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topic: Biodiversity Hotspots
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Sheinbaum’s energy agenda under fire as Mexican activists slam LNG megaproject
- A controversial project bringing U.S. liquefied natural gas through the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora to the Gulf of California continues to face strong resistance from environmental activists.
- Critics of the Saguaro energy project say the pipeline, associated infrastructure and increased industrialization will harm the biodiversity of the gulf, which hosts 85% of Mexico’s marine mammal species and one-third of the world’s dolphin and whale species.
- Energy analysts say the pipeline will increase Mexico’s dependence on U.S. fossil fuels and further delay energy transition goals, despite President Claudia Sheinbaum’s electoral promises to boost investments in clean energy.
- Environmentalists say they’re worried about the project’s greenhouse gas emissions, with methane being especially problematic due to its high global warming potential.
New strategy launched to protect Tanzanian biodiversity hotspot
- A conservation strategy for the next 20 years has been launched to protect Tanzania’s most biologically rich landscape.
- The Udzungwa Mountains are home to rare and endemic plants and animals, including a small population of kipunjis, a genus of monkeys only revealed to the world in 2006.
- Sustainable financing is being sought to fund the conservation strategy and boost livelihoods and social well-being in communities surrounding three core protected areas.
- A key part of the strategy will be the rollout of energy-efficient stoves, seen as a priority by local communities who depend on firewood and charcoal.
Global outcry as petitioners demand no mining expansion in orangutan habitat
- Nearly 200,000 people have signed a petition urging U.K. multinational Jardine Matheson to halt the expansion of the Martabe gold mine in Indonesia’s Batang Toru Forest, home to the critically endangered Tapanuli orangutan.
- Agincourt Resources, a subsidiary of Jardine’s Astra International, plans to clear up to 583 hectares (1,441 acres) of forest for a new mining waste facility, which conservationists warn will push the Tapanuli orangutan closer to extinction and harm other protected species.
- Environmental groups accuse Jardines of misleading sustainability claims and the Indonesian government of failing to enforce conservation laws, despite awarding Agincourt a “green” compliance rating.
- Protesters have demanded Jardines adopt a “no deforestation, no peat, no exploitation” (NDPE) policy for its mining operations and provide clarity on conflicting deforestation figures and the compliance of its expansion plan with its approved permits.
An Ecuadorian hotspot shows how forests can claw back from destruction
- The Ecuadorian Chocó Forest is a little-known biodiversity hotspot, under immense pressure from deforestation.
- A joint German-Ecuadorian team is studying how this tropical forest ecosystem rebounds after clearing.
- The project, called the Reassembly Research Unit, is based out of a lab in the Jocotoco Foundation’s Canandé Reserve.
- The findings so far indicate that tropical forests have a remarkable capacity to heal, given suitable conditions. The findings can inform vital regeneration strategies.
Southeast Asia in review: 2024
- 2024 was a grim year for conservation and its champions across Southeast Asia, as deforestation surged due to infrastructure, agriculture, logging and mining, threatening critical ecosystems and protected areas.
- Environmental activists and journalists also faced increasing risks, including detentions, harassment and violence, highlighting a growing climate of repression by governments across the region.
- Despite this, there were some conservation successes of note, including wildlife population recoveries, biodiversity discoveries, and Indigenous community victories against harmful development projects.
- Grassroots and nature-based initiatives, like mangrove restoration and sustainable agriculture, showcased effective approaches to enhancing biodiversity and resilience while also improving community livelihood.
Armed conflict, not Batwa people, at heart of Grauer’s gorillas’ past decline in DRC park
- The decline in critically endangered Grauer’s gorillas between 1994 and 2003 in the highland sector of Kahuzi-Biega National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo was due to the impacts of armed conflict, rather than the presence or absence of Indigenous communities, according to a new study.
- The finding, including recent analysis of forest loss in parts of the park where Indigenous Batwa people returned, challenges simple but competing narratives that the region’s Batwa people are either forest destroyers or forest guardians, say various primatologists.
- After the onset of the Rwandan genocide and Congo Wars, which drove an influx of refugees, poaching, hunting and mining in the region, estimates of Grauer’s gorillas dropped from about 258 to 130 individuals, only to rise again once the Second Congo War ended.
- Researchers and conservation authorities say conservation in Kahuzi-Biega National Park remains challenging, but that Indigenous people should be included in environmental stewardship.
Greater Mekong serves up 234 new species in a year, from fanged hedgehog to diva viper
- Researchers and local nature enthusiasts described 234 new-to-science species across the Greater Mekong region in 2023.
- Among the new assortment of critters are sweet-smelling plants, glamorous snakes, a dragon lizard, a psychedelic-orange crocodile newt, and several new mammals, including a mole shrew and a fanged hedgehog.
- The Greater Mekong is a fast-developing region of Southeast Asia, characterized by intensive agriculture, internationally significant inland fisheries and rapid urban expansion.
- As such, the newly described species and their habitats are under pressure from multiple threats, not least from the illegal wildlife trade that also flourishes in the region. Experts say consistent and concerted action is required to secure their future.
Vietnam’s mammals need conservation within and outside their range: Study
- Vietnam is a treasure trove of mammalian diversity: it’s home to the highest number of primate species in mainland Southeast Asia and a host of unique species found nowhere else on the planet.
- However, a new study reveals more than one-third of Vietnam’s mammal species are threatened with extinction at a national level.
- The researchers advocate combining field-based and ex-situ conservation measures to recover the country’s mammal populations.
- They recommend conservation managers focus on establishing captive-breeding populations of key conservation species, as well as strengthening protection of habitats and creating wildlife corridors.
‘Scratching the surface’ of Nepal butterfly research: Interview with Sanej Suwal
- With 692 identified species, including more than two dozen endemic, Nepal is an important habitat for butterflies. However, research is in its infancy due to insufficient funding, limited public interest and a lack of cultural emphasis on butterfly conservation.
- Sanej Suwal is one of a handful of researchers dedicated to butterfly research in Nepal, balancing species studies with public awareness initiatives. He organized Nepal’s first Big Butterfly Count, a citizen science initiative.
- Butterflies in Nepal likely face threats from climate change, habitat loss and urbanization. Despite their importance, butterfly research struggles with minimal funding and institutional recognition, requiring more researchers and global support to expand knowledge and conservation efforts.
Coral biodiversity hotspot at risk from fossil fuel expansion, report warns
- A new report warns that the expansion of oil, gas and liquefied natural gas projects in the Coral Triangle region in the Western Pacific risks unleashing more oil spills, direct damage to coral reefs, noise pollution and ship traffic, not to mention greenhouse gas emissions.
- More than 100 offshore oil and gas blocks are currently in production, and more than 450 additional blocks are earmarked for future exploration, according to the report. If these projects are approved, the production and exploration blocks would cover 16% of the Coral Triangle, an area the size of Indonesia, the report states.
- The report notes there is already overlap between oil and gas operations and critical conservation zones, including 16% of the Coral Triangle’s marine protected areas.
- The Coral Triangle is one of Earth’s most biodiverse regions, stretching across the waters of the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands. It’s home to 76% of all known coral species, as well as numerous endangered marine species.
Most countries miss biodiversity pledge deadline to protect 30% of Earth
Twelve of the world’s 17 most biodiverse nations, home to 70% of the planet’s species, are likely to miss the United Nations’ Oct. 20 deadline to submit plans for reversing biodiversity loss by 2030, a joint analysis by The Guardian and Carbon Brief found. At the U.N.’s 2022 conference on the Convention on Biological Diversity, […]
New tourism restrictions to protect Bangladesh’s unique wetlands and coral-rich island
- Since 1999, Bangladesh has declared 13 biodiversity-rich areas as Ecologically Critical Areas (ECA) under the country’s environment protection act.
- However, the government has failed to conserve the ECAs over the years other than a few project-based protection measures undertaken in some of the areas like Saint Martin’s Island, Tanguar Haor, Hakaluki Haor, Cox’s Bazar Beach and Sonadia Island.
- Now, the current civil society-led government plans to limit tourism in biodiversity hotspots to ensure the health of the ecosystem.
- The coral-rich Saint Martin’s Island and one of the country’s largest wetlands, Tanguar Haor, will see the first through tourism restrictions.
Wildlife-rich mangroves suffer as Indonesia ramps up construction of new capital
- The development of Indonesia’s new capital city on the island of Borneo has resulted in clearing of mangrove forests that are home to threatened wildlife such as proboscis monkeys and Irrawaddy dolphins.
- The government has repeatedly claimed that the Nusantara project will be “green,” but experts attribute the ongoing deforestation to a lack of planning by the developers.
- With around 3,900 proboscis monkeys, Balikpapan Bay is a stronghold for the endangered species; but the new capital city’s footprint overlaps with 41% of their habitat.
- The government agency overseeing the project insists it’s doing what it can to mitigate the impacts on wildlife and ecosystems through planning, as well as cracking down on contractors destroying the mangroves.
Regions with highest risks to wildlife have fewest camera traps, study finds
- Camera traps are widely used to monitor biodiversity and guide conservation actions, but a first-of-its-kind study finds the technology isn’t as prevalent in highly biodiverse areas that face the most threats from human activities, such as the Congo Basin and the Amazon Rainforest.
- Even in areas with a high number of camera-trap studies, nearly two-thirds were conducted outside the regions facing the highest risk of animal extinctions.
- Country income, accessibility, mammal diversity and biome largely determine the locations of nearly two-thirds of camera-trap research.
- Experts suggest expanding the network of camera-trap studies, building capacity among local research communities, and leveraging tools and platforms that help with data sharing and analysis to address these disparities.
Indonesian capital project finally gets guidelines to avoid harm to biodiversity
- Beset by criticism over its environmental and social impacts, the controversial project of building Indonesia’s new capital city in the Bornean jungle has finally come out with guidelines for biodiversity management.
- The country’s president has hailed the Nusantara project as a “green forest city,” but just 16% of its total area is currently intact rainforest.
- The new biodiversity master plan outlines a four-point mitigation policy of avoiding harm, minimizing any inevitable impacts, restoring damaged landscapes, and compensating for residual impacts.
- The master plan considered input from experts, but several didn’t make it into the final document, including a call for the mitigation policy to extend to a wider area beyond the Nusantara site.
Tanzania’s ‘mountain of millipedes’ yields six new species
- Scientists have recently described six new species of millipedes found in Tanzania’s Udzungwa Mountains.
- The six were among thousands of specimens collected by researchers studying forest ecology there and in the nearby Magombera Nature Reserve.
- Magombera was damaged by commercial logging in the 1970s-80s, and affected areas have been overrun by woody vines known as lianas.
- But teams working on the ground think that millipede diversity and abundance in liana thickets is equal to that of undisturbed forests, suggesting they may be dynamic places poised for forest regeneration with minimal human intervention.
New ecoregion proposed for Southern Africa’s threatened ‘sky islands’
- A group of scientists is proposing the designation of a new African “ecoregion” consisting of an “inland archipelago” of 30 isolated mountains, some harboring animals and plants found nowhere else on Earth.
- The South East Africa Montane Archipelago straddles southern Malawi and northern Mozambique.
- This geographical isolation has fueled the evolution of separate species within the forests that grow on them, and those forests are now severely threatened by charcoal production and agriculture.
- It’s hoped the designation of a new ecoregion encompassing these mountains will promote nature conservation on a landscape-wide scale.
Norway pension fund breaks with U.K. conglomerate Jardines over endangered orangutan habitat
- Norway’s state pension fund, the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, has cut ties with Jardine Matheson (Jardines) due to concerns that the conglomerate’s gold mining activities in Indonesia could damage the only known habitat of the world’s most threatened great ape, the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis).
- The fund joins 29 financiers that have excluded Jardines and/or its subsidiaries from financing due to climate and environmental concerns, according to data from the Financial Exclusions Tracker.
- The Tapanuli orangutan was only first described in 2017, and its estimated population numbers fewer than 800 that survive in a tiny tract of forest; 95% of the ape’s historical habitat has been lost to hunting, conflict killing and agriculture.
- The Martabe mining concession in northern Sumatra lies in the portion of the orangutan’s habitat, the Batang Toru forest, with the largest orangutan population, where the probability of the species’ long-term survival is highest; the fund worried that further expansion of the mine would increase threats to the ape.
Indonesian gold mine expanding in ‘wrong direction’ into orangutan habitat
- A gold mine in the only known habitat of the critically endangered Tapanuli orangutan is expanding, prompting alarm from activists and conservationists.
- The Martabe mine on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, run by a company associated with the U.K.’s Jardine Matheson Holdings, already cleared 100 hectares (about 250 acres) of forest from 2016 to 2020, and looks set to clear another 100 hectares.
- Advocacy group Mighty Earth says the expansion will impact an area recently established to help protect the orangutan and other threatened species.
- Jardines says an independent forestry and sustainability assessment concluded that the long-term impact of the planned exploration and development work was minimal.
Tropical deforestation increases even as a few hotspots see respite, new data shows
- Emissions from deforestation in tropical forests rose by 5% in 2022, even as temperate forests strengthened their role as carbon sinks, according to data from a carbon mapping tool developed by nonprofit CTrees.
- According to the data, emissions from deforestation saw a dip in Indonesia and the Congo Basin in 2022; in Brazil, however, emissions continued to rise through 2022, and only started dropping this year.
- The JMRV platform uses satellite imagery and machine learning to map forests and non-forest lands around the world to monitor forest cover, carbon stocks and emissions.
- In addition to broader global data, the tool can also help local jurisdictions monitor and verify their carbon stocks to keep track of their emissions-reduction progress under the Paris climate agreement.
Nickel mine threatens Philippines biodiversity hotspot on Sibuyan Island (analysis)
- The pursuit of cleaner sources of energy could lead to the destruction of a biodiversity hotspot of global significance — the ‘Galapagos of Asia’ — a new analysis argues.
- Communities on Sibuyan Island have opposed mining for over 50 years but need decisive action from the government to safeguard their forests and rivers via a permanent mining ban.
- Demand for nickel and other ‘energy transition metals’ is set to increase, requiring long-term planning and rigorous, independent and participatory assessment of environmental & social impacts.
- This post is an analysis. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily of Mongabay.
New Caledonia expands strictly protected coverage of its swath of the Pacific
- New Caledonia, an overseas territory of France in the Pacific, recently announced that it would highly protect 10% of its economic exclusive zone (EEZ).
- These new highly protected areas will be off-limits to industrial activities such as fishing, drilling and mining.
- A decade ago, New Caledonia designated its entire EEZ as a marine protected area, the Natural Park of the Coral Sea, but industrial activities were permitted across 97.6% of that area at the time.
Study: Despite armed conflicts, Indigenous lands have better environment quality
- Global biodiversity hotspots, which cover only 2.4% of the Earth’s land, have witnessed more than 80% of armed conflicts between 1950 and 2000, some of which continue even today.
- Armed conflicts, driven by various factors, result in big losses for biodiversity and impact Indigenous ways of life.
