topic: Palm Oil And Biodiversity

topic: Palm Oil And Biodiversity

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‘Shocking’ mortality of infant macaques points to dangers of oil palm plantations
- As oil palm plantations encroach on rainforests, wild primates increasingly enter them to forage, where they face the threat of being eaten by feral dogs, killed for raiding crops, or caught by traffickers for the pet trade.
- A new study from Peninsular Malaysia finds that exposure to oil plantations also significantly increases the risk of death among infant southern pig-tailed macaques.
- In addition to known threats, researchers speculate common pesticides used in oil palm plantations might play a role in the increased death risks for infant macaques, but their study stops short of providing direct evidence implicating any specific toxic chemical in these deaths.
- Conservationists call for using environmentally safe and wildlife-friendly agricultural practices in oil plantations to minimize risks and establishing wildlife corridors and tree islands so that endangered primates, like southern pig-tailed macaques, can move freely without being exposed to threats.

Palm oil giants push out smallholders in Guatemala; deforestation risks remain
- Thousands of traditional rural Guatemalan families are negatively impacted by the country’s fast-growing palm oil industry. Plantations now cover more than 180,000 hectares (about 450,000 acres), accounting for nearly 2.5% of the nation’s total arable land.
- Guatemala is now the third-largest palm oil producer after Malaysia and Indonesia (which produce 88% of the global supply) and is often seen as a more sustainable alternative. Today, more than 60% of Guatemala’s plantations are certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). High certification rates are largely attributed to plantations owned by a handful of producers, making it easier to certify large chunks of the industry, according to RSPO.
- Certification in Guatemala did not drastically improve deforestation rates, a recent study found. Between 2009 and 2019, certified plantations showed 9% forest loss compared with 25% on noncertified plantations.
- The palm oil industry’s expansion in Guatemala is causing a huge transfer of rural territory from traditional subsistence farming communities to a handful of palm oil mill owners. Local populations are cornered into working for these companies for low wages and often poor working conditions.

How scientists and a community are bringing a Bornean river corridor back to life
- Decades of deforestation to make way for oil palm monoculture have transformed the Kinabatangan River floodplain in east Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, dividing wildlife populations and confining many of the region’s most iconic species to small fragments of forest that cling on along the river.
- Local communities and conservation initiatives are working together to restore and reconnect pockets of remaining habitat along the river to preserve the vital wildlife corridor, but restoration in the unpredictable and often-waterlogged floodplain is notoriously difficult.
- One such initiative, Regrow Borneo, is facing the challenge by leveraging the expertise of scientists and local knowledge of community members who have been planting forests along the Kinabatangan for decades.
- They say that by focusing their approach on a model that benefits both people and wildlife, they hope their program inspires others to shift away from simply planting numbers of trees toward restoring forests where they’re most needed, including in areas that present challenging conditions.

New electric-blue tarantula species is first found in Thailand mangroves
- A new electric-blue tarantula species, Chilobrachys natanicharum, has been described by scientists in Thailand, making it the first-known tarantula species in Thai mangroves.
- Researchers from Khon Kaen University and wildlife YouTuber JoCho Sippawa found these vibrant blue tarantulas in the muddy conditions of Phang Nga province’s mangrove forest.
- The spider’s vivid blue coloration is created not by pigments but by nanostructures on the tarantula’s hairs that manipulate light and produce an iridescent effect.
- The researchers are concerned about the tarantulas’ mangrove habitats being cleared for oil palm cultivation.

Group certification helps Malaysia’s Sabah aim for palm oil sustainability
- In 2015, the government of Sabah in Malaysian Borneo committed to gaining sustainability certification for 100% of the state’s palm oil by 2025, becoming the first region in the world to pilot such a jurisdictional approach.
- As the deadline nears, getting smallholders certified has proved to be a major challenge; out of an estimated 30,000 smallholders in the state, just 885 have been certified.
- The certification process can be difficult and expensive for small farmers, but NGOs like WWF are working to overcome this barrier by supporting growers’ cooperatives.
- Other obstacles in the statewide certification process include debate over whether any deforestation should be allowed for oil palm, and the continued issuance of licenses to clear forest in the state.

Oil palms may be magnet for macaques, boars, at expense of other biodiversity
- A new study documents the “hyperabundance” of two generalist mammals around oil palm plantations in Southeast Asia, highlighting the indirect ecological impacts of oil palm expansion across the region.
- The research team found local numbers of wild pigs and macaques “exploded” in proximity to oil palm plantations, where they believe the animals derive enormous fitness benefits by consuming high-calorie palm fruit.
- Scientists caution that while these species can aggregate in some areas, their overall numbers are in decline due to a wide range of threats, including habitat loss, environmental degradation, disease outbreak, and poaching for the pet trade and biomedical research.
- The researchers call for the establishment of buffer zones around oil palm plantations and avoiding encroachment into intact forest as a way to address any problems arising from negative human-wildlife interactions and ecological impacts.

Elephant encounters rattle farmers in Indonesia’s Jambi province
- On the island of Sumatra, oil palm farmers blame a pair of translocated elephants for a rampage they say caused the worst damage to their crops in a decade.
- The two bull elephants were translocated in an effort to get them to breed with local females.
- Only 924-1,359 elephants are thought to remain in the wilds of Sumatra, a decline of more than half over a decade prior.

Nursing oil palm plantations back to nature in Malaysian Borneo
- The Rhino and Forest Fund (RFF), a conservation NGO, is working to create wildlife corridors in eastern Sabah, in Malaysian Borneo, by reforesting land converted for oil palm plantations — a strategy that includes purchasing land legally being farmed.
- RFF works closely with the Sabah government, and reports that rare species are already making use of the developing corridor, including Bornean elephants, orangutans, sun bears and clouded leopards.
- However, raising funds to buy oil palm plantations has proven challenging, with many funders more focused on preserving intact forests or shying away from any involvement with the oil palm industry.
- Unable to rely on piecemeal donations, RFF is looking for other sources of revenue, including a plan to harvest and sell oil palm fruit while restoration gets underway.

Degraded, but not defunct: Modified land still has wildlife value, study says
- Researchers studying how species respond to repeated and rapid land cover changes say more focus needs to be placed on preserving the biodiversity value of human-dominated landscapes.
- With much of the world’s intact ecosystems now modified by humans, the study warns that without careful management, species will be lost each time land is converted from one land-use type to another, such as when forestry is transitioned to plantation or agriculture.
- The researchers call for biodiversity impact assessments when land is proposed for conversion, regardless of whether it is intact primary habitat or considered “degraded” land.
- They also recommend the identification, preservation and restoration of natural features of landscapes, such as forest fragments, large and old trees, and wetlands, which can serve as vital refuges for species between successive land conversions.

