The best way to protect us from climate change? Save our ecosystems

By Tara Martin and James Watson 11 February 2016 (The Conversation) – When we think about adapting humanity to the challenges of climate change, it’s tempting to reach for technological solutions. We talk about seeding our oceans and clouds with compounds designed to trigger rain or increasing carbon uptake. We talk about building grand structures […]

Photo gallery: Endangered Batek tribe faces the loss of their last parcel of Malaysia rainforest

3 March 2016 (ABC News) – Documentary photographer, James Whitlow Delano, seeks to bring awareness to the plight that faces the Batek people of Malaysia today. Taman Negara National Park in Malaysia borders the rainforest and the ancestral home of the Batek people who are believed to have lived there for thousands of years. To […]

Why are the lost tribes now emerging from the Amazon?

By Angus Macqueen20 February 2016 (Guardian) – Footage of a man handing bananas to two naked men in the middle of an Amazonian river went viral in late June 2014. At the time, the Brazilians claimed it was a once in a generation event – that the moment of “first contact” was caught on camera. […]

EU review finds European governments failing in fight against multi-billion euro trade in illegal wood

18 February 2016 (Global Witness) – EU member states are failing to enforce laws designed to protect the world’s forests from illegal logging, according to a European Commission report published today [EU Timber Regulation: First two years show progress, but more effort needed from Member States and private sector]. The first review of the EU […]

Seven million hectares of forests have been lost in Argentina over the past 20 years – ‘We are facing a serious forest emergency’

By Ruxandra Guidi 19 February 2016 (mongabay.com) – Agriculture in Argentina has expanded at an accelerated rate in the past twenty years due to technological advances, the use of genetically modified crops, and, in particular, to the cultivation of soybean. The South American country is the first global exporter of soy, and the biggest provider […]

Drought ends in São Paulo but future still uncertain

By Caroline Stauffer; Editing by Brad Brooks and Bill Trott 18 February 2016 SÃO PAULO (Reuters) – Water levels at the main reservoir in Brazil’s largest city of São Paulo have more than doubled since the El Niño climate phenomenon ended a two-year drought, although industrialists and activists warn fresh shortages may be just a […]

Wildlife slaughtered as Amazon rainforest burns for Belo Monte dam construction – Burning timber fuels Brazil’s illegal lumber market

By Ana Aranha; translated by Holly Holmes      27 January 2016 (Upside Down World) – Source in Portuguese: Reporterbrasil.org This report follow up on an earlier article by Ana Aranha, published by Upside Down World here. Gliding through the waters of the Xingu River in Pará, between white sand beaches and four-story trees, the contrast is […]

Republic of Congo awards two million hectares of timber concessions, hinting ‘very strongly at illegal or corrupt allocation processes’

By John C. Cannon 11 February 2016 (mongabay.com) – The Republic of the Congo announced the allocation of 6 timber concessions on 8 January 2016 covering 2 million hectares (7,722 square miles), an area about the size of Israel. Two of the concessions were awarded ahead of government-established bid deadlines, an apparent breach of protocol, […]

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 […]

Deforestation in Brazilian Amazon down by 49 percent, but degradation up 323 percent

(Imazon) – SAD detected 99 square kilometers of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon in November 2015. That represented a 49% reduction in relation to November 2014 when deforestation totaled 195 square kilometers. It was possible to monitor 80% of the forest area in the Brazilian Amazon, while in November 2014 monitoring covered a smaller area […]

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