- A new study finds four-fifths of these armed conflicts in biodiversity hotspots occur on Indigenous peoples’ lands — yet these areas remain in better shape ecologically than conflict-affected non-Indigenous lands.
- The study underlines the role Indigenous peoples play in environmental conservation, and highlights Indigenous self-determination as key to conservation and prevention of armed conflicts.
Tien Hai Nature Reserve latest battleground in Vietnam’s push for development
- In April, the government of Vietnam’s Thai Binh province quietly issued a decision to remove protection from 90% of Tien Hai Nature Reserve, which forms an integral part of the UNESCO-recognized Red River Delta Biosphere Reserve.
- After environment activists publicized the decision last month, public backlash prompted officials to pause plans to develop a resort in the degazetted area — at least for now.
- The project is just one of several recent cases in which the country’s protected wetlands and forests have been threatened by development projects.
Annual Adam’s Peak pilgrimage leaves Sri Lanka biodiversity site littered
- Sri Lanka’s Adam’s Peak Wilderness sanctuary, recording the island’s highest biodiversity, continues to face multiple threats due to a pilgrimage that draws a large crowd.
- During the pilgrimage season, tons of non-biodegradable polythene and plastics are dumped and get washed down or carried by the wind.
- Adding a fresh problem, Buddhist devotees are habitually offering a beautiful and rare endemic flower, locally known as ran dothalu (Loxococcus rupicola), a practice that causes concern among environmentalists who fear the endangered palm will soon reach the brink of extinction.
- The Peak Wilderness sanctuary is facing other serious issues such as forest dieback, a direct result of the forest getting drier, as climate change adversely affects the island’s top amphibian hotspot.
Forests & finance: communities turn to tree-planting, zero-logging, and mushrooms to protect forests
- Communities in Gabon and Kenya organise to protect forests against logging.
- Renewed forest restoration efforts by a local council in Cameroon’s East region.
- Mushroom profits may help protect Tanzania’s forests.
Wild pigs threaten biodiversity hotspots across South America, study shows
- New research shows that the expanding range of wild pigs across South America poses a greater threat to protected areas and biodiversity hotspots than previously thought.
- A study published in the Journal for Nature Conservation indicates that significant portions of South America’s most biologically diverse places harbor habitats that can sustain wild pigs, with the Atlantic Forest topping the list, as 85% of its total terrain is deemed suitable for the animals.
- The increasing presence of wild pigs presents challenges for conservationists as well as local residents, whose crops are often destroyed as the pigs become accustomed to eating human foods.
- Researchers stress that scientists, local communities and managers of protected areas must work together to find appropriate means of controlling the wild pig populations.
Illegal trawling ravages Tunisian seagrass meadows crucial for fish
- The largest remaining seagrass meadows in the Mediterranean are in Tunisia’s Gulf of Gabès, a hotspot for biodiversity and fishing.
- But illegal bottom trawling and industrial pollution are destroying this unique habitat, a natural nursery to numerous species of fish and other marine fauna.
- Hundreds of trawlers ply their trade overtly with little consequence, and most of the catch makes its way to Europe, skirting laws designed to prevent the entry of illegally caught seafood.
Greater Mekong proves an ark of biodiversity, with 380 new species in a year
- Scientists described 380 new-to-science species from the Greater Mekong region of Southeast Asia between 2021 and 2022.
- Researchers working in Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam identified 290 plant, 19 fish, 24 amphibian, 46 reptile and one mammal species, including a thick-thumbed bat, a color-changing lizard, and a Muppet-looking orchid.
- However, many of these species already face the threat of extinction due to human activity, prompting advocates to call for increased protection of their habitats by regional governments.
- The most urgent threats to the region’s wildlife and habitats include the construction of hydropower dams, climate change, illegal wildlife trade, and loss of natural habitats.
Fires threaten Afromontane forests’ ‘whole new world’: Q&A with Martim Melo
- A group of international and local scientists has warned of the threat to a key piece of one of Africa’s most threatened habitats: the Afromontane forests that occur in the highlands of western Angola.
- The scientists recently discovered up to 10 new species living in the patches of evergreen forest in the Namba Mountains.
- But pressure from growing human settlements nearby, mainly uncontrolled fires in the grasslands that surround the forests, threatens to overwhelm this unique ecosystem.
- Scientists are calling for the government and international agencies to establish a protected area to preserve this biodiverse hotspot.
Logging permit threatens Quilombola bioeconomic ‘paradise’ in the Amazon
- Loggers have entered the Trombetas River Biological Reserve in Oriximiná, in Brazil’s Pará state, to develop a forest management project that has divided the local Quilombola community.
- The reserve is known for its successful bioeconomy project, but the association representing the six local communities signed a contract with a logging company to explore timber in the area.
- The Quilombola say they weren’t properly consulted about the contract and the Public Ministry of Pará recommended interrupting actions for timber management, but the association says it will not suspend the work without a judicial order.
- The Quilombola territory is part of the mosaic of protected areas between the Amazon River and the border with Suriname and Guyana, one of the largest continuous forest blocks in the world.
Forests & Finance: Agroforestry in Cameroon and reforestation in South Africa
- An agroforestry initiative in a cocoa-growing community on Cameroon aims to prevent the expansion of cocoa farms into the nearby forest while also providing additional income to farmers.
- A community effort in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province is restoring the region’s mistbelt forest that’s home to the iconic Cape parrot, and since 2011 has planted 52,000 trees while allowing participants, mostly women, to earn a living.
- A program meant to ensure the legality of timber in Gabon’s supply chain was briefly suspended between March and April over what the government says was missing paperwork — a justification that proponents have called into question.
- Forests & Finance is Mongabay’s bi-weekly bulletin of briefs about Africa’s forests.
‘Impact assessments need a shake-up’: Q&A with Georgine Kengne & Morgan Hauptfleisch
- Environmental and social impact assessments as they’re implemented in development projects across Africa need a “shake-up” to ensure they’re fit for purpose, experts say.
- Georgine Kengne, from the WoMin African Alliance, says the ideal ESIA process would be one in which “the government and the mining company are not just colluding to make profits.”
- Morgan Hauptfleisch, a professor of nature conservation in Namibia, says the fundamental problem is that ESIAs and other safeguards can simply be ignored with little consequence other than fines that the companies just budget for anyway.
- Mongabay spoke with both Kengne and Hauptfleisch about ESIAs, community participation, and the underused tool that is the strategic environmental assessment (SEA).
Six newly described chameleon species reflect Tanzania’s Eastern Arc Mountains’ fragility and richness
- Six new species of pygmy chameleon have been described from Tanzania’s Eastern Arc Mountains.
- The mountain forests are subject to intense human pressure, threatening the diverse plant and animal species that live in them.
- A recent study using satellite imagery discovered that in one district alone, 27% of its montane forests were lost to small-scale farmers and herders between 2011 and 2017.
- The Tanzanian government is currently working to increase agricultural production in a region that overlaps with the Eastern Arc Mountains, raising fears this will be at a cost to biodiversity.
Forests & finance: A lawsuit, an import ban, and restoring Zambian forests
- Campaigners sue Ghana’s government to block mining of Atewa Forest biodiversity hotspot.
- Conservationists assist a forest reserve in Zambia to restore itself.
- Forest certification is expanding rapidly across the Congo Basin.
- EU bans imports of products linked to deforestation.
For Philippines’ unprotected hotspots, new conservation window beckons
- Scientists have identified 228 key biodiversity areas in the Philippines, but only 91 are currently part of the country’s network of protected areas.
- Conservationists see an opportunity in the adoption of the new Global Biodiversity Framework, which commits signatories like the Philippines to protecting 30% of terrestrial and marine ecosystems by 2030.
- However, experts caution that protecting biodiversity is not as simple as creating new protected areas on paper, and that care needs to be taken to protect the rights and interests of Indigenous and local communities.
Nations adopt Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework
- After multiple delays due to COVID-19, nearly 200 countries at the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP15) in Montreal sealed a landmark deal to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030.
- The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), with four goals and 23 action-oriented targets, comes after two weeks of intense negotiations at COP15, in Montreal, Canada. This agreement replaces the Aichi Biodiversity Targets set in 2010.
- Among the 2030 goals, countries pledged to protect at least 30% of terrestrial and marine areas, while also recognizing Indigenous and traditional territories.
- Concerns have been raised about the ambitions of the framework, with many criticizing the agreement for its corporate influence, vague language and watered-down targets, many of which are not quantitative.
Mongabay’s Conservation Potential series investigates: Where do we need to protect biodiversity?
- Leaders and decision-makers are recognizing the urgency of protecting the world’s remaining biodiversity, but investing in conservation requires these actors have access to reliable and actionable information about ongoing conservation projects.
- Mongabay is launching a series of stories called “Conservation Potential,” in which we investigate conservation efforts in high-priority biodiversity areas in tropical forests across the globe.
- To introduce this series, we look at what some experts say about where to prioritize biodiversity conservation, what are some popular approaches to conservation, and what makes conservation projects successful.
- Approaches to conservation vary according to priorities, and there are even debates over what it means to protect biodiversity. This introduction is not meant to be an exhaustive review of the dozens of plans and schemes for preserving biodiversity, but it offers a conceptual starting point for our series.
Island shopping: Cambodian officials buy up the Cardamoms’ coast
- A buying spree by Cambodia’s wealthy and politically connected elites has put the fate of a string of small islands in the balance, affecting the livelihoods of local fishers.
- Resort developments threaten the Koh S’dach archipelago’s seagrass and coral ecosystems, which harbor rare and threatened marine life.
- Local fishers have also found themselves locked out of their traditional fishing grounds by the developers, leading to a loss of earnings.
- This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network where Gerald Flynn is a fellow.
Will shipping noise nudge Africa’s only penguin toward extinction?
- The African penguin (Spheniscus demersus) is expected to go extinct in the wild in just over a decade, largely due to a lack of sardines, their main food.
- A colony in South Africa’s busy Algoa Bay is suffering a population crash that researchers say coincides with the introduction of ship-to-ship refueling services that have made the bay one of the noisiest in the world.
- They say theirs is the first study showing a correlation between underwater noise pollution and a seabird collapse.
- Current studies are investigating whether the ship noise is interfering with the penguins’ foraging behavior and their ability to find fish.
Breeding success raises hopes for future of endangered African penguin
- Two African penguin chicks have hatched at a nature reserve in South Africa where conservationists have been working for years to entice the endangered birds to breed.
- The colony was abandoned more than 10 years ago after a caracal killed a number of penguins.
- The recent hatching comes at a time when survival prospects for Africa’s only resident penguin species look grim, due mainly to declining food stocks.
- But encouraging new colonies at sites close to abundant food sources could help to bring the species back from the brink.
Amid conflict and chaos, a reforestation project surges ahead in Haiti
- An important reforestation project is forging ahead in Haiti, despite the nation’s economic and political upheavals.
- Reforesting 50 hectares (124 acres) with native plants this year in Grand Bois National Park, the NGO Haiti National Trust (HNT) is working closely with local communities to ensure the restoration project’s long-term survival.
- On an island buffeted by governance woes, severe deforestation and climate change, reforestation can save lives by mitigating the impacts of extreme rain events, droughts and hurricanes, and even reduce the risk of landslides caused by earthquakes.
- If ongoing funding can be secured, the group hopes to continue replanting efforts into the future with larger restoration goals.
As Brazil starts repaving an Amazon highway, land grabbers get to work
- Paving work has begun on a stretch of highway running through one of the remotest and best-preserved parts of the Brazilian Amazon — even as questions about the project’s permits abound.
- BR-319 was built in the 1970s to connect the Amazonian cities of Manaus and Porto Velho, but a 405-kilometer (250-mile) “Middle Stretch” fell into disrepair, making the road virtually impassable and killing the flow of traffic.
- Conservation experts have long warned against repaving the Middle Stretch, warning that improved access to this carbon-rich region will lead to a surge in deforestation, burning and land grabbing.
- With the repaving underway, this is already happening, raising concerns about unchecked forest loss that would have massive ramifications for the global climate.
Climate change and overfishing threaten once ‘endless’ Antarctic krill
- Antarctic krill are one of the most abundant species in the world in terms of biomass, but scientists and conservationists are concerned about the future of the species due to overfishing, climate change impacts and other human activities.
- Krill fishing has increased year over year as demand rises for the tiny crustaceans, which are used as feed additives for global aquaculture and processed for krill oil.
- Experts have called on the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), the group responsible for protecting krill, to update its rules to better protect krill; others are calling for a moratorium on krill fishing.
- Antarctic krill play a critical role in maintaining the health of our planet by storing carbon and providing food for numerous species.
In world convulsed by climate-driven conflict, are peace parks an answer?
- Conflicts over disputed borders, increasingly exacerbated by climate change, are putting some of the world’s key biodiversity hotspots at risk.
- Even in countries that have avoided border wars, a global campaign of fence building — aimed at keeping out human migrants whose numbers are rising in an era of climate change and sociopolitical unrest — is causing widespread damage to vulnerable natural landscapes and migratory animal species.
- In potential conflict zones like the Himalayas, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and the South China Sea, this surging human march across national frontiers has already led to violence, and in some cases to open warfare.
- Border-straddling conservation zones known as peace parks offer a more sustainable way of managing border disputes than militarization and fence building. Peace parks on the U.S.-Canada border and in the Himalayas offer successful examples.
In Thailand’s deep south, a fight to stop quarrying in a global geopark
- Activists in the southern Thai province of Satun have for years protested against plans to open a quarry in the limestone mountain Khao Toh Krang.
- The limestone mountain sits just outside a UNESCO global geopark, notable for its Paleozoic fossils and karst landscape, and is also flanked by villages and a large school.
- Officials say the quarry will promote jobs and ensure a local source of construction material, but opponents say a group of planned quarries threaten the geopark’s UNESCO status as well as cultural and archaeological sites and the health of nearby residents.
Construction begins on controversial water project inside Lake Malawi National Park
- The government of Malawi has initiated construction works for a water project inside Lake Malawi National Park, despite court challenges and sustained protests from conservationists who say the project threatens the park’s UNESCO-recognized biodiversity and archaeological sites.
- Eyewitness reports say construction vehicles are currently blasting rocks, bulldozing boulders and uprooting trees, ripping through a pristine forest.
- The project is expected to bring potable water to around 93,000 people in the lakeshore district of Mangochi, and enjoys political support both locally and nationally.
- Conservationists say they don’t object to the project itself, but call on the government to locate it outside of the park’s boundaries.
Coal mining threatens Ethiopia’s ancient coffee forest
- The Yayu forest in southwestern Ethiopia is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and one of the world’s only remaining ecosystems in which genetically diverse varietals of arabica coffee grow wild.
- The forest also sits atop a massive deposit of coal, estimated to be enough to meet Ethiopia’s domestic coal demand for 40 years.
- With Ethiopia’s government looking to boost the country’s mining industry, a shuttered mining venture in the forest’s buffer zone is set to be revived.
