Mongabay at 25: A Reflection on the Journey and Future
In high school, I had the great fortune to visit a spectacular rainforest in Malaysian Borneo. Some of my fondest memories are from this forest: hiking under the tall trees,…
Rhett Butler News
The unrecognized cost of Indonesia’s fires (commentary)
As Indonesia’s forests go up in smoke, the world may be losing a lot more than we currently understand.
World’s biggest meatpackers buying cattle from deforesters in Amazon
This story was produced via a co-publishing partnership between Mongabay and Repórter Brasil and can be read in Portuguese here. Brazilian meatpacking giants JBS, Marfrig and Frigol bought cattle from ranches…
A lucky child: Mongabay’s origin story (insider)
One of the few benefits of having a father who had to fly each week from San Francisco to meet clients in Hawaii and Alaska during my formative years was…
What to expect for rainforests in 2017
While 2016 lacked the drama of Indonesia's 2015 fire and haze crisis, surging deforestation in Earth's largest rainforest and ongoing destruction of forests for industrial plantations meant that it was…
The year in tropical rainforests: 2016
Massive forest fires in the Congo and Amazon, surging deforestation in Brazil, and tentative steps toward reform in Indonesia and Myanmar: there were no shortage of major happenings in tropical…
Brazil: deforestation in the Amazon increased 29% over last year
Deforestation in the world's largest rainforest jumped 29 percent over last year, representing a sharp increase over the historically low deforestation rate seen just five years ago and the highest…
Could REDD help save an embattled forest in Cambodia?
ver the past three decades, few countries lost forest cover faster than Cambodia: over a quarter of the country's forests were cleared since 1990. Much of that destruction was driven…
Saving Bangladesh’s last rainforest
When most people think of Bangladesh's native ecosystems, the Sundarbans — the world's largest mangrove forest — are probably the first thing that come to mind. But the Sundarbans aren't…
Rainforest destruction rises in the Brazilian Amazon
Newly released data suggest that rainforest destruction in the Brazilian Amazon has reached the highest level since 2009. In the past week, Brazil's National Space Research Institute (INPE) and Imazon,…
On eve of Olympics, Amazon deforestation surges in Brazil
Preliminary data suggests deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon may be on the rise after years of remaining at historic lows. According to data released last week by Imazon, a group…
10 reasons to be optimistic for forests
It's easy to be pessimistic about the state of the world's forests. Rates of forest loss remain persistently high, especially in the tropics and boreal regions. Drought, fragmentation, degradation via…
New Rainforest Alliance head: technology could improve commodity certification
In January, Rainforest Alliance, one of the world's most influential environmental groups for its work in developing eco-certification as a mechanism for raising social and environmental standards for commodity production,…
For Leap Day, 35 pictures of frogs
Leap Day only happens every four years but when the next one comes around, the planet may have lost a few more frog species: amphibians are the most endangered group…
77 inspiring rainforest pictures
Mongabay was born out of my love for rainforests so for this Valentine's day, I'm doing something a little different: posting a bunch of my favorite rainforest photos from the…
With haze threatening return, Indonesian forestry giant pushes peatlands restoration model
Last year some two million hectares of land in Indonesia went up in flames across Sumatra, Borneo, and the Western half of New Guinea. The conflagrations caused choking air pollution,…
Indonesia appoints conservationist to save country’s declining peatlands
Indonesian President Joko Widodo has appointed conservationist Nazir Foead to head up a newly-created peatland restoration agency, which aims to resurrect peatlands devastated by recent fires. The establishment of the…
What’s ahead for rainforests in 2016? 10 things to watch
Between Indonesia's massive forest fires, the official approval of REDD+ at climate talks in Paris, and the establishment of several major national parks, there was plenty to get excited about…
The year in rainforests: 2015
Between the landmark climate agreement signed in Paris in December 2015, Indonesia's fire and haze crisis of the late summer and early fall, and continuing adoption of zero deforestation policies…
How does the global commodity collapse impact forest conservation?
