River with Lima. Named…
The boat comes to a halt, shuddering against the dirt bank that rises from the edge of the Ucayali River. Sixto, tanned and with a frown cutting deep furrows across…
In the mountains of Peru, where ancient cloud forests meet the Amazon Rainforest, an Andean bear made scientific history. For four months, a camera collar captured the wild male’s daily…
Significant inconsistencies and gaps in governmental policies for peatland science and protection in Peru’s Imiría Regional Conservation Area have impacted the livelihoods of Indigenous Shipibo residents, according to a new…
More than 130 Indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon were left isolated after a severe drought caused rivers used for transport to dry up, leaving families with little food, water…
It’s 4 a.m., and a group of fishers in the city of Chimbote, 422 kilometers (262 miles) north of Lima, have arrived at the rocks of Campamento Atahualpa and Vesique…
The hum of a small plane is heard overhead during a community assembly, but no one looks up. Conversation rises naturally over the sound as the engine’s intense roar fades…
The audience erupts into cheers and applause. The emcee has just announced the four finalists of the “Miss Juan Chávez Muquinuy” beauty pageant, who take the stage for their final…
The period between the end of the rubber boom and the onset of the colonisation frenzy that began in the 1960s was a time of relative stasis in the Amazon.…
At 8 a.m., 15 divers from the Artisanal Fishers Association Cristóbal Colón meet on Carrizales beach in the Marcona district of Nazca province in southern Peru. They tie a mesh…
The invention of vulcanized rubber (1839), followed by the popularization of bicycles (1870s) and the invention of the automobile (1886), led to exponential growth in the demand for rubber, which…
Because of their privileged status as a transnational religious institution and their allegiance to the pope, the Jesuits enjoyed considerable autonomy from both the Spanish and Portuguese crowns. This status…
For us, protecting our forests is like protecting our families. They are our homes. They give us life. For decades, we’ve witnessed deforestation destroy large areas of tropical forests, where…
Most of the Pan Amazonian population consists of immigrants or their descendants. They arrived over centuries, motivated by historical events that moulded their self-identity. This diverse assemblage of people represents…
Lack of transparency is a constant in the Chinese fleet dedicated to squid fishing in South American waters. Turning off their satellite-tracking systems, duplicating their identities within satellite-based monitoring systems,…
Rural-to-urban migration is a worldwide phenomenon and the Amazon is no exception. Nonetheless, a very large proportion of its immigrants are small farmers who originally came from the High Andes…
PARACAS, Peru — As the sun set over Paracas Bay on April 7, 2023, a beachside hotel flashed with the lights of an electronic music party. Seen from afar, the…
One reason it is possible to be optimistic about the future of the Pan Amazon is that none of the countries must deal with an impending demographic explosion. This was…
Infrastructure investments, agricultural production systems, land speculation and the exploitation of mineral resources have all been identified as drivers of deforestation and hydrological degradation in the Pan Amazon. These forces…
The activities of wildcat miners in the Pan Amazon has become an increasing issue of concern over the past five years; in part, because their numbers have exploded, but also…
Ten years ago, four Indigenous Asháninka environmental defenders were murdered in the forests near their community of Saweto in Peru’s Amazon Ucayali region. In 2023, a court in Pucallpa found…
In a defining moment for the rights of Indigenous peoples in Peru, 37 land titles were secured in the Amazon in record time, from June 2023 to May 2024. This…
In January 2023, the federal government of the United States issued landmark decisions affecting two controversial projects to exploit mineral resources on public lands. One was an industrial-scale copper mine,…
The Forest Stewardship Council has suspended its certification of a controversial logging company in the Peruvian Amazon accused of encroaching on the traditional territory of the Mashco Piro, an Indigenous group…
Ucayali Basin and the Camisea Megacampo Further south in Peru, the Ucayali Basin occupies a broad stretch of the Andean foothills and adjacent piedmont. It is a foreland basin located…