- Coffee farmers who have carefully managed and protected the forest for generations say a shift to mining will completely change their society, the local economy, and the environment.
How Brazil is working to save the rare lion tamarins of the Atlantic Forest
- Small, lively and threatened, the golden lion tamarin is a primate species found only in the Atlantic Forest and which today is struggling for space and connectivity inside Brazil’s most deforested and fragmented biome.
- There are four species of lion tamarin (Leontopithecus spp.) in Brazil, but the golden lion tamarin (L. rosalia) was the first to be described and has enjoyed the most fame.
- Golden lion tamarin conservation efforts have been successful, growing the population from a one-time low of 200 animals to more than 2,000 today.
- The other three species — the black lion tamarin, golden-headed lion tamarin, and black-faced lion tamarin — live isolated in fragmented patches of the Atlantic Forest and face a growing risk of extinction.
Nepal’s Supreme Court axes plans to build controversial new airport
- Around 2.4 million trees, both big and small, had to be cut to construct the two-runway airport.
- The decision forces the government to look elsewhere in the country for possible locations to build the second international aviation hub.
Caribbean incursion into Amazon sparked a flurry of life, with lessons for the future
- The vast wetland that used to sit in the heart of where the Amazon lies today received a more recent pulse of seawater than previously thought, a new study confirms — a phenomenon that contributed to the region’s species richness, including its iconic river dolphins.
- The study also says the likeliest source of these marine incursions, some 23 million to 8.8 million years ago, was the Caribbean Sea, with the water surging inland down what is today the Orinoco River Basin in Venezuela.
- Researchers say investigating the distant past of the Amazon can yield clues about its near future, given that the late Miocene was a period of global warming, with temperatures far higher than the 2°C (3.6°F) rise that the Paris Agreement is trying to prevent.
- But the current rate of global warming is taking place on an exponentially shorter time scale, and combined with record rates of fires and deforestation, it gives animal and plant species no time to adapt, scientists say.
Deforestation-neutral mining? Madagascar study shows it can be done, but it’s complicated
- The Ambatovy mine in Madagascar achieved no net forest loss by curbing deforestation in its biodiversity offsets, an analysis in the journal Nature Sustainability concluded.
- Project developers create biodiversity offsets, sites where they undertake conservation work, to make up for environmental destruction caused by their extractive operations.
- Ambatovy, which operates an open-pit nickel mine in Madagascar, carved out four biodiversity offsets to make up for biodiversity loss in its mining site, located in the species-rich eastern rainforest of the island nation.
- By slowing deforestation in these four offsets, the mine made up for forest loss in its mining concession; however, there isn’t enough data to ascertain how the measures impacted biodiversity, and previous research indicates that the mine’s offsets reduced impoverished communities’ access to forest resources.
Asia’s troubled trees need better conservation to reach restoration goals: Study
- South and Southeast Asia’s 19,000 tree species form the foundations of some of the world’s most biodiverse rainforests, as well as provide irreplaceable ecosystem services and underpin the livelihoods and diets of hundreds of millions of people.
- However, roughly three-quarters of the land deemed most important to protect regional tree diversity lies outside of protected areas, according to a new study that evaluates the distribution and threats facing 63 native tree species.
- The findings question whether countries will be able to fulfill their ambitious forest restoration targets; in particular, the researchers are concerned that crucial seed resources that could support reforestation efforts are being lost.
- The researchers recommend a more coordinated approach to conservation planning within the region, including improved cross-border collaboration and a holistic, landscape approach that integrates trees into production systems outside of protected areas.
Study: Most biodiversity hotspots lack formal protection in Borneo and Sumatra
- A new study published in Animal Conservation finds that most predicted biodiversity hotspots in Borneo and Sumatra fall outside formally protected areas, with only 9.2% and 18.2% of the modeled species richness located within protection zones on the respective islands.
- The researcher team conducted the largest camera-trap survey ever undertaken in Borneo and Sumatra, and used multiple criteria to determine the relationship of 70 species to the surrounding habitat and how animal communities are assembled.
- The study concluded that carnivorous mammals can be used as an umbrella species to assist in the development of holistic management plans in areas where multiple species coexist.
Indigenous-led report warns against ‘simplistic take on conservation’
- To deal with climate change and biodiversity loss effectively and equitably, conservation needs to adopt a human rights-based approach, according to a new report co-authored by Indigenous and community organizations across Asia.
- Unlike spatial conservation targets such as “30 by 30,” a rights-based approach would recognize the ways in which Indigenous people lead local conservation efforts, and prioritize their tenure rights in measuring conservation success.
- Without tenure rights, strict spatial conservation targets could lead to human rights abuses, widespread evictions of Indigenous communities across Asia, and high resettlement costs, the report warned.
- Also without tenure rights, the inflow of money into nature-based solutions such as carbon offsets and REDD+ projects could also result in massive land grabs instead of benefiting local communities.
In a biodiversity haven, mining drives highest ever recorded levels of mercury
- A recent study has found that forests in the southwestern Peruvian Amazon collect mercury from the atmosphere that’s used in artisanal small-scale gold mining in the Madre de Dios region.
- The study’s authors found “the highest ever recorded” levels of mercury from the “throughfall” that ends up on the forest floor when the leaves fall or rain washes the mercury from their surfaces.
- Mercury is highly toxic, causing neurological and reproductive problems in humans and other animals.
- Organizations are looking at different ways to reduce or even eliminate the use of mercury, which miners use to bind the flecks of gold found in the region’s riverine silt.
‘Everything is on fire’: Flames rip through Iberá National Park in Argentina
- Fires in the central Corrientes province of northeast Argentina have burned through nearly 60% of Iberá National Park, home to protected marshlands, grasslands and forests that hosts an array of species.
- Many of the fires originated from nearby cattle ranches, and spread across significant portions of the park due to a prolonged drought.
- Conservationists are working to relocate a number of reintroduced species, including giant river otters and macaws, to places of safety.
- While experts say they expect a substantial loss to biodiversity, they add that the park should mount a rapid recovery thanks to all the rewilding work already done.
Malaysia’s white-handed gibbons may be two subspecies, not one, study shows
- Scientists sequencing the genes of white-handed gibbons of the Malaysian subspecies (Hylobates lar lar) have discovered unusual mutations that hint at the existence of a separately evolving population in the peninsula.
- This particular population is so genetically different, it could potentially qualify as a new and distinct subspecies, the researchers said.
- For scientists looking to translocate and reintroduce captive gibbons into the forest, knowing the finer details like which subspecies and population a particular animal originated from can help reduce interbreeding and ensure the gibbons stay healthy in the long run.
- For researchers looking to differentiate between gibbons of the same subspecies, focusing on a particular segment of mitochondrial DNA can be a powerful method for pinpointing the population an animal originated from.
Tukupu: The women of the Kariña community, guardians of Venezuela’s forests
- Tukupu is Venezuela’s first Indigenous forest business, sustainably managing and reforesting 7,000 hectares (17,300 acres) of the Imataca Forest Reserve in the south-east of the country.
- The business is led mainly by women who have used their ancestral knowledge to restore over 312 hectares (770 acres) of forest, reforest another 113 (280 acres) and dedicate 189 (468 acres) to agroforestry.
- According to the FAO, the equivalent of more than 23 million tonnes of carbon emissions have been avoided, either directly or indirectly, through the project.
- One of the key points of the project has been to figure out how the resources from the forest can be commercialised in a sustainable way that also benefits members of the community.
Typhoon exposes biodiversity haven Palawan’s vulnerability — and resilience
- On Dec. 17, 2021, Typhoon Rai hit the Philippines’ Palawan Island, causing severe damage to protected areas including Puerto Princesa Subterranean River National Park (PPSRNP), Cleoptra’s Needle Critical Habitat, Malampaya Sound Protected Landscape and Seascape, and El Nido-Taytay Managed Resource Protected Area.
- The full impact of the storm has not yet been assessed; at PPSRNP, where preliminary surveys have been conducted, more than 2,200 trees were damaged on the park’s fringes and sightings of birds were down by 90%.
- Experts say the storm-damaged forests can recover — if they aren’t disturbed by human incursions, fires, or additional storms.
Despite sanctions, U.S. companies still importing Myanmar teak, report says
- U.S. timber companies undercut sanctions to import nearly 1,600 metric tons of teak from Myanmar last year, according to a new report.
- Advocacy group Justice for Myanmar said in its report that firms have been buying timber from private companies acting as brokers in Myanmar, instead of directly from the state-owned Myanma Timber Enterprise, which is subject to U.S. sanctions.
- With MTE under military control, Myanmar’s timber auctions have become more opaque, making it difficult to take action against companies circumventing sanctions.
Dual pressures of hunting, logging threaten wildlife in Myanmar, study shows
- Combating illegal logging in Myanmar’s Rakhine state helps preserve wildlife populations, but is insufficient without addressing unsustainable local hunting pressures, according to new research.
- Researchers used camera trap data from between 2016 and 2019 to investigate the effects of environmental and human factors on medium to large mammals.
- Common species regularly targeted for bushmeat were negatively affected by increased human presence, they found, highlighting the pressures of illegal hunting on their populations.
- By contrast, threatened species were generally unaffected by human presence, but were positively linked to continuous stretches of evergreen forest, indicating their vulnerability to illegal logging, deforestation and habitat loss.
How can illegal timber trade in the Greater Mekong be stopped?
- Over the past decade, the European Union has been entering into voluntary partnership agreements (VPAs) with tropical timber-producing countries to fight forest crime.
- These bilateral trade agreements legally bind both sides to trade only in verified legal timber products.
- There is evidence VPAs help countries decrease illegal logging rates, especially illegal industrial timber destined for export markets.
- Within the Greater Mekong region, only Vietnam has signed a VPA.
How does political instability in the Mekong affect deforestation?
- Myanmar’s return to military dictatorship earlier this year has sparked worries among Indigenous communities of possible land grabs.
- It has also ignited concerns about a return to large-scale natural resource extraction, which has historically been an important source of funding for the junta.
- In the months since the coup, many of the country’s environmental and land rights activists have either been arrested or gone into hiding.
- The military has bombed forests and burned down Indigenous villages in Karen state, forcing minorities to flee to neighboring Thailand.
Scientists on a quest to map worldwide web of fungi beneath our feet
- Interconnected bodies of fungi form vast underground networks through the Earth’s soils, transporting nutrients and water across ecosystems and sequestering vast amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere.
- Experts agree that protecting fungi and focusing conservation efforts belowground could help to mitigate global challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, land use change and pollution.
- A new initiative is embarking on the first global effort to document and map the world’s network-forming fungi, using eDNA and machine learning to identify and protect global hotspots of fungal biodiversity.
- Fungi are increasingly viewed as a nature-based solution to manage global carbon budgets, restore degraded ecosystems, remediate contaminated soils and speed the transition toward sustainable agriculture.
Where does the Greater Mekong’s illegal timber go?
- Not all lumber is created equal; within the Greater Mekong region, high-quality hardwoods such as Burmese teak and rosewood are particularly valuable and have been logged almost to commercial extinction.
- Burmese rosewood is highly sought after in China for furniture, while Burmese teak is popular in the European shipbuilding sector as decking for superyachts.
- Recognizing their role in Myanmar’s illegal timber trade, European Union member states developed a common position in 2017 acknowledging imports of Myanmar timber into the EU to be against the law due to their high risk of illegality.
- However, shipments continue to leak into the region through countries where enforcement is weaker, including Italy and Croatia.
Why has illegal logging increased in the Greater Mekong?
- In recent decades, rich tropical forests of the Greater Mekong region have been steadily depleted by the world’s growing appetite for timber.
- Recognizing the impact of the timber trade on natural forests, governments in the Greater Mekong region have come up with laws to regulate logging and timber exports.
- However, insufficient political will and collusion between officials, businesspeople and criminal groups means enforcement is often limited.
- There is a clear need to strengthen local laws and enforcement, but pressure from foreign governments, businesses and consumers can help.
‘Our land, our life’: Okinawans hold out against new U.S. base in coastal zone
- Opponents of the planned relocation of a U.S. military base in Okinawa say they remain undeterred despite the defeat in elections last month of the opposition party that supported the cause.
- Local activists plan to continue opposing the relocation of the Futenma Marine base, from the densely populated city of Ginowan to the less crowded Henoko Bay coastal area.
- The proposed new facility and other military bases in Okinawa have been linked to toxic environmental pollution, military-linked sexual violence, and historical land conflicts between native Okinawans and the mainland Japan and U.S. governments.
- The Okinawa prefecture government recently rejected central government plans to sink more than 70,000 compacting pillars into Henoko’s seabed for construction, which would impact coral and seagrass that host more than 5,000 species of marine life.
The Greater Mekong region: A hotspot of wildlife and crime
- The global illegal timber trade generates up to $152 billion a year, accounting for up to 90% of deforestation in tropical countries and attracting the world’s biggest organized crime groups.
- Illegal logging is today responsible for 15% to 30% of global timber production. Estimates vary because complex international supply chains make it difficult to ensure the timber has been lawfully handled at every stage.
- Illegal logging is devastating forests in the Greater Mekong region, which consists of Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Vietnam and parts of China.
Top Brazil gold exporter leaves a trail of criminal probes and illegal mines
- Brazilian gold exporter BP Trading accounted for 10% of the country’s exports of the precious metal in 2019 and 2020, having purchased it from companies prosecuted for buying illegal gold.
- Most of the illegal mines are concentrated in Indigenous territories, where they deforest the land, pollute the rivers, and inflict violence on Indigenous communities.
- The company saw strong growth in recent years, with revenues of $256 million in 2019, more than double what it made in 2018.
- Illegal mining generates $600,000 to $800,000 a year in Brazil, according to Ministry of Mines and Energy estimates.
COP-26: Amazonia’s Indigenous peoples are vital to fighting global warming (commentary)
- The United Nations Climate Change summit, the 26th conference of the parties (COP-26), held in Glasgow Scotland through November 12, is important both for the future of the global climate and for Amazonian Indigenous peoples.
- Uncontrolled climate change threatens the Amazon forest on which Indigenous peoples depend, and Indigenous peoples in turn have an important role as guardians of the forest.
- Decisions on how international funds intended to avoid greenhouse gas emissions are used represent both opportunities and risks for the climate, for the forest, and for Indigenous peoples.
- Indigenous voices need to be heard at COP-26, as empowered stakeholders threatened by climate change, and for the invaluable traditional wisdom these peoples can contribute to global warming solutions. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
BR-319 highway hearings: An attack on Brazil’s interests and Amazonia’s future (commentary)
- Brazil’s proposed reconstruction of the BR-319, a highway connecting Manaus (in central Amazonia) with the “arc of deforestation” in southern Amazonia, would bring deforesters to vast areas of what remains of the Amazon forest.
- The forest areas in western Amazonia that would be opened by planned roads connecting to the BR-319 are vital to maintaining rainfall that supplies water to São Paulo and other major urban and agricultural areas outside the Amazon region.