Since early 2014, prices for most commodities produced in the tropics have plunged. Palm oil is down by 40 percent, logs from Malaysia and Cameroon are off by roughly a…
New short film urges world to ‘stop the burning’
If world leaders are serious about addressing climate change, staving off the sixth great extinction, and raising living standards of the world's rural poor, they must 'stop the burning' of…
Palm oil expansion triggers ecological cascade, boosting pigs but hurting other species
An interview with Matthew Luskin, a part of our on-going Interviews with Young Scientists series. The direct impacts of converting rainforests and peatlands to industrial oil palm plantations are clear…
Amazon deforestation jumps in Brazil, but remains historically low
Deforestation jumped 16 percent in the Brazilian Amazon to 5,831 square kilometers for the year ended July 31, 2015, but still remained well below historical levels, according to data released…
Rainforests could provide half global climate solution by 2050
Protecting, restoring, and better managing tropical forests could provide as much as half the net carbon emissions required to meet a 2-degree Celsius climate target, argues a commentary published this…
Environmentalist gunned down by illegal miners in Peru
Another prominent environmentalist has been killed in Peru. On Thursday night, Alfredo Ernesto Vracko Neuenschwander, a woodworker who led a movement to resist forest invasions by illegal gold miners in…
Singapore court: illicit timber trafficking through our ports not our problem
In a decision that environmentalists say sets a “dangerous precedent” against efforts to stop trafficking in illegal timber, a court in Singapore has okayed the release of a large shipment…
Peru creates ‘Yellowstone of the Amazon’: 3.3M acre reserve home to uncontacted tribes, endangered wildlife
See our feature article on Sierra del Divisor: ‘A critical gift': Peru rejoices as a new national park is born After more than a decade of discussion and planning, Peru…
Conservation win in Madagascar: 7 new reserves established
Indri Lemur. Photo by David Cook. Good news on the environmental front in Madagascar has been rare and fleeting in recent years, but today the Indian Ocean island's Prime Minister…
Scaling bottom-up conservation in Latin America
NCI's buriti project helps local communities benefit while protecting areas of this wild palm , working to provide added value sales of palm fruit and extracts. Courtesy of NCI. One…
Do we need to move ‘beyond certification’ to save forests?
Over the past two years dozens of companies have established "zero-deforestation" or "deforestation-free" policies for the commodities they source, trade, and produce. The pace of adoption has been staggeringly fast…
Controversy emerges over alleged deforestation policy breach by APRIL supplier
Less than three weeks after APRIL unveiled a sustainability policy that is supposed to protect natural forests, an environmental group is alleging that one of the Indonesian forestry giant's subsidiaries…
Has Amazon deforestation reached a 7-year high in Brazil?
Imazon SAD's system serves as a short-term deforestation alert mechanism. Analysis of satellite data suggests deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon may have reached a seven-year high. Numbers released today by…
Special series
Forest Trackers
- In Brazil’s Amazon, land invasions — and fires — threaten a protected reserve
- A Guatemalan reserve turns from civil war refuge to deforestation hotspot
- Narco activity takes heavy toll on Colombia’s protected forests, satellite data show
- Photos confirm narcotraffickers operating in Peru’s Kakataibo Indigenous Reserve
Oceans
- Plan for close season rings alarm bells for Liberia’s artisanal fishers
- Lab-grown corals resisted bleaching during Caribbean’s worst marine heat wave
- Six months after first Houthi ship sinking, attacks slick Red Sea with oil
- $35m debt-for-nature deal aims to protect Indonesia’s coral reefs
Amazon Conservation
- ‘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
- ‘We need white men on our side to save the Amazon from destruction,’ 92-year-old Indigenous Chief Raoni says
Land rights and extractives
- Peruvian logger loses FSC label after latest clash with isolated Mashco Piro
- In the DRC, a government commission is taking funds owed to people relocated by mines
- A national park and its rangers in Bolivia endure persisting road construction, illegal mining
- Can nations ever get artisanal gold mining right?
Endangered Environmentalists
- Vietnam sentences yet another energy expert over renewables research
- Mother Nature Cambodia activists sentenced to prison — again
- Mongabay video screening at Chile’s Supreme Court expected to help landmark verdict in Brazil
- Indonesian activist freed in hate speech case after flagging illegal shrimp farms
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
- 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
- Small farmers in limbo as Cambodia wavers on Tonle Sap conservation rules
- To build its ‘green’ capital city, Indonesia runs a road through a biodiverse forest