Palm oil company in Ecuador operates illegally on ancestral land, community says
- The community of Barranquilla de San Javier, located near the northern border with Colombia, is trying to reclaim ancestral land that’s being used for palm oil cultivation by a company called Energy & Palma.
- Since entering the area in 2006, Energy & Palma’s plantations have diminished the quality of the land residents rely on for subsistence farming and polluted local rivers and sources of drinking water with agrochemicals, according to community leaders.
- Faced with a peaceful sit-in by the community, Energy & Palma sued seven residents for negatively impacting their profits. The community has also started a case to reclaim the ancestral land taken by the company.

‘Tree islands’ boost diversity in oil palm plantations, study finds
- Having “islands” of trees peppered across oil palm plantations can boost the biodiversity of the landscape while maintaining crop yields, a new study shows.
- Researchers found that biodiversity and ecosystem functioning improved within five years of planting these tree islands, with larger patches providing greater benefits for species such as birds and bats.
- Though these islands can boost biodiversity, the study authors underline that they are no replacement for protecting natural forests.
- “It is very important for conservation to maintain natural forest and avoid deforestation as the top priority,” said first author Delphine Clara Zemp.

Sumatra Indigenous community displaced by Samsung palm oil unit await justice
- The Talang Parit Indigenous community have witnessed their ability to sustain daily life become increasingly fraught since an oil palm plantation company, Inecda, began clearing their customary territory more than 25 years ago.
- The community faces water stress and blames difficulty in finding groundwater on the canals dug by the company to drain the landscape for its oil palm trees.
- The community has initiated a formal complaint to the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and is awaiting the findings of site visits conducted by the Geneva-based organization.

EU deforestation tracking regulation sparks division among groups, producers
- The EU is poised to adopt a regulation that bans the trade of commodities from deforestation and illegal sources as the European Parliament recently passed the law.
- The proposed law continues to be divisive, with palm oil producing countries like Indonesia and Malaysia calling the regulation too stringent and unfair, whereas civil society groups say the bill is too weak.
- In a recent joint statement, a group of 44 Indonesian CSOs say the EU regulation only focuses on eliminating deforestation from its supply chain, without addressing the root causes of deforestation in producing countries.

Palm oil giant hands over sacred community land for reforestation project
- After two years of local organizations campaigning in Cameroon’s Mbonjo village, palm oil giant Socapalm has handed over three sacred sites, totaling approximately three hectares (about seven acres) of land, to a community.
- However, the total is still short of what the community asked for, which was initially 30 hectares (about 74 acres).
- The local environmental organization and traditional leaders who campaigned for the sacred sites say reforestation and land restoration projects are now in the works.
- Socapalm is highlighting its commitment to respecting the rights and traditions of communities in accordance with its social and sustainability certifications, while local critics continue to accuse it of land grabbing.

Palm oil deforestation hits record high in Sumatra’s ‘orangutan capital’
- Deforestation in a protected wildlife reserve known as the “orangutan capital of the world” hit a record high in 2022, according to various analyses.
- The forest loss was driven by clearing for oil palm plantations by well-connected local elites, rather than smallholders, according to advocacy group Rainforest Action Network (RAN).
- RAN’s investigation found that palm oil from these illegal plantations had wound up in the global supply chains of major brands like Procter & Gamble, Nestlé, PepsiCo and Unilever, among others.

Orangutan death in Sumatra points to human-wildlife conflict, illegal trade
- The case of an orangutan that died shortly after its capture by farmers in northern Sumatra has highlighted the persistent problem of human-wildlife conflict and possibly even the illegal wildlife trade in Indonesia.
- The coffee farmers who caught the adult male orangutan on Jan. 20 denied ever hitting it, but a post-mortem showed a backbone fracture, internal bleeding, and other indications of blunt force trauma.
- Watchdogs say it’s possible illegal wildlife traders may have tried to take the orangutan from the farmers, with such traders known to frequent farms during harvest season in search of the apes that are drawn there for food.
- Conservationists say the case is a setback in their efforts to raise awareness about the need to protect critically endangered orangutans.

Forest loss may push tree-dependent marbled cats into threatened category
- Currently considered near threatened on the IUCN Red List, the little-known marbled cat may at greater risk from habitat disturbance than previously thought, a new study says.
- The study authors recommend escalating the species’ conservation status to the threatened category of vulnerable.
- Their findings are based on review of camera-trap data from across the species’ range, which found the small cat is an interior forest specialist and may change its daytime behavior to avoid humans.
- The authors say other semi-arboreal felids, such as the margay, may be similarly impacted.

Emmanuel Macron’s “Biodiversity Credits”: What are we talking about? (commentary)
- Carbon credits have long been a part of the climate change discourse and so the universe of different types of carbon credits is fairly well understood. What about biodiversity credits, at the heart of an initiative announced by Emmanuel Macron at COP27?
- Broadly speaking, two cases can be distinguished: on the one hand, regulatory or voluntary biodiversity offset systems with offsets, based on the “no net loss” principle associated with the avoid-reduce-compensate (ARC) sequence. On the other hand, credits not intended for offsetting, modeled on voluntary carbon credits, which are, above all, financing vehicles for actions in favor of biodiversity.
- Alain Karsenty, an economist at CIRAD, explores their interest and limits in relation to systems already in place or proposed elsewhere.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Indonesia’s orangutans declining amid ‘lax’ and ‘laissez-faire’ law enforcement
- The widespread failure by Indonesian law enforcers to crack down on crimes against orangutans is what’s allowing them to be killed at persistently high rates, a new study suggests.
- It characterizes as “remarkably lax” and “laissez-faire” the law enforcement approach when applied to crimes against orangutans as compared to the country’s other iconic wildlife species, such as tigers.
- Killing was the most prevalent crime against orangutans, the study found when analyzing 2,229 reports from 2007-2019, followed by capture, possession or sale of infants, harm or capture of wild adult orangutans due to conflicts, and attempted poaching not resulting in death.
- The study authors call for stronger deterrence and law enforcement rather than relying heavily on rescue, release and translocation strategies that don’t solve the core crisis of net loss of wild orangutans.

Photos: Meet the Indonesians on the front lines of human-elephant conflict in Sumatra
- At the northern tip of Sumatra, villagers deal with herds of elephants entering their villages and eating their crops.
- Incidents of human-wildlife conflict have intensified as more of the elephants’ habitat is razed for oil palm plantations and other developments.
- In the village of Cot Girek, locals have formed their own patrol team to head off these incursions.

‘Chased from every side’: Sumatran elephants pinned down by forest loss
- Sumatran elephants in Indonesia’s North Aceh district are being increasingly pinned down in shrinking patches of forest amid the ongoing destruction of their habitat, primarily for oil palm plantations.
- This is driving an increase in human-elephant conflict, with the animals forced into more frequent encounters with villagers, who resent them for destroying their crops and homes.
- Conservationists say deforestation in the district overlaps with the elephants’ migration routes and could grow worse under local government policies.