- Holding public hearings allows a “box to be checked” in the licensing process — a key step in obtaining official approval for the highway project. The hearing was held despite impacted Indigenous peoples not having been consulted, among other irregularities.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
Green groups call for scrapping of $300m loan offer for Borneo road project
- The Asian Development Bank is considering a $300 million loan proposal from the Indonesian government to fund a road project in Borneo.
- The 280-kilometer (170-mile) project across North and East Kalimantan provinces are designed to boost economic growth and further the integration of the Malaysian and Indonesian palm oil industries.
- Environmental groups around the world have urged the ADB to impose stricter environmental and social requirements for the project to reduce its expected impacts on the environment and the Indigenous communities living in the region.
- Indigenous peoples like the Dayak rely on the forests staying intact, as do critically endangered species such as Bornean orangutans.
In Guinea, an illegal $6b gold ‘bonanza’ threatens endangered chimpanzees
- Earlier this year, Australia’s Predictive Discovery announced that it had found more than $6 billion in “bonanza”-grade gold deposits in eastern Guinea.
- A Mongabay investigation has found that the company’s exploration is taking place inside the boundaries of Haut Niger National Park, in violation of the law establishing the park.
- The park is home to an estimated 500 western chimpanzees, one of the highest concentrations of the critically endangered primate in West Africa.
Fate of Malaysian forests stripped of protection points to conservation stakes
- In the seven years since Jemaluang and Tenggaroh were struck from Malaysia’s list of permanent forest reserves, the two forests in Johor state have experienced large-scale deforestation.
- The clearance is reportedly happening on land privately owned by the sultan of Johor, the head of the state, calling into question the effectiveness of the Central Forest Spine (CFS) Master Plan, a nationwide conservation initiative the two reserves had originally been part of.
- The CFS Master Plan is currently being revised, with experts seeing the review as a chance to change what has been a largely toothless program, beset by conflicts of interest between federal and state authorities.
- As the revision nears completion, Jemaluang and Tenggaroh highlight how much has been lost, but also what’s at stake for Malaysia’s forests, wildlife and residents.
To predict forest loss in protected areas, look at nearby unprotected forest
- To predict deforestation risk in a protected area, look at the condition of its surrounding forests, according to a new study.
- The study, which analyzed satellite images of protected forests worldwide, found nearby forest loss to be a consistent early warning signal of future deforestation in protected areas.
- Researchers said national park agencies can use their proposed model to predict how vulnerable protected areas in their countries are to deforestation, and prioritize conservation efforts accordingly.
- But even as these agencies work to protect forests, they should take into account the needs of local communities living in the area, the researchers said.
In Half-Earth Project, a full-on bid to get countries to protect biodiversity
- Last year, the Half-Earth Project launched its “national report cards,” which show how much land is currently protected in each country, how many land vertebrate species (including endemics) each country holds, and how much and also which areas of land should be preserved to protect its biodiversity in the future.
- Each country also receives a score based on several indicators, including the National Species Protection Index (SPI), which was generated by the Map of Life and endorsed by the Convention on Biological Diversity.
- The team at the Half-Earth Project say the map and accompanying tools can be valuable resources for decision-makers trying to reach the objective of protecting 30% of land by 2030, although they argue that the ultimate goal should be protecting half of the Earth.
- While supporters of the Half-Earth Project say achieving their goal benefits everyone, critics say a large number of people, particularly those living in poorer countries, could be adversely affected by such large-scale area-based protection.
Borneo’s bearded pigs and traditional hunters adapted to oil palms. Then came swine fever
- Oil palm expansion and urbanization have altered the traditional hunting of bearded pigs by the Indigenous Kadazandusun-Murut (KDM) community in Sabah, Malaysia, a new study has found.
- Researchers interviewed 38 hunters on changes in pig behavior and hunting practices before the African swine fever (ASF) epidemic hit Sabah in 2021.
- They found that even though pig hunting patterns have changed dramatically, the activity remains a cornerstone of KDM communal culture for food, sport, gift-giving, festivals and celebrations.
- As ASF devastates wild pig populations, the researchers’ findings highlight a need for long-term hunting management that conserves both the bearded pig and Indigenous cultural traditions.
One in three tree species is in the red, new global assessment says
- Of the 60,000 known species of trees, 440 are critically endangered, an assessment spearheaded by Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) has found.
- There are more threatened tree species in the world today than there are threatened mammal, reptile, bird and amphibian species combined.
- Among tree biodiversity hotspots, which boast a large number of indigenous trees, Brazil, Indonesia and Malaysia fare poorly.
- Lack of in-country expertise is holding back such initiatives, Frank Mbago, a Tanzanian botanist, told Mongabay.
Italian firms flout EU rules to trade in illegal Myanmar timber, report says
- Negligible fines and inadequate enforcement are turning Italy into a hotspot for illegal Myanmar timber, a new report has found.
- The report identified 27 Italian traders that have been importing Burmese teak into Europe despite a long-held common position acknowledging timber imports from Myanmar to be against the law.
- In June, the EU further imposed sanctions on the only possible source of legal timber in the country; yet traders did not confirm they would stop imports, the report said.
- Italian traders are exploiting the country’s inadequate enforcement to ship timber to the rest of Europe and circumvent the EU’s sanctions and timber regulations, the researchers wrote.
Highway cutting through Heart of Borneo poised to be ‘very, very bad’
- With Indonesia planning to shift its capital from Jakarta to the Bornean province of East Kalimantan, infrastructure development pressures on the island have intensified.
- Neighboring Malaysia is adding new stretches to the Pan Borneo Highway to capitalize on spillover economic benefits; within Indonesia, East Kalimantan’s developmental gains are also expected to trickle to other provinces through the transboundary highway.
- While the new roads could spur economic development in remote villages, they also carve into protected areas in the Heart of Borneo, opening them up for resource extraction.
- In particular, the roads could fast-track development of a new “oil palm belt,” with disastrous consequences for the wildlife and Indigenous peoples of Borneo, and for global climate, experts say.
China joins the foreign fleets quietly exploiting Madagascar’s waters
- For decades, fleets of industrial vessels from several nations have fished in Madagascar’s waters.
- Now China appears to have joined the fishing spree, sending at least 14 industrial longliner fishing vessels in the last several years, new evidence shows.
- Clues from official documents indicate that Madagascar’s government may have authorized these vessels to fish, at least since 2019.
- If so, the authorization process was not public, raising renewed concerns about the lack of transparency in Madagascar’s offshore fishing sector.
‘Shared earth’ conservation promises to prioritize nature and people
- A new article in Science calls for conservation in Africa to take a “shared earth” approach that prioritizes both nature and people.
- According to the authors, this approach would empower local communities, Indigenous people and governments to make decisions that would meet both equity and biodiversity goals.
- The authors suggest retaining or restoring 20% of living and working areas to help address global conservation targets while giving local people the benefits of nature and building resilience against climate change.
Platform presents unpublished data on Brazilian biodiversity
- Partnership between scientists and journalists translates scientific data into visual information to warn of the importance of preserving Brazil’s biomes.
- Brazil alone accounts for 17% of the entire terrestrial territory of the tropics with a biodiversity that is more abundant than entire continents: over 20% of the freshwater fish on the planet and 17% of all birds are found in Brazil.
- One problem is the lack of investment in research to survey biodiversity, which usually comes at a slower pace than changes in ecosystems – animals and plants are at risk of disappearing before scientists are able to get to know them.
UNESCO calls for closure of road running through World Heritage park in Papua
- UNESCO has called for the closure of a long stretch of road that runs through Lorentz National Park, a World Heritage Site, in Indonesia’s Papua region.
- Experts have identified an increase in deforestation and logging activities inside the park since the road was completed.
- The government says efforts to mitigate the environmental impacts of the road began in 2017 but ended prematurely a year later due to security reasons, which UNESCO calls “deeply concerning.”
In Indonesia, an unassuming brown bird is proof of turbo-charged evolution
- Scientists are proposing to add two new subspecies to four existing ones within the Sulawesi babbler (Pellorneum celebense) species.
- The team identified the new subspecies based on differences in DNA, body measurements and song recordings from dozens of babblers.
- Taxonomic implications aside, the study also sheds light on the phenomenon of rapid evolution, as the babblers’ genetic divergence occurred over just tens of thousands of years, rather than millions.
- But the nickel-rich soils believed to have given rise to the birds’ divergence could be hastening its demise, with mining companies eyeing their habitats for resource extraction.
There’s still room to save Asia’s hoolock gibbons, study says, but only just
- Hoolock gibbon habitat has declined in the past few decades, but enough suitable patches exist today to guarantee the long-term survival of the genus if properly conserved.
- Particular populations are at greater risk of local extinction and should be translocated, including scattered western hoolock populations in Bangladesh.
- Researchers have also identified strongholds where a relatively high number of hoolock gibbons have been estimated, and which are currently highly threatened, to be prioritized for conservation.
- Hoolock gibbons are particularly vulnerable to forest fragmentation and degradation due to certain behavioral traits, which makes protecting large patches of habitat much more effective than conserving many small and fragmented areas.
EU sanctions no ‘silver bullet’ against Myanmar’s illegal timber trade, experts say
- The European Union has imposed sanctions on Myanma Timber Enterprise, a state-owned entity that regulates all harvesting and sales of Myanmar timber.
- The new sanctions mean it is now illegal for businesses in the EU to directly import any timber from Myanmar.
- While the sanctions send a strong political signal to the junta, experts say their actual impact on Myanmar’s illegal timber trade could be limited.
- Local activists are urging the international community to do more as globally significant tracts of forests in the country come under threat, with illicit logging financing the military’s repressive rule.
Planned Brazil-Peru highway threatens one of Earth’s most biodiverse places
- Serra do Divisor National Park on Brazil’s border with Peru is home to numerous endemic animals and more than a thousand plant species, but faces a double threat from a planned highway and a bid to downgrade its protected status.
- The downgrade from national park to “environmental protection area” would paradoxically open up this Andean-Amazon transition region to deforestation, cattle ranching, and mining — activities that are currently prohibited in the park.
- The highway project, meant to give Acre another land route to the Pacific via Peru, has been embraced by the government of President Jair Bolsonaro, which has already taken the first steps toward its construction.
- Indigenous and river community leaders say they have not been consulted about the highway, as required by law, and have not been told about the proposed downgrade of the park, both of which they warn will have negative socioenvironmental impacts.
Monks and wildlife come under pressure from Malaysian cement company
- Since last December, cement manufacturer Associated Pan Malaysia Cement has been looking to evict dozens of monks and devotees from the Dhamma Sakyamuni Caves Monastery in the limestone hills of Mount Kanthan in Malaysia’s Perak state.
- APMC calls the monks unlawful trespassers on company land; the monks say the company consented to their occupying the land for decades.
- Much of Mount Kanthan has already been quarried by APMC, and the untouched southern section where the monastery is located is also home to highly endemic and critically endangered flora and fauna.
- The monks and devotees are petitioning for the Perak state government to officially designate the monastery as a place of worship and Mount Kanthan as a national heritage site.
NGOs call for alternative routes for Bornean road to avoid wildlife habitat
- Coalition Humans Habitats Highways has urged authorities in the Malaysian state of Sabah to adopt alternative routes to a 13-kilometer (8-mile) stretch of the Pan Borneo Highway.
- That particular stretch cuts through a protected forest reserve and overlaps extensively with heavily used elephant migration paths.
- Experts say constructing the highway as currently planned would increase wildlife-vehicle collisions, including deadly accidents involving elephants, as well as human-elephant conflict.
- It would also derail progress made by local community efforts encouraging humans and elephants to coexist in harmony.
‘Conservation litigation’ tries to put a true price on wildlife crime
- An international team of experts says it’s possible to sue environmental and wildlife offenders for the damage they inflict upon ecosystems and biodiversity and seek compensation to help restore what has been lost.
- Several countries, including Indonesia, the Philippines, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Mexico, already have legislation that allows for this “conservation litigation,” experts say.
- There have also been several successful civil lawsuits in which environmental offenders have had to provide compensation for ecological restoration.
- However, conservation litigation is not commonly used due to a lack of understanding about its feasibility, and the difficulties of coming up with defensible, scientifically robust remedies for environmental and wildlife crimes — but experts say they hope this litigation is used more frequently in the future.
Reptile traffickers trawl scientific literature, target newly described species
- The descriptions and locations of new reptile species featured in scientific literature are frequently being used by traders to quickly hunt down, capture and sell these animals, allowing them to be monetized for handsome profits and threatening biodiversity.
- New reptile species are highly valued by collectors due to their novelty, and often appear on trade websites and at trade fairs within months after their first description in scientific journals.
- In the past 20 years, the Internet, combined with the ease and affordability of global travel, have made the problem of reptile trafficking rampant. Some taxonomists now call for restricted access to location information for the most in demand taxa such as geckos, turtles and pythons.
- Once a new species has been given CITES protection (typically a lengthy process), traders often keep the reptiles in “legal” commercial circulation by making false claims of “captive breeding” in order to launder wild-caught animals.
Madagascar’s vanishing trees
- Madagascar has a documented 2,900 endemic species of trees, but a new report shows that almost two-thirds of them are in danger of disappearing.
- Of the 3,118 species covered, more than 90% had never been systematically evaluated before, and one in 10 fell in the IUCN’s critically endangered category, a step away from going extinct in the wild.
- Though the island nation’s protected area network has expanded to more than 7 million hectares (17 million acres), a tenth of the tree species are found outside this safety net.
- Scientists are racing against the extinction clock to document this mind-boggling biodiversity and determine just how imperiled individual species are.
Arctic biodiversity at risk as world overshoots climate planetary boundary
- The Arctic Ocean biome is changing rapidly, warming at twice the rate of the rest of the world. In turn, multiyear sea ice is thinning and shrinking, upsetting the system’s natural equilibrium.
- Thinner sea ice has led to massive under-ice phytoplankton blooms, drawing southern species poleward; fish species from lower latitudes are moving into the peripheral seas of the Arctic Ocean, displacing and outcompeting native Arctic species.
- Predators at the top of the food chain, such as polar bears, are suffering the consequences of disappearing ice, forced onto land for longer periods of time where they cannot productively hunt.
- The Central Arctic Ocean Fisheries Agreement has been signed by 10 parties to prevent unregulated commercial fishing in the basin until the region and climate change impacts are better understood by scientists. International cooperation will be critical to protect what biodiversity remains.
‘Profound ignorance’: Microbes, a missing piece in the biodiversity puzzle
- Researchers are certain that human activity has resulted in a decline in plant and animal species. But a huge unknown remains: what impacts have human actions —ranging from climate change, to ocean acidification, deforestation and land use change, nitrogen pollution, and more — had on the Earth’s microbes?
- A new paper poses this significant question, and offers a troubling answer: Science suffers from “profound ignorance” about the ways in which microbial biodiversity is being influenced by rapid environmental changes now happening on our planet.
