Saving rainforests by buying them
Volcanic rainforest cone and landscape in Sierra del Divisor. Photo by Diego Pérez. For more than twenty five years, an international non-profit known as the World Land Trust has been…
Rhett Butler News
Conservation legend Jane Goodall turns 80 today
Dr. Jane Goodall, primatologist, ethologist, and anthropologist, with a chimpanzee in her arms, c. 1995. Image Credit: Apic/Getty Images Primatologist and conservation legend Jane Goodall turns 80 today. In recognition…
Community’s push to clear forest for plantation challenges efforts to conserve in Indonesia
This is part of a series of articles on market transformation in the pulp and paper and palm oil sectors in Indonesia. Drainage canal that forms the boundary between the…
APP pledges to restore forests, if given the opportunity
This is part of a series of articles on market transformation in the pulp and paper and palm oil sectors in Indonesia. APP acacia plantation in Riau, Indonesia in February…
Will zero deforestation commitments save Indonesia’s forests?
This is an expanded version of A New Leaf in the Rainforest: Longtime Villain Vows Reform, which ran on Yale e360 last week. This story was originally developed in January…
After GAR expands policy, over 50% of world’s palm oil bound by zero deforestation commitments
Oil palm plantation in Borneo. Over half the world's palm oil traded internationally is now bound by zero deforestation commitments after Singapore-based Golden-Agri Resources (GAR) extended its forest conservation policy…
Procter & Gamble’s palm oil suppliers linked to deforestation (photos)
A solitary rainforest tree remains standing in a recently planted palm oil plantation on former orang-utan habitat inside the PT Karya Makmur Abadi Estate II palm oil concession. PT KMA…
Revolutionary Google-backed system unlocks power of ‘big data’ to save forests
Global Forest Watch showing tree height and forest loss and gain between 2000 and 2012. World Resources Institute (WRI) today announced the release of a tool that promises to revolutionize…
APP, environmentalists talk future of Indonesia’s forests
Indonesian pulp and paper giant talks forest conservation policy with critics Lafcadio Cortesi, Rainforest Action Network (RAN); Scott Poynton, The Forest Trust (TFT); Bustar Maitar, Greenpeace; Rhett Butler, Mongabay; Aida…
Helping the Amazon’s ‘Jaguar People’ protect their culture and traditional wisdom
Portrait of a Matsés woman. Photo by Alicia Fox. Tribes in the Amazon are increasingly exposed to the outside world by choice or circumstance. The fallout of outside contact has…
Talking deforestation and conservation with APP, Greenpeace, RAN, WWF, TFT, and Ekologika
APP One Year Forest Conservation Policy Anniversary event Today I moderated a panel at Asia Pulp & Paper's one year anniversary event of its forest conservation policy. Briefly, the policy…
Rainforest Alliance to independently audit APP’s zero deforestation commitment
Rainforest Alliance has agreed to conduct an audit of Asia Pulp & Paper's progress in implementing the zero deforestation policy the forestry giant signed last year. The deal, announced Thursday…
287 amphibian and reptile species in Peruvian park sets world record (photos)
Ameerega macero poison dart frog in Manu N.P. Photo by Alessandro Catenazzi. It's official: Manu National Park in Peru has the highest diversity of reptiles and amphibians in the world.…
Norwegian insurance giant blacklists palm oil companies
Fire burning on an oil palm plantation in Borneo. Photo by Rhett A. Butler. Storebrand, one of Norway's largest life insurance and pension savings companies, has sold off holdings in…
Debating deforestation in Indonesia and APP’s forest conservation policy
Rainforest in Sumatra For the past decade and a half, Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) has been one of the most controversial paper producers on the planet. Environmentalists, human rights…
New dolphin discovered in the Amazon surprises scientists
Inia araguaiaensis Researchers have discovered a new species of river dolphin from the Amazon. Writing in the journal Plos One, scientists led by Tomas Hrbek of Brazil's Federal University of…
Land conflicts complicate effort to spare forests from palm oil in Borneo
Carbon-dense peat forest in Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo. Photo by Rhett A. Butler A widely-heralded effort to spare carbon-dense rainforests and peatlands from palm oil development in Indonesian Borneo is facing…
In precedent-setting case, palm oil company fined $30M for destroying orangutan forest
Mother Sumatran orangutan with baby in Gunung Leuser, North Sumatra.. In a precedent-setting case, an Indonesian court has found a palm oil company guilty of violating environmental laws and ordered…
Most popular eco news articles of 2013
The endangered Huemul deer. Photo by: Alejandro Vila. The most popular environmental news article on mongabay.com during 2013 was a story about the recovery of the endangered Huemul deer (Hippocamelus…
Are there economic alternatives to palm oil?
