The World Bank continues to indirectly finance some of Asia’s largest coal developers despite its pledges to stop doing so and align with the Paris Agreement, according to a new…
Regional governments in wildfire-hit Indonesia shuttered schools in the first week October, as sickly air pollution continued to cloak several population centers in Kalimantan and Sumatra. Local authorities in Central…
MAKASSAR, Indonesia — Daeng Bau says he has no plans to move from his home on the tiny island of Lae-Lae, a stone’s throw across the seafront here in Makassar,…
SOUTH PAGAI, Indonesia — A white coastal beacon stood in place against the surf as gales hurtled across the Indian Ocean here off South Pagai, one of the Mentawai Islands…
New acute respiratory infections in Indonesia’s Palembang city, on the island of Sumatra, are on track to surpass the total number recorded there in 2022, as firefighters scramble to confront…
JAKARTA — Every morning, sisters Janah and Jaroh rise early on the diminishing coastline of Indonesia’s capital city and pray for calm weather and good fortune. At around 9 a.m.,…
JAKARTA — In June, Dormaida Sihotang and dozens of other women from Dairi district in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province arrived in Jakarta to plead with authorities to stop a zinc…
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…
SAROLANGUN, Indonesia — On a night in early July, Solikin was awake chasing elephants past sunrise. The animals had entered the community’s oil palm fields and raised hell, mashing hundreds…
POHUWATO, Indonesia — The world's largest collective of seafaring nomads has sailed the waters off Sulawesi Island and farther afield for centuries, forging a cultural legacy that inspired even James…
NORTH PENAJAM PASER, Indonesia — When an expectant mother is around three days from entering labor, the Suku Balik prepare a container out of coconut palm containing fruit, tobacco and…
SERAM ISLAND, Indonesia — Zainudin Kelsaba traversed across the eastern Seram highland and stopped at an ancient outcrop grown over by trees and scrub. “The mountain is our home,” Zainudin…
Indonesia’s oldest women’s Islamic organization will prepare volunteers in Kalimantan and Sumatra to open clean air sanctuaries, should a strengthening El Niño accelerate wildfires over the coming months. “We will…
JAKARTA — Only a fifth of Indonesian palm oil companies are compliant with a requirement to allocate part of their land to smallholder farmers, according to official data. The government’s…
PALEMBANG, Indonesia — In February 1965, President Sukarno, flanked by aides and a photographer, unlocked the door to Indonesia’s first experimental nuclear reactor, the TRIGA Mark II, in the city…
WEST SERAM, Indonesia — It’s a sunny day off the coast of Piru village on the island district of West Seram, in Indonesia’s Maluku province. La Samiun and his wife…
JAKARTA — Indonesian officials say the country’s deforestation rate continued to decline for the third year running, hitting a historical low in 2021-2022. But claims of an improving trend are…
Indonesia is readying a fleet of drones to launch over Nusantara, its new capital city, as part of efforts to protect the under-construction site in Borneo from wildfires, officials told…
JAKARTA, Indonesia — The Kinjil Three languished in a jail cell an island away as demonstrators arrived outside a beige Jakarta office block and began distributing thousands of coins on…
CENTRAL SULAWESI, Indonesia — Karolus Kolong, a 62-year-old villager on Indonesia’s Sulawesi island, has spent nearly two decades fighting to get his land back from palm oil giant Astra Agro…
GORONTALO, Indonesia — Marine and fisheries activists in Indonesia are ramping up their calls for the revocation of a new government regulation allowing the export of sea sand, saying the…
Humans have transformed the planet to a staggering extent. Studies estimate that, as a species, we’ve modified at least three-quarters of the Earth’s land surface. Over time, vibrant mosaics of…
Indonesian President Joko Widodo has warned of potentially dangerous weather conditions accelerating across the archipelago in the coming months, as the nation’s meteorology agency says more than half the country…
When battling to protect Indonesia's peatlands during wildfire crises in 2015 and 2019, most volunteer firefighters confronted the infernos with a dire shortage of equipment and technological resources. For community…
MADURA, Indonesia — For centuries, every architect in Indonesia relied on local materials when constructing homes and public spaces. Today Yu Sing is one of the few holding onto this…
ARU ISLANDS, Indonesia — More than 10 years have passed since a young official in Indonesia’s eastern Aru Islands saved his archipelago from becoming a monoculture plantation. Today, Mika Ganobal…
Only 13 of some 60 men implicated in a human trafficking case in which Indonesian drug users were imprisoned under the guise of a rehabilitation program and forced to work…
Planting clusters of native trees in oil palm plantations can boost biodiversity without sacrificing yields, according to a new study. Researchers say the findings from an experimental project on the…
BATANGHARI, Indonesia — In a sweltering oil palm field in Batanghari village, Rokani fixes a sickle to an 11-meter (36-foot) pole and begins cutting down bunches of fruit from the…
KOLAKA, Indonesia — Ansal grabbed a makeshift raincoat, an empty rice sack, and ran home as the rain began to pound the fields of Pomalaa. A few hours later, after…
