Gold mining ramps up, pushes deeper into Peruvian Amazon rainforest

By Morgan Erickson-Davis22 April 2016 (mongabay.com) – The quest for gold has been stripping rainforest from around rivers in the Amazon Basin, with not even protected areas immune from mining. The situation has gotten so out of hand that the Peruvian government launched an intervention in January, destroying a slew of mining equipment and more […]

Ecuador signs contracts with China oil giant for oil exploration in Amazon – Nearly 1 million acres of rainforest at risk – Indigenous people protest

1 February 2016 (Pachamama Alliance) – The indigenous people in this region are strongly opposed to any plans for oil development and vow to resist and stop these projects. They know the environmental and social disaster that oil development will bring. On January 26, the government of Ecuador formally signed exploration contracts for two Amazonian […]

Study reveals Amazon deforestation tends to decrease but remains high – 222,248 square kilometers destroyed between 2000 and 2013

(RAISG) – The Amazonian Network of Georeferenced Socio-Environmental Information (RAISG) reveals in a recent publication that the loss of original forest cover of the Amazon rainforest decelerated between 2000 and 2013 relative to the 1970-2000 period. Despite this deceleration, figures remain high within the entire region for the three periods analyzed (2000-2005, 2005-2010, 2010-2013). The […]

Second largest lake in Bolivia dries up – ‘There’s no future here’

By Carlos Valdez, with additional reporting by Frank Bajak21 January 2016 UNTAVI, Bolivia (AP) – Overturned fishing skiffs lie abandoned on the shores of what was Bolivia’s second-largest lake. Beetles dine on bird carcasses and gulls fight for scraps under a glaring sun in what marshes remain. Lake Poopo was officially declared evaporated last month. […]

Chile flood: Death toll rises to 23 after record rains in world’s driest region – Four relief workers killed in helicopter crash

By Cedar Attanasio30 March 2015 (Latin Times) – Fourteen are confirmed dead and dozens are still missing following heavy rains in the Chilean Andes that flooded the northern regions of Atacama, Antofagasta, and Coquimbo last week. The rains started on Tuesday March 24th but have since ceased. Rescue workers are racing to evacuate residents that […]

Cusco Running Club: Global warming and Peru

My guest post is up at Cusco Running Club: Global Warming and Peru. Check it out if you’re interested in the effects of abrupt climate change in the rural Andes: Global warming is real You may have heard that global warming isn’t happening, or that it’s a hoax, or that it has “paused” in recent […]

Study links global warming to a Peruvian glacier’s retreat

By JUSTIN GILLISFEB25 February 2014 (The New York Times) – Sitting on a flat volcanic plain 18,000 feet above sea level, the great Quelccaya ice cap of Peru is the largest piece of ice in the tropics. In recent decades, as scientists have watched it melt at an accelerating pace, it has also become a […]

More than 100 scientists warn Ecuador Congress against oil development in Yasuní National Park – ‘They are not nibbling around the edges of the park anymore, but going deep into the core’

By Jeremy Hance 3 October 2013 (mongabay.com) – Over 100 scientists have issued a statement to the Ecuadorian Congress warning that proposed oil development and accompanying roads in Yasuní National Park will degrade its “extraordinary biodiversity.” The statement by a group dubbed the Scientists Concerned for Yasuní outlines in detail how the park is not […]

Climate change pushing tropical trees upslope ‘exactly as predicted’ – ‘Dieback is happening much faster than expansion’

By Claire Salisbury 27 September 2013 (mongabay.com) – Tropical tree communities are moving up mountainsides to cooler habitats as temperatures rise, a new study in Global Change Biology has found. By examining the tree species present in ten one-hectare plots at various intervals over a decade, researchers found that the proportion of lowland species increased […]

Climate change could kill off Andean cloud forests, home to thousands of species found nowhere else

By Jeremy Hance18 September 2013 (mongabay.com) – One of the richest ecosystems on the planet may not survive a hotter climate without human help, according to a sobering new paper in the open source journal PLoS ONE. Although little-studied compared to lowland rainforests, the cloud forests of the Andes are known to harbor explosions of […]

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