Community embraces ecotourism instead of deforestation for palm oil. Community-based Borneo rainforest tourism at its best Replacing rainforests and peatlands with oil palm plantations is ecologically devastating at the local…
Rainforest news review for 2013
The year in rainforest news 2013 was full of major developments in efforts to understand and protect the world's tropical rainforests. The following is a review of some of the…
Our favorite nature pictures from 2013
Page 1 of 2 Green basilisk in Costa Rica With 2013 drawing to a close, here are 100 nature pictures taken during my various Mongabay reporting trips in 2013, including…
Biggest new animal discoveries of 2013 (photos)
What happened to the Innovation in Conservation prize?
South African sunset over the savanna Several people have asked me what became of Mongabay's 'Innovation in Conservation' award, which was granted each December between 2007 and 2012. The answer…
Top 10 HAPPY environmental stories of 2013
Also see our Top 10 Environmental Stories of 2013. The discovery of a new tapir species is number seven in our first ever Top 10 List of Happy Environmental Stories.…
Ongoing deforestation reported in Borneo concession held by APP supplier
Up to 1,400 hectares of forest have been cleared in a concession belonging to an Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) supplier in Borneo, potentially putting the company in breach of…
Top nature pictures of 2013
Transitioning to a non-profit model means that I'm spending less and less time working in the field these days, but I still managed take some photos in 2013, adding more…
Top 10 Environmental Stories of 2013
Also see our Top 10 HAPPY environmental stories of 2013. Elephant in South Africa. The poaching crisis in Africa is number six on our annual top ten list. Photo by:…
World’s biggest palm oil company makes zero deforestation commitment
Deforestation for an oil palm plantation in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. Photos by Rhett A. Butler. Wilmar, the world's largest palm oil trader and a long-time target of environmentalists, has signed…
Clarifying Google’s forest map
The map does not distinguish between natural forests and plantations, but the underlying database will support the development of additional layers, which can be used to create masks for oil…
Malaysia has the world’s highest deforestation rate, reveals Google forest map
Malaysia had the world's highest rate of forest loss between 2000 and 2012, according to a new global forest map developed in partnership with Google. Malaysia's total forest loss during…
Deforestation accelerates in Indonesia, finds Google forest map
Forest loss in Indonesia has sharply risen over the past 12 years, reports a new study published in the journal Science. The study, led by Matt Hansen of University of…
Special series
Forest Trackers
- 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
- Fires rip through Indigenous territories in Brazilian Amazon
Oceans
- Global tracking study reveals marine megafauna hotspots lie largely unprotected
- First-ever assessment highlights threats to Atlantic cold-water corals
- Major coral loss in Vietnam’s first marine protected area: Study
- When heat waves hit, clownfish shrink to survive, study finds
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
- Indigenous Amazonians win landmark ruling against mercury pollution in Colombia
- Indigenous Bajo suffer child deaths & toxic sludge amid green energy push
- ‘Colombia’s Amazon peoples provide solutions’: Interview with José Homero Mutumbajoy
- Should mining companies consider no-go zones where isolated Indigenous peoples live? (Commentary)
Endangered Environmentalists
- Environmental & rights activists flee and hide as M23 captures DRC’s cities
- Environmental journalist in Cambodia shot and killed by suspected logger
- Vietnam sentences yet another energy expert over renewables research
- Mother Nature Cambodia activists sentenced to prison — again
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
- 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
- Small farmers in limbo as Cambodia wavers on Tonle Sap conservation rules
