JAKARTA — The Indonesian government is targeting protected forest areas as part of its plan to convert 20 million hectares (50 million acres) of forest into “food and energy estates,”…
LELILEF SAWAI, Indonesia — Hernemus Takuling’s life in this coastal village has changed ever since construction began on the Weda Bay Industrial Park, which borders Lelilef Sawai, home to around…
JAKARTA — Indonesia, one of the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters, has signaled it might follow in the footsteps of the U.S. and withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. “If…
TEBO, Indonesia — Dewita’s voice cracked through tears as she read her personal statement before a court on Dec. 3 in Tebo, a landlocked district in Jambi province on the…
We can now confirm that on the evening of Jan. 5, 2025, Mongabay journalist Gerald Flynn was denied entry to Cambodia while returning from a vacation. Immigration officials at the…
BANGKOK, Thailand — On Jan. 5, Mongabay journalist Gerald Flynn was denied entry to Cambodia. Flynn has lived and reported in the country since 2019, but upon his return from…
The soundscape in mangrove forests can be wonderfully complex. If you prime your ears, you might chance to hear mudskippers sloshing their bellies across silky mud, or fiddler crabs pattering…
The trade of endangered long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis) from Cambodia should be suspended, according to recommendations announced Jan. 14 by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild…
Marine biologists diving in the Gulf of Thailand were thrilled in 2023 to rediscover several colonies of a rare type of ocean sponge once thought to be extinct in the…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s parliament is fast-tracking amendments to the country’s mining law, in a move that could reshape the country’s mining landscape for the worst, say activists who warn of…
With oversized and inquisitive eyes, an infant-like expressive face, and a palette of thick, furry coats ranging from beige to black, gibbons tick all the right boxes to be called…
Garment factories burning coal is bad, and must stop. The fashion industry has largely aligned on this fact by now, with most high street brands (absent Patagonia, PVH, C&A and…
Last November, at the G20 conference in Rio de Janeiro, Indonesia’s new president, Prabowo Subianto, vowed to bring forward by a decade the date at which Southeast Asia’s biggest economy…
A new investigation by wildlife trade monitoring group TRAFFIC has uncovered an “alarming” slew of online adverts offering illegal wildlife products for sale in Vietnam, despite pledges from multiple platforms…
JAKARTA — Illegal deforestation has reportedly surged to record levels in a wildlife reserve at the northern tip of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island that’s known as the “orangutan capital of the…
The first biodiversity survey ever conducted in one of northwestern Cambodia’s last forest frontiers has found potentially new-to-science species and recorded direct threats to what conservationists call a “small but…
In Nagasaki prefecture, on the southern Japanese island of Kyushu, J-Power, the operator of the aging Matsushima coal-fired power plant, has an idea to keep the unit operating despite the…
On the slopes of Mount Kalatungan, a protected area on the island of Mindanao in the southern Philippines, rows of robusta coffee shrubs thrive alongside tropical hardwoods like lauan. The…
BANGKOK — Farmers and environmental advocates rallied in Bangkok Jan. 13 to demand the government and a private corporation take serious action to address the escalating spread of blackchin tilapia,…
JAKARTA — Prominent Indonesian environmental forensic expert Bambang Hero Saharjo faces yet another potential lawsuit for serving as a state witness against alleged violators, this time in a high-profile tin…
Among New Guinea’s rainforest inhabitants is a group of birds called pitohuis, chatty songbirds that stand out for their loud, attractive songs. But there’s more to these birds than their…
BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — In October 2023 in the Indigenous Dayak village of Bangkal, Indonesian police fired on farmers demonstrating against PT Hamparan Masawit Bangun Persada (HMBP), a palm oil plantation…
JAKARTA — An Indonesian government plan to clear forests spanning an area twice the size of South Korea for food and biofuel crops has sparked fears of massive greenhouse gas…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian company responsible for the largest amount of deforestation, PT Mayawana Persada, has largely ceased clearing peatlands in the western part of Borneo. However, it has shifted…
JAKARTA — In a controversial speech, Indonesia’s new president argued oil palm plantations are like forests, calling for their expansion by stating, ‘oil palms are trees … they’ve got leaves.’”…
The EU Deforestation Regulation, or EUDR, will require companies importing certain products into the European Union to trace the origins of these products all the way back up the supply…
2024 was a year marked by a COP climate summit so dismal that many governments and analysts questioned whether the annual meetings are even worth holding. While world leaders failed…
Conservationists searching for Vietnam's critically endangered Tonkin snub-nosed monkey, one of the world's most threatened primates, have found no sign of the species in one of the two forest patches…
EAST HALMAHERA, Indonesia — Halik Fanen and his wife, Fatimun, spent much of the day sifting the couple’s inheritance into seven plastic sacks near the east of Indonesia’s Halmahera Island.…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s plan to clear rainforests half the size of Switzerland for sugarcane plantations isn’t just an agricultural gamble, experts warn — it’s a potential environmental catastrophe. A new…
For Thảo, a journalist based in Hanoi, online reports from Vietnamese internet users were key to her and her colleagues’ coverage of Typhoon Yagi and its aftermath. The storm, the…
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…