- Researchers are supremely challenged by the microbial biodiversity question, finding it difficult to even define what a microbe species is, and uncertain how to effectively identify, analyze and track the behaviors of microbes on Earth —microorganisms estimated to be more numerous than stars in the known universe.
- We do know microbes play crucial roles — helping grow our food, aiding in the sequestering and release of soil carbon, curing and causing disease, and more. One thing researchers do agree on: knowing how human activities are influencing the microbial world could be very important to the future of humanity and our planet.
New map shows where the 80% of species we don’t know about may be hiding
- A new study maps out the regions of the world most likely to hold the highest number of species unknown to science.
- The study found that tropical forests in countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Madagascar and Colombia had the highest potential for undescribed species, mostly reptiles and amphibians.
- According to the lead researcher, the main reason for species going undescribed is a lack of funding and taxonomic experts in some parts of the world.
- He added that it’s essential to learn about as many species as possible to protect them, but that undescribed species are currently not taken into account by governing bodies like the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).
Can ‘Slow Food’ save Brazil’s fast-vanishing Cerrado savanna?
- The incredibly biodiverse Cerrado is Brazil’s second-largest biome after the Amazon. However, half of the savanna’s native vegetation has already been lost to industrial agribusiness, which produces beef, soy, cotton, corn, eucalyptus and palm oil for export.
- Those wishing to save the Cerrado today are challenged by the lack of protected lands. One response by traditional communities and conservationists is to help the rest of Brazil and the rest of the planet value the Cerrado’s cornucopia of endemic fruits, nuts and vegetables that thrive across South America’s greatest savanna.
- These include the baru nut, the babassu and macaúba coconut, the sweet gabiroba (looking like a small guava), the cagaita (resembling a shiny green tomato), the large, scaly-looking marolo (with creamy pulp and strong flavor), the berry-shaped mangaba, which means “good fruit for eating,” the egg-shaped, emerald-green pequi, and more.
- Small family farmers, beekeepers, traditional and Indigenous communities, Afro-Brazilian quilombolas (runaway slave descendants), socioenvironmental activists, and celebrity chefs have become allies in a fast-expanding slow food network, declaring: “We want to see the Cerrado on the plate of the Brazilian and the world!”
Amid South China Sea dispute, Philippines’ Palawan is besieged by political split
- The Philippine province of Palawan is set to decide on a law that will divide the province into three: Palawan del Norte, Palawan Oriental and Palawan del Sur.
- Palawan stands on the Philippines’ western border and is the country’s sentinel in the maritime dispute in the South China Sea.
- Anti-division groups have raised concerns that the split will weaken the implementation and management of environmental programs Palawan has been known for, and in the process, endanger the province’s already threatened ecology.
- Palawan’s marine ecosystems have been under constant threat from illegal fishing and poaching by foreign vessels encroaching on its waters.
Cat corridors between protected areas is key to survival of Cerrado’s jaguars
- Only 4% of the jaguar’s critical habitat is effectively protected across the Americas, and in Brazil’s Cerrado biome it’s just 2%.
- A survey in Emas National Park in the Cerrado biome concludes that the protected area isn’t large enough to sustain a viable jaguar population, and that jaguars moving in and out could be exposed to substantial extinction risk in the future.
- The study suggests that improving net immigration may be more important than increasing population sizes in small isolated populations, including by creating dispersal corridors.
- To ensure the corridors’ effectiveness, conservation efforts should focus on resolving the conflict between the jaguars and human communities.
‘What’s at stake is the life of every being’: Saving the Brazilian Cerrado
- The Cerrado boasts a third of Brazil’s biodiversity and is the largest savanna in South America with 44% of its 10,000 species of plants endemic. And yet, since the colonial period, this semi-arid region was largely ignored, and has even been portrayed as an “infertile, uninhabited region,” nothing more than “a place between places.”
- That all changed over recent decades with agribusiness declaring the Cerrado to be Brazil’s last great agricultural frontier. Today, half of the vast savanna which covers two million square kilometers (770,000 square miles) has been converted to crops of soy, cotton, corn and eucalyptus, or to pasture covered in massive cattle herds.
- As the savanna has been lost, its communities have simultaneously risen to save what’s left. The National Campaign in Defense of the Cerrado, launched in January 2016, has fought an uphill political battle to preserve the region’s native vegetation and biodiversity. The effort has grown more dogged during the Bolsonaro presidency.
- Working with Indigenous and traditional peoples, the organization is striving to build global awareness of the Cerrado’s natural significance and to get more of the region declared as World Heritage sites. “Defending the Cerrado is defending its people,” declares one activist.
‘Race against time’: Saving the snakes and lizards of Brazil’s Cerrado
- Brazil’s Cerrado is among the world’s most biodiverse savannas, covering two million square kilometers (772,204 square miles), nearly a quarter of the country and half the size of Europe.
- Once thought of as a “wasteland,” scientists have counted 208 snake species, some 80 lizards, 40 worm lizards, seven turtles and four crocodile species — many recently logged in the biome’s grasslands, palm-covered riverscapes, lowland forests and dry plateaus.
- But half of the Cerrado’s natural vegetation has been lost to mechanized agribusiness and ranching, with native plants and wildlife also at risk from climate change, and more frequent and intense fires. Today’s biome is fragmented, with just 3% under strict protection, and another 5% “protected” in farmed, inhabited mixed-use areas
- While researchers agree that there is an urgent need to protect large swathes of remaining savanna, there is also a vital requirement to preserve patches of unique habitat where diverse, niche-specialized reptilians make their homes.
Indonesia’s plantation program on collision course with wildlife, Indigenous groups
- Indonesia’s food estate program threatens to overlap onto habitats of key species like orangutans and tigers in Sumatra, according to a government map.
- Environmental activists warn this could exacerbate human-wildlife conflicts, and have criticized the lack of an environmental assessment before the start of the program.
- Also at threat are forests that Indigenous communities rely on for their livelihoods, with the government again failing to involve them in the planning process.
- The government claims it mapped the food estate areas in a way to minimize disturbances to known wildlife habitats.
Trans-Purus: Brazil’s last intact Amazon forest at immediate risk (commentary)
- Brazil’s remaining Amazon forest is roughly divided in half by the Purus River, just west of the notorious BR-319 (Manaus-Porto Velho) highway. To the west of the river lies the vast “Trans-Purus” region — intact rainforest stretching to the Peruvian border. To the east, the forest is already heavily deforested, degraded and fragmented.
- Multiple threats are now closing in on the Trans-Purus region, and expected to increase greatly with the impending “reconstruction” of the BR-319. Planned roads linked to the BR-319 would open the Trans-Purus region to land grabbers (grileiros), organized landless farmers (sem-terras) and other actors from Brazil’s “arc of deforestation.”
- A massive planned gas and oil project would also likely lead to new road connections to the other planned highways in the Trans-Purus area, opening even more of the region to invasion. Asian oil palm and logging companies are among those with a historical interest in the area.
- This last large block of intact Brazilian Amazon forest is essential for ecosystem services — maintaining biodiversity, carbon stocks, and the forest water cycling functions essential for rainfall in other parts of Brazil and neighboring countries. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.
Crimefighting NGO tracks Brazil wildlife trade on WhatsApp and Facebook
- A nonprofit, the National Network Combating Wild Animal Trafficking (RENCTAS) was founded in 1999, and since then has won international awards and acclaim for its innovative approach to tracking and combating the global illegal wildlife trade, especially the sourcing of animals in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest and Cerrado savanna biomes.
- The group’s pioneering strategy: use social media to track the sale and movement of animals out of Brazil, and turn over the data to law enforcement. In 1999, it identified nearly 6,000 ads featuring the illegal sale of animals on e-commerce platforms. By 2019, it reported 3.5 million advertisements for the illegal trade on social networks.
- The most trafficked Brazilian animals currently: the double-collared seedeater (Sporophila caerulescens); a small, finch-like songbird with a yellow bill that thrives in the southern Cerrado, and the white-cheeked spider monkey (Ateles marginatus), found across the Amazon basin. Sales of animals have been tracked to 200+ illegal trafficking organizations.
- Tragically, of the millions of Brazilian animals captured, sold, resold, and transported, only an estimated 1 in 10 ever reach Brazilian and foreign consumers alive. The rest, ripped from their homes, starved and abused, die in transit.
Brazil’s Bem Querer dam: An impending Amazon disaster (commentary)
- Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro has announced his administration’s priorities for Amazon dams, including the planned Bem Querer dam on the Rio Branco in the far-northern state of Roraima.
- Bem Querer is primarily intended to increase the energy supply to industries in locations outside of Amazonia, rather than for residents of Roraima.
- Probable environmental impacts include blocking fish migrations and flooding a riparian forest that possesses extraordinary bird diversity. Downstream flow alteration would impact protected areas, including two Ramsar wetland biodiversity sites. Riverside dwellers would also be impacted.
- Sediment flow blockage would impact fisheries and the unique Anavilhanas Archipelago, a spectacular Brazilian national park. These adverse impacts need to be fully evaluated before a decision to build is made. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
Activists in Malaysia call on road planners to learn the lessons of history
- To its proponents, the 2,000-kilometer (1,200-mile) Pan Borneo Highway holds the promise of economic development for the Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak on the island of Borneo.
- But activists in Sabah say that poor planning and an emphasis on extracting resources mean that the highway could harm communities and ecosystems in Sabah’s forests and along its coastlines.
- A new film captures the perspectives of people living closest to the highway’s proposed path and reveals the struggles that some have faced as the road closed in on their homes.
- Meanwhile, an environmental historian argues that Pan Borneo Highway planners are repeating the same mistakes British colonists made in focusing on extraction, rather than trying to find ways to benefit Sabah’s communities.
One year on: Insects still in peril as world struggles with global pandemic
- In June 2019, in response to media outcry and alarm over a supposed ongoing global “Insect Apocalypse,” Mongabay published a thorough four-part survey on the state of the world’s insect species and their populations.
- In four, in-depth stories, science writer Jeremy Hance interviewed 24 leading entomologists and other scientists on six continents and working in 12 nations to get their expert views on the rate of insect decline in Europe, the U.S., and especially the tropics, including Latin America, Africa, and Australia.
- Now, 16 months later, Hance reaches out to seven of those scientists to see what’s new. He finds much bad news: butterflies in Ohio declining by 2% per year, 94% of wild bee interactions with native plants lost in New England, and grasshopper abundance falling by 30% in a protected Kansas grassland over 20 years.
- Scientists say such losses aren’t surprising; what’s alarming is our inaction. One researcher concludes: “Real insect conservation would mean conserving large whole ecosystems both from the point source attacks, AND the overall blanket of climate change and six billion more people on the planet than there should be.”
Road-paving project threatens a wildlife-rich reserve in Indonesia’s Papua
- The Indonesian government plans to pave a stretch of highway running through an ecologically important wildlife reserve in the country’s Papua region.
- Experts warn the paving will encourage greater encroachment into Mamberamo Foja Wildlife Reserve, which is home to at least 332 bird species and 80 mammal species.
- Another section of the Trans-Papua Highway was constructed through Lorentz National Park earlier, and studies show it’s already having an impact in terms of increased deforestation.
BR-319: The beginning of the end for Brazil’s Amazon forest (commentary)
- Brazil’s planned reconstruction of the BR-319 (Manaus-Porto Velho) Highway paralleling the Purus and Madeira rivers would give deforesters access to about half of what remains of the country’s Amazon forest, and so is perhaps the most consequential conservation issue for Brazil today.
- The highway route is essentially a lawless area today, and the lack of governance is a critical issue in the battle over licensing the highway reconstruction project.
- The BR-319 upgrade would link the current “arc of deforestation” to central Amazonia, allowing movement of deforestation actors to all forest locations with road links to Manaus, while a planned BR-319 connecting road would open the vast forest area between the BR-319 and the Peruvian border.
- The BR-319 Environmental Impact Assessment has many flaws, including ignoring impacts beyond those adjacent to the highway. The EIA also contains passages admitting to some disastrous project impacts. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
Brazil’s Amazon dam plans: Ominous warnings of future destruction (commentary)
- Brazil’s current 10-year Energy Expansion Plan calls for three more large dams in Amazonia by 2029, and Brazil’s 2050 National Energy Plan lists many more.
- Both plans contain ominous passages explaining that the list of dams could expand if “uncertainty” is resolved regarding current regulations protecting Indigenous peoples and protected areas for biodiversity.
- Brazil’s National Congress is considering bills to eliminate environmental licensing; a bill submitted by President Jair Bolsonaro would allow dams on Indigenous lands. Brazil’s dam-building plans to satisfy 2050 energy demand extend to neighboring Amazonian nations, including Peru and Bolivia.
- The 2050 plan essentially admits that dams on Indigenous lands and within other protected areas are not necessary because the electricity could be generated by offshore wind power. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
At-risk Cerrado mammals need fully-protected parks to survive: Researchers
- A newly published camera trap study tracked 21 species of large mammal in Brazil’s Cerrado savanna biome from 2012-2017.
- The cameras were deployed in both fully protected state and federal parks and less protected mixed-use areas known as APAs where humans live, farm and ranch.
- The probability of finding large, threatened species in true reserves was 5 to 10 times higher than in the APAs for pumas, tapirs, giant anteaters, maned wolves, white-lipped and collared peccaries, and other Neotropical mammals.
- With half the Cerrado biome’s two million square kilometers of native vegetation already converted to cattle ranches, soy plantations and other croplands, conserving remaining habitat is urgent if large mammals are to survive there. The new study will help land managers better preserve biodiversity.
We’re not protecting enough of the right areas to save biodiversity: Study
- In 2010, the member nations of the U.N.’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), 195 countries plus the EU, agreed that at least 17% of global land and 10% of the ocean needed to be protected by 2020.
- A new global review finds that many countries have fallen short of these targets, and the expansion of protected areas over the past 10 years has not successfully covered priority areas such as biodiversity hotspots and areas providing ecosystem services.
- The research team overlaid maps of protected areas, threatened species, productive fisheries, and carbon services, and found that 78% of known threatened species do not have adequate protection.
- Adequate protection of the world’s biodiversity will require conservation areas in the right places, the involvement of Indigenous peoples and local communities in decision-making and management, ecologically connectivity between protected areas, and much more financing.
Watch: Rare wildlife caught on camera in a remote Liberian rainforest
- Camera traps laid by WCF captured video of 23 species, including western chimpanzees and a pygmy hippopotamus.
- WCF worked with local authorities and communities to place camera traps in 500 locations throughout the park.
- Grebo-Krahn National Park was established in 2017 as part of an effort to turn 30% of Liberia’s forests into protected areas.
Less than half of world’s humid tropical forests have high ecological integrity: Study
- Over 93% of the Earth’s best-quality and least-disturbed tropical forests have no legal protection from destruction, according to a study published in Nature Ecology and Evolution.
- Humid broadleaf tropical and subtropical forests cover just 14% of the Earth’s land surface, but support at least half of all species and offer key ecosystem services, making them crucial to meeting global climate and conservation targets.