Deforestation in Borneo threatens one in four orangutans, study says
- Deforestation in Borneo will destroy the habitat of more than 26,000 orangutans, a quarter of the population of the critically endangered species, by 2032, a new study says.
- Researchers used historical data and modeling with known drivers of deforestation to project that orangutan habitat a tenth the size of Italy could be lost over the next decade.
- Forests at highest risk of deforestation include those near areas that have already experienced forest loss, as well as industrial timber and oil palm plantation concessions.
- The study suggests the largest immediate conservation gains could come from curbing deforestation in and around plantation landscapes, through efforts such as zero-deforestation pledges, sustainability certification, ecosystem restoration, and a halt on clearing land.

Study assesses wildlife exposure to rat poison on oil palm plantations
- Rodents can pose a financial risk to oil palm plantation managers as they can cause significant damage to crops, potentially reducing yields by up to 10%.
- Anticoagulant rodenticides are often used to eradicate or manage rodent populations.
- A recent study assessed the risk of exposure to wildlife species known to hunt on palm plantations.
- Little is known about exposure and the potential risk to a wide variety of species, the study warns, and more research is needed to fill these knowledge gaps.

Draining tropical peatlands for oil palms isn’t just bad — it’s unnecessary, study shows
- Oil palms growing in rewetted peatlands show no decline in palm fruit yields compared to those in drained peatlands, a new study shows.
- This debunks the long-held thinking in the palm oil industry that draining the carbon-rich peat soil is necessary to maintain yields on peatlands.
- Instead, rewetting peatlands should have net positive effects for smallholders by reducing the risk of fires that can damage property, plantations and human health.
- The study also finds that conserving peatland forests supports bird biodiversity, as a richer variety of bird life is found in peat forests than in adjacent oil palm plantations.

Saving medicinal plants a village cause in Indonesia
- Residents of the Sumatran village of Muara Jambi are working to preserve their ancient practice of cultivating and using medicinal plants.
- The village is also home to an ancient Buddhist temple complex that may be linked to the medicinal plant tradition, but some fear government plans to restore the site could threaten the plants growing there.
- Other threats come from oil palm plantations and coal mines operating nearby.

In oil palm-dominated Malaysia, agroforestry orchards are oases of bird life: Study
- Demand for agricultural land threatens Peninsular Malaysia’s remnant native forest cover, and with it, Malaysia’s rich bird life.
- A recent study has found that agroforestry and polyculture plantations — those with a greater number of tree species — provide a more complex habitat for bird life and are better structured to support biodiversity.
- The study suggests that the introduction of fruit trees that encourage bird life into monoculture croplands would benefit farmers through the restoration of ecological functions, such as reducing the need for pest control through bird diet without compromising yield.

Indonesia’s three most consequential forestry stories of 2021
- 2021 marked an inflection point for the fate of Indonesia’s rainforests, the largest expanse outside the Amazon and the Congo Basin.
- The year started out with news of a record drop in the deforestation rate in 2020, which the government attributed to its policies but which some observers say was due more to outside factors such as the pandemic.
- This was also the year that a moratorium on issuing licenses for new oil palm plantations came to an end, with experts warning of an impending wave of forest clearing now that the policy has expired.
- Land conflicts pitting local and Indigenous communities against agribusiness companies and developers saw an increase despite the pandemic-driven economic slowdown, with observers pointing to a lack of effective conflict-resolution mechanisms.

Report: Orangutans and their habitat in Indonesia need full protection now
- A new report underscores the urgency of protecting Indonesia’s orangutans and conserving their remaining habitat, warning that Asia’s only great ape is in crisis.
- The report from the Environmental Investigation Agency says the Indonesian government has systematically failed to protect orangutan habitat, enforce existing wildlife laws, or reverse the decline of the three orangutan species.
- “For decades, Indonesia has prioritized industry and profit over environmental health and biodiversity protection, and orangutans have paid the price,” said EIA policy analyst Taylor Tench.
- The report calls for protecting all orangutan habitat (much of which occurs in oil palm and logging concessions), halting a dam project in the only habitat of the Tapanuli orangutan, and recognizing Indigenous claims to forests adjacent to orangutan habitat.

In a sea of oil palms, even monitor lizards need islands of natural forest
- Forest patches in and around oil palm plantations are crucial for the survival of Asian water monitor lizards, a generalist species that usually thrives in human-impacted landscapes.
- A new study focused on the Kinabatangan floodplain in Malaysian Borneo found significantly more lizards in natural forest near oil palm plantations than in the plantations themselves.
- The researchers suggest lizards are particularly dependent on forest patches for breeding sites and shelter.
- The study adds to a growing body of evidence that demonstrates the vital role of natural forest in and around oil palm plantations and reaffirms the importance of buffer zones and habitat corridors that enable animals to negotiate oil palm-dominated landscapes.

Remnant forests struggle to survive amid oil palm plantations, study shows
- Forest trees that persist in areas dominated by oil palm plantations tend not to grow to maturity, a new study shows.
- Researchers say this has important implications for biodiversity and ecosystem service conservation in these landscapes.
- Remnant trees can support secondary forests and recover biomass and biodiversity, but only if they’re allowed to grow to maturity.
- The study indicates that growing forest trees among oil palms can boost biodiversity without impacting on palm oil yields.

Sri Lanka to ban palm oil imports, raze plantations over environmental concerns
- Sri Lanka has imposed a ban on palm oil imports and ordered oil palm plantations in the country to be replaced with rubber trees and other crops over the next decade, citing adverse environmental and social impacts.
- The decision is based on recommendations from a 2018 report by a panel of environmental experts, who linked oil palm plantations to soil erosion and the drying up of water sources.
- Unlike in other countries where the crop is grown, oil palms aren’t a driver of deforestation in Sri Lanka; instead, they’ve replaced rubber plantations, which host a higher level of biodiversity and provide more jobs for locals.
- Another concern is that oil palm is becoming an invasive species, occurring in the wild in a forest reserve, with as-yet-unknown impacts on native flora and fauna.

Pig nest-building promotes tree diversity in tropical forest: Study
- New research from a tropical forest in Malaysia reveals that wild pigs, better known for their destructive tendencies on farms and in ecosystems, may actually help encourage tree diversity in forests.
- Expectant mother pigs will build nests amid clumps of saplings, which are usually from a set of tree species common to the forest.
- When the sow kills these saplings for the nest, she’s effectively providing a check on any one species becoming dominant in the forest.
- The research demonstrates the benefits that pigs can bring to forest health, but they also note that pig populations that grow too numerous could — and do, in places — keep the forest from regenerating.

Review finds palm oil firm Golden Veroleum cleared carbon-rich Liberian forests
- The largest investor in Golden Veroleum is Singapore-based Golden Agri-Resources, itself a branch of the Indonesian conglomerate Sinar Mas.
- In 2018, a Liberian civil society group joined with the U.S. and Netherlands chapters of Friends of the Earth in submitting a complaint to the High Carbon Stock Approach alleging that Golden Veroleum cleared high carbon stock forests in Liberia.
- The investigation was the first of its kind by the High Carbon Stock Approach, and found that Golden Veroleum cleared more than 1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) of carbon-rich forests in Liberia’s remote southeast.

