BELLINGEN, Australia — A coastal breeze can be felt through the rustling eucalyptus leaves of blackbutt, ironbark and tallowwood trees in the old-growth native forest now known as Newry on…
Indigenous activists have claimed two small victories against timber giant Samling in their decades-long battle to protect their remaining forests and territories in the Malaysian state of Sarawak. Operating in…
RIO DE JANEIRO — Monitoring the threats that uncontacted traditional peoples face in the Brazilian Amazon is set to become easier for Indigenous rights activists and agencies, thanks to a…
MALIKO’MIJK, Canada — Decades ago, the sea around Maliko’mijk Island was an expansive green carpet of eelgrass, the meadows so thick that members of the Pictou Landing First Nation had…
Brazil’s Supreme Court voted against the highly controversial time frame proposal, a legal challenge that would have stripped Indigenous rights and opened up traditional territories to mining and agribusiness.
The Philippines has gained the grim distinction of being Asia's deadliest country for land and environmental defenders, with 281 deaths over the past decade, roughly one-third of which were linked…
Sustainable farming, mercury-free fishing and circular trade are among the strategies Amazon Indigenous peoples have been developing to survive in one of the most hostile states for Indigenous people in Brazil.
The planet’s Indigenous peoples are valued as Earth’s best stewards, protecting forests and other ecosystems holding vast carbon stores. But governments offer insufficient aid to meet the extreme climate threats now buffeting traditional communities.
LABASA, Fiji — Jerry Lotawa knows his forest. He was raised in the tiny settlement of Drawa, a village of 11 brightly painted houses tucked high in the mountains of…
LABASA, Fiji — No one finds their way to the village of Drawa by accident. To get there, you must first board a tiny plane to Labasa, the biggest town…
PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea — A moratorium on deep-sea mining established by a group of Pacific island nations has struck a blow to the Solwara 1 project in Papua…
CHANGUINOLA, Panama — Long before the Naso peoples in the northern jungles of Panama won the fight for their land, before a king came from far away to lead them…
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…
Yesterday, Ecuador voted to halt all future oil drilling in a sensitive protected area known for its fragile rainforest ecosystem and isolated Indigenous communities. Millions of people participated in a…
In September 2022, researchers at BC Whales, a Canadian research nonprofit studying cetaceans in the north of British Columbia province, gasped when they saw a drone image of a humpback…
KAVIENG, Papua New Guinea — Papua New Guinea’s minister for mining confirmed in early August that a deep-sea mining company would once again be looking to mine the seafloor under…
In just 72 hours this month, five Indigenous people were wounded by gunfire in violent attacks in a part of the Brazilian Amazon dubbed the “palm oil war” region, sparking outrage and claims for justice.
QUITO, Ecuador — Ecuadorians have been given a chance to vote on whether or not they want oil drilling to continue in Yasuní National Park, deep in the northern Amazon…
Between Aug. 4 and Aug. 7, security guards for a palm oil company allegedly shot and wounded five Tembé Indigenous people, in the latest flareup linked to a long-running land dispute. The incidents occurred in a part of the Amazonian state of Pará that’s been dubbed the “palm oil war” region, where Mongabay has over the past year documented the escalating tensions.
Indigenous peoples and local communities have critical intimate knowledge of climate change impacts and adaptation options in their lands while the majority of those lands are under threat from industrial…
In the Ecuadorian Amazon, a region marked by half a century of extractive industries, mainly oil, deforestation is a constant. In recent years, a new threat to the conservation of…
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…
Despite being among the best safeguards against deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest, Indigenous lands saw a sharp increase in deforestation over the past decade, according to a study published recently…
The mining giant has secured permission to build a second railroad track that cuts through Amazon's Mãe Maria Indigenous Territory, prompting complaints from Indigenous leaders who say Vale applied maneuvers they consider unethical and that the extension will cause greater environmental damage.
A new investigation shows that farms located in the Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau Indigenous Territory in the Brazilian Amazon supplied two JBS meatpacking plants that sell beef to brands of the French supermarket giant.
A bill eyeing to strip uncontacted Indigenous people in Peru of lands and protections was officially scrapped at the end of June. This legislative proposal, called a “step backward” by…
GUASSA COMMUNITY CONSERVATION AREA, Ethiopia — On an early misty morning in July, Worku Mekonen, 39, one of the scouts at the Guassa Community Conservation Area in Ethiopia’s central highlands,…
A recent study found that locally managed marine areas in Fiji strengthened the mechanisms believed to advance conservation efforts but ultimately led to few social, economic or even ecological benefits.…
Perhaps the most notorious industrial farming institution is the concentrated animal feeding operation, or CAFO, in which livestock are raised in crowded conditions that require the heavy use of antibiotics…
Land legally designated or owned by Indigenous, Afro-descendant and local communities increased by 102.9 million hectares (254 million acres), larger than the size of Egypt, between 2015 and 2020, according…