- As a result of human activities, 33% of the biome has already been deforested and a further 22% is degraded. The study makes recommendations for maintaining existing protections, adding new ones, mitigating human activities, and restoring degraded forests.
- The Convention on Biological Diversity’s Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework will set 30-year conservation goals in 2021. New satellite imaging data offers a chance to set improved targets for forest protection and restoration, taking canopy structure into account.
Global wildlife being decimated by human actions, WWF report warns
- Between 1970 and 2016, wild populations of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish shrank by 68% on average, according to a new report by WWF and the Zoological Society of London.
- The most catastrophic declines were documented from Latin America and the Caribbean, where populations of monitored species contracted by more than 90% during that 46-year period.
- Among the 3,741 populations of freshwater species they tracked, the researchers found overall declines of more than 80%, underlining the threat from excessive extraction of freshwater, pollution and the destructive impacts of damming waterways.
- The assessment aims to grab the attention of world leaders who will gather virtually for the U.N. General Assembly that kicks off Sept. 15.
Madagascar minister calls protected areas a ‘failure,’ seeks people-centric approach
- Madagascar’s environment minister has criticized the way protected areas are managed in the country, setting the stage for a potential overhaul of the system to make conservation more people-centric.
- The stand has flustered some in the conservation community in Madagascar because it could mean reorienting their efforts in one of the planet’s most biodiverse countries, which is also extremely poor with high rates of environmental destruction.
- At a two-day meeting in late June, protected area managers, including a quasi-governmental agency and several international and local NGOs, shared details of their work, financial position, and challenges, with ministry officials.
- The ministry is expected to collate and analyze this information as a first step toward a broader evaluation and potential overhaul of the protected area system that could happen this year.
Harvard’s half-billion land stake in Brazil marred by conflict and abuse
- Harvard University has plowed $450 million of its $40 billion endowment in Brazil, most of it to buying up at least 405,000 hectares (1 million acres) of land in the Cerrado.
- This is a region where major landowners have racked up human rights violations against smallholder farmers and crimes against the environment.
- Most investments in land in this region are purely speculative; while the land goes unused, locals are deprived of their water sources, farmland and other resources.
- Harvard would not comment on its Brazilian investments specifically, but said it is trying to divest from unsustainable ventures. But even as it has trouble finding buyers for the farms, it continues to profit from the appreciating value of the land.
Is Chinese investment driving a sharp increase in jaguar poaching?
- A 200-fold increase in the number of trafficked dead jaguars seized by authorities in Central and South America between 2012 and 2018 has been reported in a new study.
- Researchers suggest the major surge in the trade may be facilitated by Chinese investment networks in Latin America.
- Corruption and low incomes in source countries also are likely a significant factor boosting trafficking.
- Acting on the paper’s findings, initiatives organized by nations, states, municipalities, NGOs, universities and research institutes could help improve collaborative regional efforts to combat the illicit trade.
The Large-antlered muntjac — Southeast Asia’s mystery deer (Commentary)
- 12 species of muntjac, the so-called barking deer because of its unique auditory calls, are found only in Asia. The Large-antlered muntjac is Critically Endangered with members of its scant, rarely seen population inhabiting the rugged Annamites Range bordering the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Vietnam and Cambodia.
- One of the biggest dangers to muntjacs is snaring, a hunting method used widely across Indochina. No one knows how many tens or hundreds of thousands of snares clutter Southeast Asia. But rangers in one Cambodian national park found 27,714 snares in 2015 alone — 7 snares per square kilometer, or 17.5 per square mile.
- If muntjacs are to be preserved, greater public awareness of their plight is required. On Vietnam’s Dalat Plateau and in Lao’s Nakai–Nam Theun National Protected Area, conservation appears possible, and scientists hope to garner better population density estimates in relation to the snaring threat. Captive breeding may be needed.
- This story is the second in a series by biologist Joel Berger written in conjunction with colleagues in an effort to make seriously endangered animals far better known to the public. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.
Brazilian Amazon drained of millions of wild animals by criminal networks: Report
- A new 140-page report is shining a bright light on illegal wildlife trafficking in the Brazilian Amazon. The study finds that millions of birds, tropical fish, turtles, and mammals are being plucked from the wild and traded domestically or exported to the U.S, EU, China, the Middle East and elsewhere. Many are endangered.
- This illicit international trade is facilitated by weak laws, weak penalties, inadequate government record keeping, poor law enforcement — as well as widespread corruption, bribery, fraud, forgery, money laundering and smuggling.
- While some animals are seized, and some low-level smugglers are caught, the organizers of this global criminal enterprise are rarely brought to justice.
- The report notes that this trafficking crisis needs urgent action, as the trade not only harms wildlife, but also decimates ecosystems and puts public health at risk. The researchers point out that COVID-19 likely was transmitted to humans by trafficked animals and that addressing the Brazilian Amazon wildlife trade could prevent the next pandemic.
The woman building the forest corridors saving Brazil’s black lion tamarin
- The Black Lion Tamarin Conservation program created a series of forest corridors to connect areas with isolated populations of this once critically endangered primate, bringing back to life pars of the Atlantic Forest in the Pontal do Paranapanema region of inland São Paulo state in Brazil.
- Gabriela Rezende, the biologist currently leading the program, was one of the winners of the prestigious Whitley Award for environmental conservation in 2020. The $50,000 prize will fund the continuing efforts to protect the black lion tamarin.
- The plan is to open more corridors and manage the population, moving the animals to accelerate their occupation of the forest and expand the population.
- The project also involves environmental education, professional training and the generation of income for the local population.
In Madagascar’s dry forests, COVID-19 sparks an intense, early fire season
- Though Madagascar officially has just under 1,800 reported infections and 16 deaths from COVID-19, the pandemic’s socioeconomic effects will be catastrophic for the country, the U.N. has warned.
- One tangible impact has been the fire season, which has started early and is likely to be fiercer this year as rural residents deprived of tourism revenue, employment opportunities and access to food markets turn to the forest to survive.
- The environment ministry registered 52,000 forest fire incidents from January until the start of June, with the western flank of the country, which hosts its unique dry forests, being the worst-affected.
- A reduction in NGOs’ and state agencies’ field activities has made forest patrols more challenging and affected the critical task of creating fire breaks.
China and EU appetite for soy drives Brazilian deforestation, climate change: Study
- A recent study highlights how demand for Brazilian soy by Europe and China is stoking deforestation, thereby increasing carbon emissions, especially in Brazil’s Cerrado savanna biome, followed by the Amazon rainforest.
- The extent to which Brazilian soy production and trade contribute to climate change depends largely on the location where soybeans are grown. Soy exported from some municipalities in Brazil’s Cerrado, for example, contributes 200 times more total greenhouse gas emissions than soy coming from other parts of the country.
- China was the world’s largest importer of Brazilian soy from 2010 to 2015 and responsible for 51% of associated carbon dioxide emissions, with the European Union responsible for about 30%. However, EU soy imports (sourced from the northern Cerrado) were linked to more recent deforestation than China’s imports.
- The study is the first to offer an estimate of carbon emissions across Brazil’s entire soy sector. The data obtained by analyzing 90,000 supply chain streams could help policymakers curb emissions by designing low-carbon supply chains, with more effective forest conservation, and making improvements in transport infrastructure.
Palm oil from Indonesian grower that burned forest is still being sold
- An investigation by the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) shows that palm oil from PT Kallista Alam, a company in Sumatra, entered the global supply chain and may have ended up in products made by Nestlé and Mars.
- The company was largely blackballed by buyers with sustainability commitments after a 2012 fire on its concession razed 1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) of pristine lowland rainforest that’s home to critically endangered Sumatran orangutans.
- An “oversight” in the second half of 2019 led to its crude palm oil being bought by a refinery run by the Permata Hijau Group, a top Indonesian palm oil processor that supplies commodities giant Cargill.
- Cargill, in turn, sells palm oil to multinational brands including Nestlé and Mars; RAN has called on the latter two companies to explicitly issue a no-buy order to their suppliers for Kallista Alam’s palm oil.
Amazon river dolphin risks extinction if Brazil moratorium not renewed
- The Amazon river dolphin (also known as the pink river dolphin, or boto) is the largest of the world’s freshwater dolphins. It lives in the Amazon and Orinoco river systems.
- For years, the dolphin’s populations, though protected in Brazil, trended downward, halving every decade there, as poachers hunted the animals, using their fatty blubber as bait to catch a carnivorous catfish known as the piracatinga, which is drawn to the scent of rotting flesh.
- In 2015, the government of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff tried to curb this chronic criminal behavior and protect the dolphins by introducing a five-year moratorium on catching piracatinga.
- Early in 2020 that moratorium lapsed and scientists urged its quick renewal to prevent the Amazon river dolphin from going extinct. UPDATE: Within days of this Mongabay story being published, Brazil’s Ministry of Agriculture announced that the piracatinga moratorium will be extended for one year starting 1 July.
Disaster interrupted: How you can help save the insects
- In a new paper, a group of 30 scientists offers suggestions for industry, land managers, governments and individuals to protect insects in the face of a global decline.
- Noting that invertebrates lack the “charisma” of larger species like pandas and elephants, the scientists call for spreading “the message that appreciation and conservation of insects is now essential for our future survival.”
- They suggest a list of actions that individuals can take to help, including planting native plants, going organic and avoiding pesticides, and reducing carbon footprint.
- “As insects are braided into ecosystems, their plight is essentially integrated with more expansive movements such as global biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation and in an alliance with them,” the scientists say.
As habitat degradation threatens Amazon species, one region offers hope
- Two recent studies looked into the impact of human disturbance on ecological diversity in Amazonia habitats. Another study in the Rupununi region of Guyana found how important maintaining connectivity is to maintaining ecosystem health.
- The first study investigated how forest fragmentation impacts mixed-species flocks of birds. The research found evidence that forest habitat fragmentation in the Amazon has caused mixed-species bird flocks to severely diminish and even disappear.
- A second study evaluated the impact of logging and fire on seed dispersal in tropical forest plots in the eastern Brazilian Amazon. The research team found that Amazon forests which have been heavily logged and burned are populated primarily by tree species with smaller seeds, and smaller fruits.
- The remote Rupununi region provides water connectivity between the ancient Guyana Shield and the Amazon basin. A recent study there identified more than 450 fish species within the Rupununi region. The research illustrated the value of conserving connectivity between diverse habitats.
Amazon road projects could lead to Belize-size loss of forest, study shows
- Scientists studying the impact of 75 road projects in five countries in the Amazon Basin have found that they could lead to 2.4 million hectares (5.9 million acres) of deforestation.
- Seventeen percent of these projects were found to violate environmental legislation and the rights of indigenous peoples.
- The total cost for the projects, which stretch a combined 12,000 kilometers (7,500 miles) is $27 billion, yet half of them will be financially unfeasible.
- The study’s authors cite a lack of reliable technical feasibility studies, solid data and pressure from financiers to minimalize socioenvironmental impacts.
Bolsonaro revives a plan to carve a road through one of Brazil’s last untouched areas
- President Jair Bolsonaro has revived a plan, conceived in the 1970s, to extend the BR-163 highway, the main soy corridor in Brazil, north to the border with Suriname.
- The road would cross 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) over a vast forest area called Calha Norte.
- The Trombetas State Forest, one of the four conservation units the road would cut through, stores 2.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide — more than Brazil’s entire emissions in 2018.
- The area is also rich in biodiversity: 40% of its species are found nowhere else on Earth.
Pandemic lockdown gives Philippine province time to rethink planned split-up
- The coronavirus pandemic has halted a planned vote on whether to split up the biodiverse province of Palawan into three smaller ones.
- Those in support of the proposal say breaking up the country’s biggest province into more manageable constituencies will allow officials to better address poverty and development issues.
- But critics say it will exacerbate bureaucratic bloat, allow the ruling elites to grab more power, and harm both the management of natural resources and welfare of indigenous peoples.
- They say the argument that the province is too big to properly manage is flawed, given how officials have largely been able to execute pandemic responses, and that the real issue is political will.
Brazilian government office responds to Fearnside’s BR-319 oil & gas commentary
- On 9 March 2020, Mongabay published a commentary written by Philip M. Fearnside on the “Solimões Sedimentary Area”, an oil and gas project that would implant thousands of wells spread over the western portion of the Brazilian Amazon, to the west of Highway BR-319 – a forest area almost entirely intact due to lack of road access. According to the commentary, the project would bring many risks to the area: oil spills, impact on isolated indigenous tribes and deforestation due to the expansion of a road network.
- EPE, the Brazilian Energy Research Office, sent a response to Mongabay on 27 March 2020 (published below), claiming “conceptual mistakes.” It argues, among other objections, that the Solimões project’s main goal is to evaluate future scenarios for a potential oil and gas exploration system in the area, not a de facto implementation of this system. The office also mentions the participatory process in which the local communities were allegedly involved and, concerning the risk of deforestation, refutes it saying that this kind of operation is mainly done by air or navigable rivers.
- As a rebuttal to EPE’s response, also published here, Fearnside objects that the project is a “trial balloon” to see what criticisms will arise so that the authors of the impact assessment can be more prepared to ensure approval of the environmental licenses. Furthermore, Fearnside emphasizes that the opening of a new frontier can stimulate the government to build roads and attract other activities linked to deforestation, like logging, land grabbing and palm oil production.
For Philippines’ displaced indigenous students, COVID-19 is one of many threats
- Students from indigenous communities in Mindanao who moved to Manila to evade armed conflict that forced their schools shut now face a new threat from the lockdown imposed in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
- Access to adequate health services has always been a challenge for indigenous communities in their homelands but displacement puts them at higher risk of contracting diseases like COVID-19.
- Despite the pandemic, displaced indigent students remain focused on their education, seeing it as a way to protect their ancestral lands no matter how far they are from home.
- Land disputes have abounded amid an escalation in armed conflict between government security forces and rebel groups in Mindanao, placing local communities and indigenous schools in the crossfire and forcing them to flee from their ancestral lands.
BR-319 illegal side road threatens Amazon protected area, indigenous land (commentary)
- Brazil faces a critical decision on licensing Highway BR-319, in the Purus / Madeira river basins of Amazonas state, which would “chop the Amazon rainforest in half.”
- The highway would bring deforesters to vast areas of intact Amazon rainforest. Protected areas along the route have been created to avert spread of deforestation.
- However, an illegal side road is already being built connecting with the BR-319, and accessing one of those protected areas, while also threatening indigenous and traditional riverine communities.
- The construction of this illegal road dramatizes the fiction that governance measures would control on-the-ground events if the completed highway is licensed. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.
The next great threat to Brazil’s golden lion tamarin: Yellow fever
- Once critically endangered due to extremely high levels of poaching, the golden lion tamarin — a primate endemic to Brazil’s Atlantic Forest — was down to just a few hundred by the 1980s, holding out in forest fragments 80 kilometers from Rio de Janeiro city. Intensive conservation efforts restored that number to 3,700 by 2014.