‘We attack,’ Indonesia declares in joint bid with Malaysia to shield palm oil
- Indonesia and Malaysia plan to mount a joint offensive to shore up the palm oil industry against criticism of the deforestation and conflicts associated with the production of the commodity.
- The leaders of the two countries allege that the EU, which plans to phase out palm-based biodiesel as a renewable energy, is discriminating to protect its own vegetable oil producers.
- Top government and industry leaders in Indonesia have declared a “black campaign” against their European competitors and against Indonesian NGOs calling for a more sustainable palm oil industry.
- Activists have expressed dismay at the prospect of a PR war, saying the money and effort would be better spent on bringing actual reforms aimed at sustainability.

Forest patches amid agriculture are key to orangutan survival: Study
- A recent study highlights the importance of small fragments of forest amid landscapes dominated by agriculture for the survival of orangutans in Southeast Asia.
- The research, drawing on several decades of ground and aerial surveys in Borneo, found that orangutans are adapting to the presence of oil palm plantations — if they have access to nearby patches of forest.
- The authors say agricultural plantations could serve as corridors allowing for better connectivity and gene flow within the broader orangutan population.

Seven financial firms key to rooting out deforestation, report finds
- Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and index funds are some of the most popular investment tools available, popular among individual and institutional investors alike.
- Just a handful of asset management firms control between 60% and 70% of these funds, according to a recent report from the financial think tank Planet Tracker.
- Planet Tracker’s analysis found that $9.3 billion from ETFs is invested in a set of 26 companies engaged in the soybean trade and linked to deforestation.
- The report concludes that the financial firms in which ETFs and index funds are concentrated are critical in addressing financial support for deforestation.

‘We are losing’: Q&A with The Orangutan Project’s Leif Cocks on saving the great ape
- For International Orangutan Day, Mongabay spoke with Leif Cocks, founder and president of The Orangutan Project, which seeks to protect the endangered orange-haired primates and their rapidly disappearing habitats in Southeast Asia.
- All three species of orangutans — Sumatran (Pongo abelii), Bornean (P. pygmaeus) and Tapanuli (P. tapanuliensis) are one step away from extinction.
- Deforestation is the biggest threat the primates face, and at the moment most conservation efforts have only been able to slow forest loss, not turn the tide around, Leif told Mongabay.
- Oil palm plantations replacing primary rainforests is a major problem in Malaysia and Indonesia, but Cocks says simply banning these plantations is not the answer; instead, he advocates for replacing exploitative production systems with those that recognize the services that these forests provide to the local communities and building on that.

‘Meaningless certification’: Study makes the case against ‘sustainable’ palm oil
- Three-quarters of oil palm concessions in Indonesia and Malaysian Borneo certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil occupy land that was forest and/or wildlife habitat as recently as 30 years ago, a new study shows.
- While not the initial drivers of deforestation in those areas, these plantations shouldn’t be certified sustainable if that history is accounted for, the study authors say.
- “The fact that someone else did deforestation just a few years before does not absolve the palm oil plantation’s owner and definitely does not justify a sustainability label by a certification scheme,” says co-author Roberto Cazzolla Gatti.
- He adds the RSPO’s failure to account for past deforestation means that “every logged area ‘today’ could be certified as a sustainable plantation ‘tomorrow,’ in an infinite loop of meaningless certification.”

Does coconut oil really threaten more species than palm oil? No, it doesn’t. (commentary)
- A brief study recently published by the journal Current Biology examines the environmental impact of different oil crops like oil palm and coconut by quantifying the number of species that have been threatened by each.
- The study and the media coverage that followed appeared to show that coconut oil is far more damaging to global biodiversity than palm oil, but this argument is not supported by the data: according to the IUCN, palm oil production has actually threatened five times more species than coconuts.
- The Current Biology authors have since stated that “we want to be very careful not to say that coconut is actually a greater problem than palm oil.” Here, a coconut industry CEO explains how the brief study arrived at its conclusions, and what makes coconuts more sustainable.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

That coconut oil you love? Species have gone extinct over it, study says
- A new study found that coconut oil production, by some measures, is more destructive than palm oil production, with coconuts affecting 20 threatened species per million liters of oil produced, and palm oil only affecting 3.8 species per million liters.
- Globally, coconut farms occupy 12.3 million hectares (30.4 million acres) of land, about two-thirds the area of oil palm plantations, with most farms located in Indonesia and the Philippines.
- Instead of positioning coconut oil as a product that should be avoided, the study aims to demonstrate that most consumable oils, such as olive, soy and rapeseed oil, have a negative impact on the environment, although these impacts are not all well known or publicized.
- Since this story was published, a substantive rebuttal to the findings on coconut oil was published by Mongabay, see below for a link to that.

RSPO questions effectiveness of Indonesian palm plantation moratorium
- There hasn’t been any quantifiable way to tell if a year-long moratorium on issuing new licenses for oil palm plantations has been effective, observers say.
- Indonesia imposed the moratorium last year, but failed to define baseline data or publish permit details that would have been essential to measuring progress, according to an official from the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.
- As part of the moratorium, the government also ordered a review of existing plantation permits; however, a lack of sanctions sends the message that violators can keep “making mistakes over and over again.”
- An industry watchdog has called on the government to stop thinking about the industry in terms of sheer production volume, and instead to find ways to ensure that the production is sustainable.

‘Bring it on,’ EU MP says of trade fight over palm biofuel phase-out
- A European member of parliament says the bloc isn’t concerned about threats by Indonesia and Malaysia to file a trade complaint over an EU policy to phase out palm oil-based biofuels by 2030.
- The two Southeast Asian countries supply 85 percent of the world’s palm oil, and have denounced the EU policy as discriminatory.
- The EU has justified its decision on the environmental impact of palm oil production, notably the large-scale deforestation to clear land for palm plantations.
- Concerns have also been raised that Indonesia’s response of boosting its domestic production of palm-based biodiesel, which a minister calls “green fuel,” could actually result in a net increase in carbon emissions.

The Pan Borneo Highway could divide threatened wildlife populations
- Crews are set to begin construction on a stretch of Malaysia’s Pan Borneo Highway in eastern Sabah state, involving the widening of the road from two lanes to four.
- The new divided highway will cross the Kinabatangan River and pass through a critical wildlife sanctuary that’s home to orangutans, elephants and proboscis monkeys, along with other wildlife species already hemmed in by the region’s oil palm plantations.
- Planners and politicians hope the road will stimulate local economies and bring in more tourists.
- Conservationists and scientists, however, are concerned that the highway could further section off animal populations and damage the current tourism infrastructure, unless certain mitigation measures are introduced.

