By ARTHUR WESTING 14 July 2011 Some 200 years ago Benjamin Franklin noted that nothing is certain except for death and taxes. Today Franklin could readily have been additionally certain of the inevitability of two further events of sad note, namely armed conflicts and global warming. In his latest book, impassioned investigative journalist and courageous […]
The primary Mata Atlantica forest once stretched over much of the eastern edge of Brazil. Large swaths of it have been eliminated and replaced with eucalyptus plantations. Photos and commentary by Anne Petermann, Executive Director, Global Justice Ecology Project30 June 2011 On Wednesday, July 29th, around 200 participants divided into 4 groups toured various facilities […]
By Stephan Nielsen1 July 2011 SAO PAULO – Deforestation rates in the Amazon, the world’s biggest rain forest, more than doubled in May as Brazilian farmers become more confident they’ll be granted amnesty for illegal logging. Almost 268 square kilometers (66,200 acres) of protected rain forest were cut down in May, up from 110 square […]
By www.mongabay.comJune 17, 2011 Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon continued to rise as Brazil’s Congress weighed a bill that would weaken the country’s Forest Code, according to new analysis by Imazon. Imazon’s near-real time deforestation tracking system found that 165 square kilometers (103 square miles) of forest was cleared last month, a 72 percent rise […]
By JULIANA BARBASSA15 June 2011 RIO DE JANEIRO — A landless peasant activist was killed by a gunshot to his head outside his home in Brazil — the fifth murder in a month likely tied to the conflict over land and logging in the Amazon. The body of the victim, Obede Loyla Souza, was found […]
Reporting by Leonardo Goy, Raymond Colitt; Editing by Reese Ewing and Eric Beech1 June 2011 (Reuters) – Brazil’s environment agency gave its definitive approval on Wednesday for construction of the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam, a controversial $17 billion project in the Amazon that has drawn criticism from native Indians and conservationists. The regulator, Ibama, issued […]
By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF28 May 2011 Early last Tuesday, José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva, a forest activist and tree nut harvester, and his wife, Maria do Espirito Santo, drove a motorcycle through Brazil’s northern Para State, in the Amazon rain forest. As they crossed a river bridge, gunmen lying in wait opened fire with a […]
By Raymond Colitt; Editing by Stuart Grudgings24 May 2011 BRASILIA (Reuters) – An Amazon rainforest activist and his wife were shot dead in northern Brazil on Tuesday as the country’s Congress debated a divisive land bill that threatens to fuel deforestation. Joao Claudio Ribeiro da Silva, a rubber tapper and leading forest conservationist, and his […]
By Rhett A. Butler, www.mongabay.com18 May 2011 New data from the Brazilian government seem to confirm environmentalists’ fears that farmers and ranchers are clearing rainforest in anticipation of a weakening of the country’s rules governing forest protection. Wednesday, Brazil’s National Space Research Agency (INPE) announced a sharp rise in deforestation in March and April relative […]
By Rhett A. Butler, www.mongabay.com16 May 2011 Deforestation has increased sharply in Mato Grosso over the past nine months according to information leaked to Folha.com. The news, revealed during a lecture last Friday in Cuiaba, is significant because INPE, Brazil’s space research agency that tracks deforestation has unusually not provided any updates from its rapid […]