- But now, yellow fever, transferred from people via mosquitoes, is putting the tamarin’s recovery at risk. In May 2018, the first tamarin death due to yellow fever was recorded in the wild following an outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease across Brazil. An astonishing 32% of the population has disappeared in the year since.
- Dr. Carlos Ruiz, President of the Golden Lion Tamarin Association, told Mongabay that the disease could set back conservation efforts thirty years. However, another Brazilian researcher is pioneering a possible yellow fever vaccine for the primate. The approval application is currently being considered by the Brazilian government.
- While trafficking continues, that risk has been much reduced. Experts today believe that a combination of climate change and deforestation (drastically reducing tamarin habitat) is largely driving the devastating yellow fever epidemic.
Three new species of chameleons emerge from centuries-old entanglement
- Three new species of soft-nosed chameleons endemic to Madagascar were described in a recent paper in Vertebrate Zoology.
- Calumma emelinae from the east coast of Madagascar, C. tjiasmantoi from the southeast, and C. ratnasariae from the north officially joined the ranks of more than 90 species of chameleon that are endemic to Madagascar.
- A co-author described them as “tiny chameleons with funny noses,” because of the horn-like rostral appendage they sport.
- The discovery of distinct species within the species complex calls for the re-evaluation of their conservation status, according to the authors of the study.
Extreme El Niño drought, fires contribute to Amazon insect collapse: Study
- A recent study found that dung beetle species experienced significant diversity and population declines in human-modified tropical Brazilian ecosystems in the aftermath of droughts and fires exacerbated after the 2015-2016 El Niño climate event.
- Forests that burned during the El Niño lost, on average, 64% of their dung beetle species while those affected only by drought showed an average decline of 20%. Dung beetles provide vital ecoservices, processing waste and dispersing seeds and soil nutrients.
- For roughly the past three years, entomologists have been sounding alarms over a possible global collapse of insect abundance. In the tropics, climate change, habitat destruction and pesticide use are having clear impacts on insect abundance and diversity. However, a lack of funds and institutional interest is holding back urgently needed research.
Oil and gas project threatens Brazil’s last great block of Amazon forest (commentary)
- The eastern part of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest is already heavily deforested and degraded, but the western portion of the region (covering roughly 740,000 square kilometers; 285,000 square miles) is almost entirely intact due to the lack of road access.
- The huge block of forest to the west of Highway BR-319 (a road stretching between Amazonas and Rondônia states) is essential to maintaining the region’s biodiversity, its indigenous peoples, its huge forest carbon stocks, and its role in water recycling that supplies rainfall to places like São Paulo.
- Planned roads branching off Highway BR-319 would open the northern part of this vast forest block to entry by deforesters. Now a new threat is rapidly advancing: the Solimões oil and gas project that would implant thousands of wells spread over the central and southern portions of this forest block. Although not part of the official development’s preliminary environmental impact statement, future roads linking the drilling areas to the BR-319 are likely to give deforesters access to the entire area.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
Coronavirus outbreak may spur Southeast Asian action on wildlife trafficking
- Illegal wildlife trafficking remains a perennial problem in Southeast Asia, but with the ongoing spread of the new coronavirus, there’s added impetus for governments in the region to clamp down on the illicit trade.
- The coronavirus disease, or COVID-19, has infected more than 90,000 people worldwide and killed more than 3,000, according to the World Health Organization.
- Initial findings, though not conclusive, have linked the virus to pangolins, the most trafficked mammal on Earth and one of the mainstays of the illegal wildlife trade in Southeast Asia that feeds the Chinese market.
- Despite having a regional cooperation framework designed to curb wildlife trafficking, Southeast Asian governments have yet to agree on and finance a sustainability plan to strengthen efforts against the illegal trade.
Pope makes impassioned plea to save the Amazon — will the world listen?
- In a 94-page document entitled “Querida Amazonia” (Dear Amazon), Pope Francis has made an impassioned plea for world leaders, transnational companies, and people everywhere to step up and protect the Amazon rainforest along with the indigenous people who live there and are its best stewards.
- The Amazon is seeing rapid deforestation in Brazil, Peru, Bolivia and Colombia, while violence against indigenous people is rising. Scientists say climate change and deforestation are forcing a forest-to-savanna tipping point, which could lead to a massive tree die-off, the release of huge amounts of CO2, and global climate catastrophe.
- “We are water, air, earth and life of the environment created by God,” Pope Francis writes in Dear Amazon. “For this reason, we demand an end to the mistreatment and destruction of mother Earth. The land has blood, and it is bleeding; the multinationals have cut the veins of our mother Earth.”
- Faith leaders applauded the pope: “Care for creation and… social justice for indigenous peoples and forest communities are part of one moral fabric,” said Joe Corcoran of the Interfaith Rainforest Initiative. But most media ignored the pope’s message, focusing instead on his verdict disallowing Amazon priests from marrying.
Economists, conservationists, political leaders urge adoption of carbon tax to halt tropical deforestation
- A comment piece published in Nature yesterday urges tropical countries to adopt a tax on carbon emissions in order to halt global warming, species loss, and deforestation.
- The authors of the piece include Edward B. Barbier, a distinguished professor of economics at Colorado State University in the US; Ricardo Lozano, Colombia’s Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development; Carlos Manuel Rodríguez, Costa Rica’s Minister of Environment and Energy; and Sebastian Troëng, executive vice-president of US-based NGO Conservation International.
- “Tropical deforestation and land-use change must be halted to safeguard the climate and global biodiversity,” the authors write in Nature. “The widespread adoption of a tropical carbon tax is a practical way forward.”
Vale has filed hundreds of requests to exploit indigenous lands in Amazon
- Data obtained via the Access to Information Act reveals that Vale has 236 applications registered with the National Mining Agency for mineral exploration in Brazil’s Amazon Basin. Many of them are applications for research, the first step to obtaining authorization for mineral exploration.
- Of the total applications, 214 are on indigenous territory, including some of the largest in Brazil, such as Trombetas/Mapuera and Munduruku reservations. The Constitution prohibits mining in such areas without sanction by Congress and after hearing from the affected communities — something Vale has not done.
- More than 90% of the requests filed are for gold mining, but there are other minerals on the list too, including nickel, tin, lead, copper, manganese, diamonds, beryllium, silver, and platinum.
- Reached for response, Vale said it had only 76 “active” applications, but declined to provide details. The company has also requested that its mining application information be sealed, effectively keeping some of these processes out of the public eye.
Update to biodiversity treaty proposes protecting at least 30% of Earth
- Global policymakers have proposed extending protections to at least 30% of terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems around the world.
- The coming decade of biodiversity protection looks to borrow from the Paris climate agreement by setting targets for protecting intact ecosystems, curbing the spread of invasive species, and halving pollution from organic and plastic waste.
- For biodiversity hotspots, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) calls for safeguarding 60% of these areas by bringing them under the protected area framework or other management mechanisms.
- Some groups have questioned whether offering protection to 30% of areas and strict protection to only 10% will be enough to curb the alarming loss of biodiversity being witnessed globally.
Bolsonaro’s Brazil: 2020 could see revived Amazon mining assault — part two
- President Michel Temer issued a presidential decree in 2017 to open up the vast 4.6 million hectare (17,800 square mile) RENCA preserve in the northern Amazon to mining. Meeting with a firestorm of criticism he abandoned the effort. Sources now say the Bolsonaro administration is poised to quietly revive plans to open RENCA in 2020.
- Likewise, with Bolsonaro in charge, transnational mining companies are pushing for a change in Brazilian law allowing the firms to mine inside protected lands and indigenous reserves across the nation. The change could be introduced in 2020 via the mining law, a bill long stalled in Congress.
- Should mines in RENCA and elsewhere go ahead, transport will be needed. The planned Ferrovia Pará railway (Fepasa) would move commodities from Pará state’s interior for river transport to the coast. Other plans call for 20+ new river ports, 2 thermoelectric power stations, and a transmission line crossing Pará.
- However, all these major projects face a legal hurdle. The Brazilian Constitution states that no major measure can be authorized allowing mining in indigenous areas, or large new infrastructure projects approved before prerequisites are satisfied, including consent of affected indigenous and traditional communities.
EU/Chinese soy consumption linked to species impacts in Brazilian Cerrado: study
- The Brazilian Cerrado, the world’s largest tropical savanna, is a biodiversity hotspot with thousands of unique species and is home to 5 percent of the world’s biodiversity.
- However, half of the Cerrado has already been converted to agriculture; much of it is now growing soy which is exported abroad, particularly to the European Union (EU) and China, primarily as animal feed. But tracing soy-driven biodiversity and species losses to specific commodities traders and importing nations is challenging.
- Now a new groundbreaking study published in the journal PNAS has modeled the biodiversity impacts of site-specific soy production, while also linking specific habitat losses and species losses to nations and traders.
- For example, the research found that the consumption of Brazilian soy by EU countries has been especially detrimental to the giant anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla), which has lost 85 percent of its habitat to soy in the state of Mato Grosso.
Deforestation for potential rubber plantation raises concerns in Papua New Guinea
- The project, ostensibly for a 125-square-kilometer (48-square-mile) rubber plantation, began in mid-2018.
- Satellite imagery shows that Maxland, working with a local landowner company, has built logging roads and deforested patches of the Great Central Forest on Manus Island.
- Like Papua New Guinea as a whole, Manus is home to a wide variety of unique wildlife — just one aspect of the forest on which human communities have depended for thousands of years.
- Government forestry and environment officials were aware of the importance of the forest and a local forest management committee protested the project before it began, but it’s been allowed to continue anyway.
Central American countries pledge to protect Mesoamerica’s ‘5 Great Forests’
- The governments of all eight members of the Central American Commission for Environment and Development (CCAD) — Belize, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama — presented an ambitious regional climate action plan at COP25.
- Among the objectives of the 5 Great Forests Initiative is ending all illegal cattle ranching within the forests; ensuring that no wildlife species in the great forests goes extinct; protecting 10 million hectares (nearly 25 million acres) of land; and restoring 500,000 hectares of forest.
- The initiative also aims to improve the livelihoods of forest-dependent peoples, especially members of indigenous and local communities within the five forests, whose leadership is seen as crucial to forest conservation efforts.
As pesticide approvals soar, Brazil’s tapirs, bees, other wildlife suffer
- Brazil has been recognized as the world’s largest pesticide consumer since 2008, which has resulted in widespread application and in significant environmental contamination. Since then there has been an explosion of new pesticide registrations, first under President Michel Temer, now under Jair Bolsonaro.
- While research is scant, evidence points toward pesticide harm to Brazil’s wildlife, including the death of 500 million bees in four Brazilian states between December 2018 and February 2019. Another report found that 40 percent of samples collected from 116 tapirs were contaminated with insecticides, herbicides and heavy metals.
- High concentrations of the insecticide carbamate aldicarb were detected in 10 of 26 stomach content samples. Because the animals much prefer native vegetation to crops, this suggests that aerial spraying — with residue carried by wind — may be resulting in the spread of the pesticide from croplands into unsprayed natural areas.
- The Bolsonaro administration and bancada ruralista agribusiness lobby in Congress are moving rapidly to deregulate pesticides, especially pushing for passage of amendment 6299/2002, dubbed “The Poison Bill” by critics. It would transfer pesticide regulation to the Agriculture Ministry, a move that analysts decry as a serious conflict of interest.
Madagascar: Is NGO-led conservation too conservative to conserve much?
- International environmental NGOs working in Madagascar assume a relatively narrow role of supporting local conservation and development in line with government strategy.
- The nature of the NGOs’ legal relationship with the Malagasy government, which has close ties to the extractive industries, and the restrictions that come with international funding make it difficult for them to take a broader role or push for systemic environmental reforms.
- The result, some critics say, is that international NGOs fail to address the country’s most serious conservation challenges.
- Homegrown civil society groups have more room to operate in Madagascar and do some of the most important conservation work.
Indonesian dam raises questions about UN hydropower carbon loophole
- North Samatera Hydro Energy (PT NSHE) wants to build the Batang Toru dam, a 510-megawatt project, in Indonesia. But, the discovery of a new primate species, the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis), with under 800 individuals mostly inhabiting the project site, has alarmed activists and put the dam’s funding at risk.
- PT NSHE is at the COP25 climate summit this month extolling the project’s contribution to curbing global warming: company reps say the dam will reduce Indonesia’s carbon emissions by 4 percent. In fact, the nation is already counting the proposed project as part of its 2015 Paris Climate Agreement carbon reduction pledge.
- However, while the United Nations and Paris Agreement count most new hydroelectric dams as carbon neutral, recent science shows that tropical dams can emit high levels of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide; this especially occurs when reservoirs are first filled.
- Dams built over the next decade will be adding their greenhouse gas emission load to the atmosphere when the world can least afford it — as the world rushes to cut emissions to prevent a 2 degree Celsius increase in global temperatures. PT NSHE argues its dam will have a small reservoir, so will not produce significant emissions.
Amazon’s giant South American river turtle holding its own, but risks abound
- The arrau, or giant South American River turtle (Podocnemis expansa), inhabits the Amazon and Orinoco rivers and their tributaries. A recent six nation survey assessed the health of populations across the region in Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru.
- The species numbered in the tens of millions in the 19th century. Much reduced today, P. expansa is doing fairly well in river systems with conservation programs (the Tapajós, Guaporés, Foz do Amazonas, and Purus) and not so well in others (the Javaés and Baixo Rio Branco, and the Trombetas, even though it has monitoring).
- The study registered more than 147,000 females protected or monitored by 89 conservation initiatives and programs between 2012 and 2014. Out of that total, two thirds were in Brazil (109,400), followed by Bolivia (30,000), Peru (4,100), Colombia (2,400), Venezuela (1,000) and Ecuador (6).
- The greatest historical threat to the arrau stems from eggs and meat being popular delicacies, which has led to trafficking. Hydroelectric dams and large-scale mining operations also put the animals at risk — this includes mining noise impairing turtle communication. Climate change could be the biggest threat in the 21st century.
What makes community ecotourism succeed? In Madagascar, location, location, location
- For the past two decades, donors and international NGOs have worked with the Malagasy government to create thousands of local associations to manage and conserve parcels of forest.
- Ecotourism ventures, along with farming support, are often presented as an important way to overcome the loss of income that usually accompanies new restrictions on how local people can use their land.
- Successful ecotourism ventures are few and far between, but a common factor is also something that’s hard to replicate: proximity to highways and other tourist destinations.
Study finds massive reorganization of life across Earth’s ecosystems
- A new study pulls together data from 239 studies that looked at more than 50,000 biodiversity time series.
- The research reveals that almost 30 percent of all species are being swapped out for other species every 10 years.
- The scientists found that the reorganization and loss of species are happening much more quickly in some environments than in others, a finding that could help inform future conservation.