81% of Indonesia’s oil palm plantations flouting regulations, audit finds
- An Indonesian government audit has found the vast majority of oil palm plantations operating in the country are in breach of a range of regulations.
- These include a lack of permits, encroachment into protected areas, and non-compliance with national sustainability standards.
- The findings echo the results of a 2016 audit by the anti-corruption commission that concluded Indonesia lacked a credible and accountable system to prevent violations and corruption in the palm oil industry.
- Activists say the government needs to be serious about cracking down on plantation companies, some of which are owned by top government officials, and about boosting transparency in the industry.

Indonesia calls on palm oil industry, obscured by secrecy, to remain opaque
- The Indonesian government has called on the country’s palm oil companies to refrain from releasing their plantation data, citing national security, privacy and competition reasons.
- The publication of the data is a necessary part of sustainability certification under the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO).
- Activists say they fear that withholding the information will further damage the reputation of Indonesia’s palm oil industry, which is already beset by allegations of deforestation, land grabbing, and labor rights abuses.
- The government has for years sent out mixed messages about whether it will make available the plantation data, which activists say is crucial in helping resolve the hundreds of land disputes across Indonesia, most of them involving palm concessions.

Malaysia calls on Southeast Asia to back palm oil against ‘unfair’ claims
- The Malaysian government has called for support from fellow members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to support the region’s palm oil industry in the wake of a European Union policy to stop recognizing the commodity as a biofuel.
- Malaysia and fellow ASEAN member Indonesia supply more than 80 percent of the world’s palm oil, while Singapore, another ASEAN state, is home to some of the world’s biggest palm oil companies and the banks that finance the industry.
- Malaysia’s minister of primary industries, Teresa Kok, says there’s a global campaign to portray the production of palm oil as exceptionally destructive, which she calls “extremely provocative and belittling.”
- While both the Malaysian and Indonesian governments have instated policies to curb the clearing of rainforest for palm plantations, there still remain challenges to ensuring sustainability across the wider industry, environmental activists say.

Indonesia’s threat to exit Paris accord over palm oil seen as cynical ploy
- A top Indonesian minister says the country may consider pulling out of the Paris climate agreement in retaliation for a European policy to phase out palm oil from biofuels by 2030.
- Luhut Pandjaitan, the coordinating minister for maritime affairs, says Indonesia, the world’s biggest producer of palm oil, can follow in the footsteps of the United States, which has declared its withdrawal from the climate pact, and Brazil, which is considering doing the same.
- The threat is the latest escalation in a diplomatic spat that has also seen Indonesia and Malaysia, the No. 2 palm oil producer, threaten retaliatory trade measures against the European Union.
- The EU says its policy is driven by growing consumer concerns about the sustainability of palm oil, which in Indonesia is often grown on plantations for which vast swaths of rainforest have had to be cleared.

Europe, in bid to phase out palm biofuel, leaves fans and foes dismayed
- Both palm oil producers and environmental activists alike have expressed dismay with a move by European officials to phase out palm-oil based biofuel by 2030.
- Officials in Indonesia and Malaysia, which together produce 85 percent of global supply of the commodity, say the move is discriminatory and have vowed a vigorous response, including lobbying EU member states to oppose it, bringing the matter before the WTO, and imposing retaliatory measures on goods from the EU.
- Environmental activists say the policy doesn’t go far enough, leaving loopholes that will allow palm oil produced under certain circumstances to continue being treated as a renewable fuel, thereby allowing for the expansion of palm estates into peat forests.
- They have also criticized the policy’s failure to label soybean oil as high risk, in light of growing evidence that deforestation linked to the cultivation of soy may be just as bad as or worse than that of palm oil.

Deforestation-linked palm oil still finding its way into top consumer brands: report
- A new report by Greenpeace finds that palm oil suppliers to the world’s largest brands have cleared more than 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles) of rainforest — an area the size of the city of Los Angeles — since the end of 2015.
- Greenpeace says palm oil-fueled deforestation remains rampant in countries like Indonesia and Malaysia because global consumer brands like Unilever, Nestlé and PepsiCo continue to buy from rogue producers.
- These brands have failed to commit to their zero-deforestation pledges and are poised to fall short of their own 2020 deadlines of cleaning up their entire supply chain from deforestation, Greenpeace says.
- Greenpeace has called for a transformation in the palm oil industry, particularly in Indonesia, the world’s biggest producer of the commodity.

What’s worse than palm oil for the environment? Other vegetable oils, IUCN study finds
- A new IUCN report shows that while palm oil leads to deforestation and biodiversity losses, replacing it with other types of vegetable oils might be even worse for the environment.
- The key factor is the high yield of oil palms, with other oil crops requiring up to nine times as much land to produce the same volume of vegetable oil. Transitioning to the latter would shift the deforestation associated with palm oil production to other regions such as South America, a major producer of soy.
- The report found that by far the biggest gains for biodiversity in an oil palm context are through avoiding further deforestation, which can be achieved through improved planning of new plantations and better management of forest patches left untouched in plantations.

PepsiCo to probe deforestation in palm oil supplier’s Leuser Ecosystem concession
- PepsiCo has launched an investigation into reports of deforestation in one of its supplier’s oil palm plantations, located in the Leuser Ecosystem, a biodiversity hotspot that is home to some of the last Sumatran tigers, rhinos, orangutans and elephants left on Earth.
- The investigation comes in response to a complaint from the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), which says the company has failed to act since the deforestation allegations were first reported four years ago.
- For its part, the supplier alleges that the deforestation was carried out by local villagers encroaching into its concession, and that it is in discussions with them on resolving the long-running dispute over the land tenure.
- Separately, PepsiCo has also recently updated and expanded its policy on sustainable palm oil, which has been criticized by RAN for failing to ensure the elimination of labor rights violations and forest destruction from the company’s extensive supply chain.

Orangutan forest school in Indonesia takes on its first eight students
- A forest school in Indonesia’s East Kalimantan province, funded by the Vienna-based animal welfare organization Four Paws and run by the local organization Jejak Pulang, has just started training its first eight orangutan orphans to learn the skills they need to live independently in the forest.
- Borneo’s orangutans are in crisis, with more than 100,000 lost since 1999 through direct killings and loss of habitat, particularly to oil palm and pulpwood plantations.
- Security forces often confiscate juvenile orangutans under 7 years of age, and without their mothers to teach them the skills they need, they cannot be released back into the forest.
- Jejak Pulang’s team of 15 orangutan caretakers, a biologist, two veterinarians and the center’s director aim to prepare the orphaned orangutans for independence.

