PALMAR SUR, Costa Rica — “Once, we were digging to build a fence for the animals and we discovered by luck some archaeological artifacts,” says Ana Isabel Vargas Ortiz, a…
The Brazilian Congress is analyzing a bill that would leave all the country's non-forestry vegetation unprotected, affecting an area twice the size of the United Kingdom.
Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh signed a decision this month to fully retain Tien Hai Nature Reserve, in a rare example of environmental protection winning over development in the…
When Leandro Castello graduated with his degree in oceanography in 1998, he didn’t immediately get a job related to the ocean. Instead, he found himself in the Middle Solimões region…
With their tooth-packed jaws, dinosaur-slit eyes, and stealthy ability to emerge without warning through the surface of muddy-brown waters, saltwater crocodiles are indisputably one of the world’s most revered top…
As the sun rises over the wetlands on the shores of Lake Victoria, papyrus harvesters set out into the swamps to harvest stalks of papyrus. At the docks, fishermen returning…
Yuly Velásquez grew up on the banks of the Magdalena River near the Colombian city of Barrancabermeja, an area surrounded by a large network of swamps, lagoons and tropical forests.…
Water is essential for all forms of life. It also underpins food security, economic prosperity and public health. This is especially so in Thailand, a country transited by some of…
The Indigenous residents of the highlands of southeastern Angola have long lived there with a light touch. Ironically, with the end of the country’s civil war and the slow return…
In the two decades since the Franco-British multinational Perenco established operations at Muanda, at the mouth of the Congo River, surrounding communities have suffered the loss of the natural resources…
In mid-April, the government of Thai Binh province on Vietnam’s north-central coast quietly issued a decision that has since spawned growing controversy. The decision removed protection from almost 90% of…
SUMENEP, Indonesia — Fisherwomen on Indonesia’s Madura Island are at the forefront of a protest against a plan to convert a stretch of their coast into salt farming in their…
When the sustainable development community gathers in New York on September 18-19 it would do well to answer an important call. Our ocean is calling for our help — and…
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — A flurry of subdecrees released through the end of July and early August show that the Cambodian government has approved he addition of more than a…
MAKHASANENI, South Africa — In a village in the rolling hills of grassland, woodlands and scattered homesteads in South Africa’s picturesque KwaZulu-Natal province, a broil between traditional leaders and community…
Amazonian lakes sequester carbon dioxide at a rate 39% higher than the rainforest itself. This is according to a 2022 study by researchers from Brazil, Australia, the U.S., France, Portugal,…
MENDAHARA ULU, Indonesia — At the end of 2018, three communities in this subdistrict on the island of Sumatra were given rights to manage their local peatland by Indonesian President…
LOS BAÑOS, Philippines — Built on wooden stilts and tied to endemic bangkal trees (Nauclea orientalis) are the homes of the Manobo Indigenous tribe, seemingly floating on the waters of…
EBRO DELTA, Spain — Perched on an oyster and mussel farming platform in the middle of Fangar Bay, Vacile Cotirlet works with the assured movements that come with two decades…
JAKARTA — Small-scale and traditional fishers make the greatest contribution to Indonesia’s total fish production, driving the country’s rise as one of the world’s top fishing nations. In an effort…
The takeover of a polluting landfill in Colombia was supposed to help clean up the area for residents falling sick from exposure to toxic chemicals, but years later they say…
JAKARTA — Most peatlands in Indonesia that need protection are currently not protected, a new study has found. It identifies 5.65 million hectares (13.96 million acres) of peatlands — an…
One of Bangladesh’s two Ramsar sites, wetlands of international importance, is slowly losing some of the waterbirds that seek respite at this key migratory pit stop, a new study says.…
On April 4, a large fire gutted thousands of shops at a popular clothing market named Banga Bazar in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka. Firefighters complained of water scarcity as a…
In 2005, fishers in northern Thailand captured a Mekong giant catfish of gargantuan proportions. Tipping the scales at 293 kilograms (646 pounds), the critically endangered Pangasianodon gigas raised a question…
KORK THLORK, Cambodia — Vorn Keo, perched on the edge of a green wooden boat, navigates through the flooded forest of Tonle Sap Lake and across the boundary into a…
For Indigenous women in the Amazon, the wetland of Lake Tarapoto is a living classroom. The women consider it not just a home for the fish they rely on to…
LIMURU, Kenya — Kiambu County in Kenya is facing a major water scarcity crisis that is threatening not only people’s livelihoods but also biodiversity. Rivers and wetlands that were once…
PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Lithan, 68, grew up eating fish caught from the rivers and freshwater swamps near his village in Ogan Ilir district, near the southern tip of the island…
CACHOEIRAS DE MACACU, Brazil — Gesturing across the still, green water reflecting the backdrop of forest-clad mountains, Nicholas Locke told of the time when this flourishing wetland was once a…