Oil palm plantations in Amazonia inhospitable to tropical forest biodiversity: Study
- According to a study published in the journal PloS One late last year, the Brazilian Amazon has about 2.3 million square kilometers (nearly 900,000 square miles) of land suitable for oil palm cultivation, making it one of the largest areas in the world for potential expansion of the palm oil industry.
- Researchers investigated the responses of tropical forest mammals to living in a landscape made up of a mosaic of 39,000 hectares (more than 96,000 acres) of mature oil palm plantations and 64,000 hectares (a little over 158,000 acres) of primary Eastern Amazon forest patches in the Brazilian state of Pará.
- They write in the study that their results in the Amazon “clearly” reinforce “the notion that oil palm plantations can be extremely hostile to native tropical forest biodiversity, as has been shown in more traditional oil palm countries in South-East Asia, such as Malaysia and Indonesia.”

Palm oil certification? No silver bullet, but essential for sustainability (commentary)
- We need a global standard on what constitutes sustainable palm oil and a common system to implement it. Arriving at this consensus requires a convening body to connect every link in the palm oil supply chain, across different countries and jurisdictions.
- A recent report from Changing Markets Foundation, released with additional comments by NGOs such as FERN, the Environmental Investigation Agency, Mighty Earth, and Friends of the Earth Netherlands, criticizes the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and proposes that certification standards are — as stated by the same NGOs — ‘holding back the progressive reform of the sector’ and may even be causing ‘active damage.’
- This report disregards some of the important realities in the industry and on the ground, and fails to offer practical solutions. Simply bashing certification because of its imperfections puts the advances made at risk, instead of helping develop standards and synergies that facilitate compliance across the global palm oil supply chain.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

Roads might pose even bigger threat to Southeast Asian forests, biodiversity than previously understood
- According to Alice Hughes, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Centre for Integrative Conservation, global analyses often underestimate levels of deforestation driven by road-building in the Indo-Malaysia region. This is because many of those analyses rely on a widely used global map of roads compiled by Open Street Maps (OSM) that misses as much as 99 percent of roads in parts of the region.
- According to Hughes, this level of inaccuracy can have serious consequences: “Not only does it mean that any analysis based on global roads datasets will underestimate the level of fragmentation and overestimate the forest coverage of a region, but most forms of exploitation also occur within close proximity to a road.”
- Increasing deforestation is not the only threat posed by opening new areas to roads. “These growing road networks provide accessibility for other forms of resource exploitation,” Hughes notes in the study. “Most notably this includes selective logging, and hunting, which in the Indo-Malay region also targets a vast suite of species as pets, medicine and meat.”

Restoring flagging oil palm plantations to forest may benefit clouded leopards, study finds
- A team of biologists fitted four clouded leopards in the Kinabatangan region of Malaysian Borneo with satellite collars, and they gathered several months of data on the animals’ movements.
- They found that the cats stuck to areas with canopy cover, and they avoided land cleared for oil palm.
- Converting underperforming oil palm plantations back to forest could help the clouded leopard population with minimal impact on the state’s production of palm oil, the authors predict.

Borneo’s elephants prefer degraded forests, a new study finds
- New research has found that Bornean elephants most often use degraded forests with canopy heights topping out at around 13 meters (43 feet).
- Less than 25 percent of the state’s protected intact forests, which include primary forests, are suitable for elephants, the authors concluded.
- The team suggests that maintaining suitable elephant habitat in Malaysian Borneo will require the protection of relatively small patches of degraded forests that elephants favor.

Oil palm plantations’ dearth of biodiversity rubs off on nearby forests, study shows
- Oil palm plantations in Malaysian Borneo host a lower number of frog species than forests in same area.
- However, the plantations exhibit an edge effect that extends as far as 4 kilometers, resulting in a decline in the diversity of frog species in adjacent forests.
- The researchers suggest that for small forest patches or narrow corridors to be of long-term conservation value in oil palm landscapes, their sizes and widths need to adequately account for these edge effects.

Bornean bearded pigs seen adapting to oil palm habitats, study finds
- Bornean bearded pigs appear to thrive in oil palm plantations, but remain heavily dependent on nearby forests as their primary habitat, a recent study indicates.
- The findings are crucial because of the species’ key role as an “ecosystem engineer,” controlling the spread of tree species and turning over the soil with their rooting behavior.
- The researchers have called on the Malaysian government to better protect these forests in a bid to ensure a sustainable population of bearded pigs in mixed forest-oil palm areas.

What is happening to the orangutans of Borneo?
- A new study calculates that the island of Borneo lost nearly 150,000 orangutans in the period between 1999 and 2015, largely as a result of deforestation and killing. There were an estimated 104,700 of the critically endangered apes left as of 2012.
- The study also warns that another 45,000 orangutans are doomed by 2050 under the business-as-usual scenario, where forests are cleared for logging, palm oil, mining and pulpwood leases. Orangutans are also disappearing from intact forests, most likely being killed, the researchers say.
- The researchers have called for more effective partnerships between governments, industries and local communities to ensure the Bornean orangutan’s survival. Public education and awareness will also be key.

New study suggests Borneo’s had elephants for thousands of years
- The research, published in January in the journal Scientific Reports, used genetic information and changes to the topography of the region to surmise that Asian elephants arrived in Borneo between 11,000 and 18,000 years ago.
- The authors hypothesize that elephants moved from nearby islands or the Malaysian peninsula to Borneo via land bridges.
- It’s an indication that the elephants are ‘native’ to Borneo, the scientists argue, and points to the need to bolster conservation efforts.

Economic headwinds buffet once-resilient Sumatran forest-farms
- Farmers in Indonesia’s Krui region have long cultivated valuable damar resin trees among typical crops such as coconuts and rice.
- These agroforests have for more than a century served as an economic bulwark for local communities against the encroachment of palm oil and timber operations.
- Since 2000, however, a fifth of the region’s damar agroforests have been razed for sawmills and oil palm plantations, with land grabs and low resin prices driving the decline.

Oil palm firms advance into Leuser rainforest, defying Aceh governor’s orders
- The government of Indonesia’s Aceh province has banned land clearance for oil palm development inside the Leuser Ecosystem.
- However, deforestation is still ongoing as some companies ignore the moratorium.
- During the first seven months of 2017, Leuser lost 3,941 hectares of forest cover, an area almost three times as large as Los Angeles International Airport, watchdogs say.

Mammal numbers high in logged tropical forests, study finds
- The study quantified mammal numbers in forests and landscapes with varying degrees of human impact in Malaysian Borneo.
- Across 57 mammal species recorded with live and camera traps, the average number of all animals combined was 28 percent higher in logged forests — where hunting wasn’t an issue — compared to old-growth forests.
- The findings demonstrate the importance of conserving degraded forests along with more pristine areas.

Orangutans find home in degraded forests
- The study leveraged three years of orangutan observation in the field and airborne mapping of the forest structure using laser-based light detection and ranging (LiDAR) technology.
- The research team found that orangutans make use of habitats that have been ‘degraded’ by logging and other human uses.
- The research is part of a larger effort in collaboration with the Sabah Forestry Department to map carbon stocks and plant and animal biodiversity throughout the Malaysian state of Sabah with the goal of identifying new areas for conservation.

In Liberia, a battered palm oil industry adjusts to new rules
- Palm oil companies signed a series of large contracts between 2008-2012 to develop plantations in Liberia.
- Disputes over land ownership by rural communities and the imposition of new environmental rules have forced investors to adjust their projections.
- The ‘High Carbon Stock’ approach, endorsed by environmental advocates, will restrict expansion in some cases.

Over the bridge: The battle for the future of the Kinabatangan
- Proponents of the project contend that a bridge and associated paved road to Sukau would have helped the town grow and improve the standard of living for its residents.
- Environmental groups argue that the region’s unrealized potential for high-end nature tourism could bring similar economic benefits without disturbing local populations of elephants, orangutans and other struggling wildlife.
- The mid-April cancellation of the bridge was heralded as a success for rainforest conservation, but bigger questions loom about the future of local communities, the sanctuary and its wildlife.

Audio: Meet the ‘Almost Famous Animals’ that deserve more conservation recognition
- The Almost Famous series was created in the hope that familiarity will help generate concern and action for under-appreciated species. Glenn tells us all about how species get selected for coverage and his favorite animals profiled in the series.
- We also feature another installment of our Field Notes segment on this episode of the Newscast.
- Luca Pozzi, an evolutionary primatologist at the University of Texas, San Antonio, recently helped establish a new genus of galagos, or bushbabies, found in southeastern Africa. We play some of the calls made by galagos in the wild, and Luca explains how those recordings aid in our scientific knowledge about wildlife.

The Republic of Congo: on the cusp of forest conservation
- The Republic of Congo’s high forest cover and low annual deforestation rates of just over 0.05 percent have led to the country being named as a priority country by the UN’s REDD+ program.
- The country has numerous protected areas and has signed agreements to certify the sustainability and legality of its timber industry.
- Skeptics caution that more needs to be done to address corruption and protect the country’s forests, a third of which are still relatively untouched.

‘Revolutionary’ new biodiversity maps reveal big gaps in conservation
- The research uses the chemical signals of tree communities to reveal their different survival strategies and identify priority areas for protection.
- Currently, the Carnegie Airborne Observatory’s airplane provides the only way to create these biodiversity maps. But the team is working to install the technology in an Earth-orbiting satellite.
- Once launched, the $200 million satellite would provide worldwide biodiversity mapping updated every month.

‘Running out of time’: 60 percent of primates sliding toward extinction
- The assessment of 504 primate species found that 60 percent are on track toward extinction, and the numbers of 75 percent are going down.
- Agricultural expansion led to the clearing of primate habitat nearly three times the size of France between 1990 and 2010, impinging on the range of 76 percent of apes and monkeys.
- By region, Madagascar and Southeast Asia have the most species in trouble. Nearly 90 percent of Madagascar’s more than 100 primates are moving toward extinction.
- Primates also face serious threats from hunting, logging and ranching.

New study analyzes biggest threats to Southeast Asian biodiversity
- Deforestation rates in Southeast Asia are some of the highest anywhere on Earth, and the rate of mining is the highest in the tropics.
- The region also has a number of hydropower dams under construction, and consumption of species for traditional medicines is particularly pronounced.
- A new study published in the journal Ecosphere analyzing all of the threats to Southeast Asia’s biodiversity concludes that the region “may be under some of the greatest levels of biotic threat.”

Industry, NGOs agree to single approach to eliminating deforestation from palm oil supply chain
- Prior to this announcement, there were essentially two competing methodologies for determining what constitutes a “High Carbon Stock” landscape and setting rules for conversion of land to oil palm plantations in a sustainable manner: the High Carbon Stock Approach (HCSA), and another known as HCS+.
- But now the HCS Convergence Working Group, which includes major players in the palm oil industry as well as NGOs, announced in Bangkok on Tuesday that they will be releasing a revised HCSA toolkit that represents convergence between the HCSA and HCS+ approaches.
- Tropical forests, where most oil palm is grown due to the fact that the humid tropics are the species’ natural range, sequester large amounts of carbon and harbor much of Earth’s biodiversity, in addition to providing livelihoods, food, and medicine to millions of indigenous peoples and local communities.

Higher incomes driving Indonesian smallholders to oil palm and rubber
- Interviews with more than 460 farming households led the scientists to conclude that farmers making the switch to a single crop chasing better incomes.
- More than 40 scientists from Indonesia, Switzerland, New Zealand and Germany were involved in the research.
- The research is part of the EFForTS project, based at the University of Göttingen in Germany.

Mongabay Newscast episode 3: Crucial conservation votes at CITES CoP17 and the future of socio-ecological research
- Decisions were made regarding pangolins, African gray parrots, elephants, and rosewood at CITES CoP17.
- Also appearing on the show is Steven Alexander of the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center at the University of Maryland. Alexander answers a question submitted by Mongabay reader Duncan Nicol: “What areas or questions in socio-ecological research need the most attention over the next decade?”
- All that, plus the top news!

Scoring palm oil buyers on their sustainability commitments
- The scorecard reports the results of WWF’s analysis of 137 retailers, manufacturers, and food service companies from Australia, Canada, Europe, India, Japan, and the United States that collectively use more than six million metric tons of palm oil, 10 percent of all palm oil traded around the globe.
- Out of the 137 companies, WWF found that only 78 had made commitments to use 100 certified sustainable palm oil by 2015, while 30 have not made any kind of public commitment whatsoever.
- Just 96 companies reported using any certified sustainable palm oil in 2015, the scorecard states.

Here’s how much forest we’ll have to destroy to feed our growing junk food addiction
- A key ingredient in junk food is vegetable oil, and 60 percent of edible vegetable oil is produced from oil palm and soybeans — crops that are currently associated with massive deforestation in Southeast Asia and South America, respectively.
- A team of researchers from Princeton University, Adelaide University in Australia, and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore estimated the amount of land — and the potential amount of forests — required to produce the palm and soybean oil used in junk foods.
- We will need an estimated 17.1 million metric tons of vegetable oil for junk food production by 2050, which would require something like an additional 5 million to 9.3 million hectares (12.3 million to 23 million acres) of soybean land and about 0.5 to 1.3 million hectares (1.2 million to 3.2 million acres) of additional oil palm land, the team determined.

Here’s where tropical forests have been destroyed for palm oil over the past 25 years
- A new study led by researchers at Duke University that was published last month in the journal PLOS ONE looked at high-resolution imagery from 20 countries to determine where oil palm plantations have destroyed tropical forests over the past quarter century and where oil palm might threaten rainforests in the future.
- The researchers found that existing plantations drove high levels of deforestation between 1989 and 2013, with Southeast Asia accounting for 45 percent of forest destruction for oil palm expansion and South America accounting for just over 30 percent.
- Their analysis showed that all of the countries with a high percentage of deforestation within current oil palm plantations had more than 30 percent unprotected forests that are suitable for oil palm, suggesting great potential for further deforestation in those countries in the future.

Study concludes conservation NGOs might be better off working outside the RSPO
- NGOs adopt a number of different roles based on their conservation goals and the resources at their disposal for achieving those goals.
- However, the RSPO’s institutional structure could limit NGOs’ ability to have an impact, the authors of the study found.
- Conservation NGOs have played a vital role in strengthening biodiversity conservation within the RSPO, the authors write, but the RSPO system has largely failed to support NGOs in reaching their initial conservation goals.

Replanting oil palm plantations reduces frog diversity, but researchers say there are ways to fix that
- An international team of researchers compared frog populations in mature palm plantations that were about 21 to 27 years old with populations on plantations that had been re-planted within the past two years in Sumatra, Indonesia.
- They found a loss in both number of frog species (31 percent lower) and number of total frogs (47 percent lower) in young oil palm plantations as compared to mature plantations.
- The researchers say that practices such as staggered replanting and maintaining connectivity between mature oil palm patches could help maintain frog diversity, but more studies are needed for the many different types of wildlife that live in oil palm plantations.

NGOs and oil-palm growers team up to help orangutans, but progress is slow
- Rescuing orangutans from plantations and moving them to protected lands has long been the conservation approach in response to rapid deforestation and plantation development in Borneo.
- Increasingly, conservationists insist that commercial interests should share the burden of conserving orangutans by creating “high conservation value” forest enclaves on their properties.
- Industry, through the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, is starting to make progress on this issue. But some NGOs, grown impatient, have started working directly with companies to protect orangutans on oil-palm plantations in Borneo.
- Even there, however, progress remains slow.

France imposes new palm oil tax; Indonesia, Malaysia protest
- The tax is part of France’s new biodiversity bill. It was imposed on environmental grounds.
- The Indonesian and Malaysian governements, and industry associations in both countries, protest the tax.
- The tax will eventually reach 90 euros per ton in 2020.

Gorillas in threatened Cameroon forest caught on film for first time
- Ebo Forest covers nearly 2,000 square kilometres (about 770 square miles) of lowland and montane forest in southwestern Cameroon.
- Camera traps deployed by the Clubs des Amis des Gorilles (Gorilla Guardian Clubs), a community-based conservation program launched by the Ebo Forest Research Project, captured three individual gorillas in new footage.
- Hunting and the bushmeat trade is a major threat to the Ebo Forest gorilla population, while palm plantations are encroaching on the forest itself.

Communities and cutting-edge tech keep Cambodia’s gibbons singing
- The Central Indochina Dry Forest ecoregion is rapidly being consumed by large agribusiness concessions, threatening the Pileated Gibbon, Asian Elephant, Fishing Cat and many other unique animals.
- SMART, a new cutting edge law enforcement monitoring tool, developed by a consortium of conservation organizations including the Wildlife Conservation Society, is now helping strengthen wildlife protection standards in Cambodia. The number of Pileated Gibbon poaching cases have fallen drastically as a result.
- A Cambodian moratorium on new agricultural concessions, a plan for a major new protected area that will connect prime Pileated Gibbon habitat, and vibrant community engagement in conservation are all brightening the future for this Endangered gibbon.

A toad’s relationship with its prey endures in the face of deforestation for palm oil

Giant river toad. Photo credit: Rhett A. Butler. It’s no secret that vital biodiversity hotspots in Southeast Asia are under threat from logging and the spread of oil palm plantations. Biologists and conservationists have studied the effects of habitat degradation on individual species, but have rarely investigated how logging and conversion of rainforests to oil […]
Palm oil certification body to establish stronger voluntary standard

Due to its widening impact on tropical forests yet high profit margins, palm oil is one of the most polarizing crops in the tropics. Scientists and environmentalists warn of the high ecological costs caused by converting peatlands and rainforests for oil palm plantation, but growers and food producers argue that as the highest-yielding oilseed, palm […]
Surprising habitat: camera traps reveal high mammal diversity in forest patches within oil palm plantations

Researchers urge collaboration between NGOs, corporations At first the forest seems still, with only the sounds of busy insects and slight movement of wind betraying activity in the patchy undergrowth. Then, curiously, a Malay civet (Viverra tangalunga), an animal resembling half cat and half weasel, scampers out to claim its prize: a stick smeared with […]
Next big idea in forest conservation? Privatizing conservation management

Innovation in Tropical Forest Conservation: Q&A with Dr. Erik Meijaard Stunning wildlife encounter along the Kinabatangan River, Sabah. Although they are called the Bornean pygmy elephant, there is nothing small about these animals when seen from a few meters. Photo by Marc Ancrenaz. Is it possible to equitably divide the planet’s resources between human and […]
Can palm oil move past its bad reputation?

A new report explores innovative steps being taken by several of the industry’s largest firms to improve social and environmental practices Oil palm plantation in Riau. Photo by: Rhett A. Butler. Indonesia’s palm oil industry has gained a notorious reputation in recent years. Palm oil companies are routinely accused of clearing primary forests, destroying the […]
Traditional palm knowledge at risk of becoming lost forever

The humid tropical forests of northwestern South America boast over 140 different palm species (Arecaceae), yet the people who dwell underneath these green canopies and the knowledge they posses remain relatively unknown to modern science. But Rodrigo Cámara-Leret of the Autonomous University of Madrid and his team of researchers are working to change that by […]
Greenpeace photos expose palm oil giant’s deforestation in Indonesia

Peatland forest clearance for palm oil. Excavators clear intact peatland forests and build drainage canals in an oil palm concession owned by PT Andalan Sukses Makmur, a subsidiary of Bumitama Agri Ltd. Taken 11/13/2013 © Kemal Jufri / Greenpeace. A series of photos released this week by Greenpeace shows that an Indonesian palm oil company […]
Controversial oil palm company now accused of illegal logging in Cameroon rainforest

Environmental group, Greenpeace, has accused Herakles Farms of illegal logging in Cameroon after the company has already been lambasted by scientists and conservationists for its plan to build a 70,000 hectare palm oil plantation in one of Africa’s most biodiverse rainforests. Herakles Farms has been under fire from green groups—both in Cameroon and abroad—for years […]
Conserving the long-neglected freshwater fish of Borneo

The 2013 Zoos and Aquariums: Committing to Conservation (ZACC) conference runs from July 8th—July 12th in Des Moines, Iowa, hosted by the Blank Park Zoo. Ahead of the event, Mongabay.com is running a series of Q&As with presenters. For more interviews, please see our ZACC feed. The Kinabatangan River in the Malaysian state of Sabah, […]
Palm oil expansion endangering rare frogs in Malaysia

Expansion of the palm oil industry in Malaysia is destroying key habitat for endangered frogs, putting them at greater risk, finds a new study published in the journal Conservation Biology. Over a two-year period, Aisyah Faruk of the Zoological Society of London and colleagues documented the impact of oil palm plantations on the peat swamp […]

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