Madagascar: Opaque foreign fisheries deals leave empty nets at home
- Malagasy fishers blame shrimp trawlers that ply coastal waters for their declining catches.
- However, the bulk of industrial fishing in Madagascar’s waters takes place far from shore and out of view. It’s conducted by foreign fishing fleets working under agreements that critics say lack transparency.
- Conservationists argue that these foreign vessels are also depleting the country’s fish stocks and marine ecosystems.
- With negotiations to renew a fisheries deal with the European Union having flopped late last month and uncertainty lingering over an enormous and controversial fisheries deal with a Chinese company, much is at stake for Madagascar’s small-scale fishers.
Vatican calls landmark meeting to conserve Amazon, protect indigenous peoples
- From October 6-27 Catholic Church bishops from nine Amazon nations, indigenous leaders and environmental activists will convene in Rome at the Vatican to develop a unified strategy for preserving the Amazon rainforest and protecting the region’s indigenous peoples.
- The event is an outgrowth of Pope Francis’ 2015 teaching document known as Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home — an indictment of capitalism’s excesses, global extraction industries, industrial agribusiness, and our consumer society, which the pope mostly holds responsible for climate change, deforestation and endangerment of indigenous cultures.
- The Vatican meeting to discuss the Amazon is seen as a direct threat to national sovereignty by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, whose spokesperson earlier this year said of the Amazon synod that “it’s worrying and we want to neutralize it.”
- In a conference call this week, a few of those who will participate in the Amazon synod took a more positive view, saying that: “People are afraid that they’re going to have to change their own interests. But change has to come and the time is now.”
Wilderness cuts the risk of extinction for species in half
- Wilderness areas buffer species against the risk of extinction, reducing it by more than half, a new study shows.
- Places with lots of unique species and wilderness with the last remaining sections of good habitat for certain species had a more pronounced impact on extinction risk.
- The authors contend that safeguarding the last wild places should be a conservation priority alongside the protection and restoration of heavily impacted “hotspots.”
Camera trap study reveals Amazon ocelot’s survival strategies
- Ocelots suffered severe declines in the 1960s and 70s due to hunting, but populations have rebounded since the international fur trade was banned. Now, heavy deforestation and increasing human activity across their range threaten to put this elegant creature back on the endangered list.
- Researchers collected images from hundreds of camera traps set across the Amazon basin and analyzed the effect of different habitat characteristics on the presence of ocelots. Statistical modeling revealed the cat’s preference for dense forests and a dislike of roads and human settlements.
- Experts say ocelots may also be responding to human activity and forest degradation in ways that camera traps cannot easily detect, such as changing how and when they use a particular habitat. The study looked at ocelot behavior in protected and forested habitat, not in degraded landscapes.
- Ocelots are considered ambassador species for their forest ecosystem, and studies like this give support to maintaining protected areas, which are increasingly under threat from agricultural expansion and other human activities.
Study shows how to protect more species for less money in western Amazon
- A new study identifies nearly 300 areas for proposed protection in the western Amazon that would give the most bang for the buck in terms of the number of species conserved in this biodiversity hotspot.
- The researchers considered management and lost-opportunity costs in their analyses, and found that the presence of indigenous communities in protected areas can actually bring down the costs of conservation.
- While the estimated cost for protecting these proposed areas is just $100 million a year — less than a hundredth of the GDP of the countries in the western Amazon — the researchers say there needs to be clear political will to implement such a solution.
In Nigeria, a highway threatens community and conservation interests
- Activists and affected communities in Nigeria’s Cross River state continue to protest plans to build a major highway cutting through farmland and forest that’s home to threatened species such as the Cross River gorilla.
- The federal government ordered a slew of measures to minimize the impact of the project, but two years later it remains unclear whether the developers have complied, even as they resume work.
- Environmentalists warn of a “Pandora’s box” of problems ushered in by the construction of the highway, including illegal deforestation, poaching, land grabs, micro-climate change, erosion, biodiversity loss and encroachment into protected areas.
- They’ve called on the state government to pursue alternatives to the new highway, including investing in upgrading existing road networks.
Altered fish communities persist long after reefs bleach, study finds
- In a new study, bleached reefs in the Indian Ocean archipelago of Seychelles had fewer predators like snappers and groupers and more plant-eating fish such as parrotfish and rabbitfish.
- The researchers found that this change in the composition of fish species persisted for more than a decade and a half after bleaching occurred in 1998.
- Scientists expect bleaching events to occur more frequently as a result of climate change, making it likely that these shifts in fish communities will become permanent.
New film details wrenching impact of illegal rhino horn trade on families
- A new short film, titled Sides of a Horn, looks at the impacts of the illegal trade of rhino horn on a community in South Africa.
- The 17-minute film follows two brothers-in-law, one who is a wildlife ranger and another who contemplates poaching as a way to pay for his ailing wife’s medical care.
- A trip to South Africa in 2016 inspired British filmmaker Toby Wosskow to write and direct the short feature, which was publicly released June 25.
Logging road construction has surged in the Congo Basin since 2003
- Logging road networks have expanded widely in the Congo Basin since 2003, according to a new study.
- The authors calculated that the length of logging roads doubled within concessions and rose by 40 percent outside of concessions in that time period, growing by 87,000 kilometers (54,000 miles).
- Combined with rising deforestation in the region since 2000, the increase in roads is concerning because road building is often followed by a pulse of settlement leading to deforestation, hunting and mining in forest ecosystems.
Mongabay investigative series helps confirm global insect decline
- In a newly published four-part series, Mongabay takes a deep dive into the science behind the so-called “Insect Apocalypse,” recently reported in the mainstream media.
- To create the series, Mongabay interviewed 24 entomologists and other scientists on six continents and working in 12 nations, producing what is possibly the most in-depth reporting published to date by any news media outlet on the looming insect abundance crisis.
- While major peer-reviewed studies are few (with evidence resting primarily so far on findings in Germany and Puerto Rico), there is near consensus among the two dozen researchers surveyed: Insects are likely in serious global decline.
- The series is in four parts: an introduction and critical review of existing peer-reviewed data; a look at temperate insect declines; a survey of tropical declines; and solutions to the problem. Researchers agree: Conserving insects — imperative to preserving the world’s ecosystem services — is vital to humanity.
Primates lose ground to surging commodity production in their habitats
- “Forest risk” commodities, such as beef, palm oil, and fossil fuels, led to a significant proportion of the 1.8 million square kilometers (695,000 square miles) of forest that was cleared between 2001 and 2017 — an area almost the size of Mexico.
- A previous study found that 60 percent of primates face extinction and 75 percent of species’ numbers are declining.
- The authors say that addressing the loss of primate habitat due to the production of commodities is possible, though it will require a global effort to “green” the international trade in these commodities.
The Great Insect Dying: How to save insects and ourselves
- The entomologists interviewed for this Mongabay series agreed on three major causes for the ongoing and escalating collapse of global insect populations: habitat loss (especially due to agribusiness expansion), climate change and pesticide use. Some added a fourth cause: human overpopulation.
- Solutions to these problems exist, most agreed, but political commitment, major institutional funding and a large-scale vision are lacking. To combat habitat loss, researchers urge preservation of biodiversity hotspots such as primary rainforest, regeneration of damaged ecosystems, and nature-friendly agriculture.
- Combatting climate change, scientists agree, requires deep carbon emission cuts along with the establishment of secure, very large conserved areas and corridors encompassing a wide variety of temperate and tropical ecosystems, sometimes designed with preserving specific insect populations in mind.
- Pesticide use solutions include bans of some toxins and pesticide seed coatings, the education of farmers by scientists rather than by pesticide companies, and importantly, a rethinking of agribusiness practices. The Netherlands’ Delta Plan for Biodiversity Recovery includes some of these elements.
Out on a limb: Unlikely collaboration boosts orangutans in Borneo
- Logging and hunting have decimated a population of Bornean orangutans in Bukit Baka Bukit Raya National Park in Indonesia.
- Help has recently come from a pair of unlikely allies: an animal welfare group and a human health care nonprofit.
- Cross-disciplinary collaboration to meet the needs of ecosystems and humans is becoming an important tool for overcoming seemingly intractable obstacles in conservation.
The Great Insect Dying: The tropics in trouble and some hope
- Insect species are most diverse in the tropics, but are largely unresearched, with many species not described by science. But entomologists believe abundance is being impacted by climate change, habitat destruction and the introduction of industrial agribusiness with its heavy pesticide use.
- A 2018 repeat of a 1976 study in Puerto Rico, which measured the total biomass of a rainforest’s arthropods, found that in the intervening decades populations collapsed. Sticky traps caught up to 60-fold fewer insects than 37 years prior, while ground netting caught 8 times fewer insects than in 1976.
- The same researchers also looked at insect abundance in a tropical forest in Western Mexico. There, biomass abundance fell eightfold in sticky traps from 1981 to 2014. Researchers from Southeast Asia, Australia, Oceania and Africa all expressed concern to Mongabay over possible insect abundance declines.
- In response to feared tropical declines, new insect surveys are being launched, including the Arthropod Initiative and Global Malaise Trap Program. But all of these new initiatives suffer the same dire problem: a dearth of funding and lack of interest from foundations, conservation groups and governments.
The Great Insect Dying: A global look at a deepening crisis
- Recent studies from Germany and Puerto Rico, and a global meta-study, all point to a serious, dramatic decline in insect abundance. Plummeting insect populations could deeply impact ecosystems and human civilization, as these tiny creatures form the base of the food chain, pollinate, dispose of waste, and enliven soils.
- However, limited baseline data makes it difficult for scientists to say with certainty just how deep the crisis may be, though anecdotal evidence is strong. To that end, Mongabay is launching a four-part series — likely the most in-depth, nuanced look at insect decline yet published by any media outlet.
- Mongabay interviewed 24 entomologists and researchers on six continents working in over a dozen nations to determine what we know regarding the “great insect dying,” including an overview article, and an in-depth story looking at temperate insects in the U.S. and the European Union — the best studied for their abundance.
- We also utilize Mongabay’s position as a leader in tropical reporting to focus solely on insect declines in the tropics and subtropics, where lack of baseline data is causing scientists to rush to create new, urgently needed survey study projects. The final story looks at what we can do to curb and reverse the loss of insect abundance.
Altered forests threaten sustainability of subsistence hunting
- In a commentary, two conservation scientists say that changes to the forests of Central and South America may mean that subsistence hunting there is no longer sustainable.
- Habitat loss and commercial hunting have put increasing pressure on species, leading to the loss of both biodiversity and a critical source of protein for these communities.
- The authors suggest that allowing the hunting of only certain species, strengthening parks and reserves, and helping communities find alternative livelihoods and sources of food could help address the problem, though they acknowledge the difficult nature of these solutions.
The health of penguin chicks points scientists to changes in the ocean
- A recent closure of commercial fishing around South Africa’s Robben Island gave scientists the chance to understand how fluctuations in prey fish populations affect endangered African penguins (Spheniscus demersus) absent pressure from humans.
- The researchers found that the more fish were available, the better the condition of the penguin chicks that rely on their parents for food.
- This link between prey abundance in the sea and the condition of penguin chicks on land could serve as an indicator of changes in the ecosystem.
Interest in protecting environment up since Pope’s 2015 encyclical
- New research into the usage of environmentally related search terms on Google suggests that interest in the environment has risen since Pope Francis released Laudato Si’ in 2015.
- Laudato Si’, a papal encyclical, argues that it is a moral imperative for humans to look after the environment.
- Researchers and scholars believe that the pope’s support for protecting the environment could ripple well beyond the 16 percent of the world’s population that is Catholic.
Public education could curb bushmeat demand in Laos, study finds
- A recent survey of markets in Laos found that the demand for bushmeat in urban areas was likely more than wildlife populations could bear.
- The enforcement of Laos’s laws controlling the wildlife trade appeared to do little to keep vendors from selling bushmeat, but fines did appear to potentially keep consumers from buying bushmeat.
- The researchers also found that consumers could be turned off of buying bushmeat when they learned of specific links between species and diseases.
Climate change spurs deadly virus in frogs in the U.K.
- As temperatures climb, ranaviruses cause more frog deaths over a longer part of the year, according to a new study.
- The researchers combined data from outbreaks of disease caused by ranaviruses in common frogs (Rana temporaria) with laboratory investigations.
- They say that shaded areas and deeper ponds could provide refuges for afflicted animals that might slow the spread of the virus, but they also caution that this “short-term solution” is only a stopgap as the warming climate continues to make life difficult for amphibians.
Social media enables the illegal wildlife pet trade in Malaysia
- Conservationists say that prosecuting wildlife traffickers in Malaysia for trading in protected species isn’t easy, as traders have several loopholes to aid their efforts.
- One wildlife trafficker known as Kejora Pets has been operating in Peninsular Malaysia for years, selling “cute” pets to individuals through social media.
- Malaysia’s wildlife act doesn’t address the posting of protected animals for sale on social media, and operators like Kejora Pets appear to avoid ever being in possession of protected animals, allowing them to skirt statutes aimed at catching illicit traders.
- Proposed changes to Malaysia’s wildlife act could offer some relief to besieged populations of protected species by making it easier to prosecute online trafficking of protected animals.
’Unprecedented’ loss of biodiversity threatens humanity, report finds
- The U.N.’s Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services released a summary of far-reaching research on the threats to biodiversity on May 6.
- The findings are dire, indicating that around 1 million species of plants and animals face extinction.
- The full 1,500-page report, to be released later this year, raises concerns about the impacts of collapsing biodiversity on human well-being.
Bird flu in Namibia’s penguins wanes, after killing nearly 500
- More than 450 African penguins, an IUCN-listed endangered animal, have died in an outbreak of bird flu on three islands off the coast of Namibia.
- The virus, H5N8, is thought to have been introduced to the colonies, which hold 96 percent of Namibia’s penguins, by another bird traveling from South Africa, where a similar outbreak occurred in 2018.
- The disease appears to be abating, and researchers are hopeful that the country’s penguins will recover.
- However, they continue to face threats from food shortages caused by overfishing and climate change.
Community buy-in stamps out elephant poaching in Zambian park
- No elephants were poached in Zambia’s North Luangwa National Park in 2018, and the surrounding area had a 50 percent decrease in poached carcasses found.
- The North Luangwa Conservation Programme, a partnership between the Frankfurt Zoological Society and the country’s Department of Parks and Wildlife, has been around since the late 1980s and has focused its efforts on community involvement in stopping poachers from going after elephants, rhinos and other wildlife in the park.
- Staff of the program say the participation of the communities living near the park’s borders is critical to protecting the elephants of North Luangwa.
- The broader Luangwa ecosystem is home to more than 63 percent of Zambia’s elephants.
Swelling amount of plastic in the ocean confirmed by new study
- A new study used log books from 60 years of plankton research to document the increase in the amount of plastic in the ocean.
- The study’s authors tabulated the entanglements of the continuous plankton recorder, a sampling device that’s towed behind ships, revealing a significant increase in plastic in the ocean since the 1990s.
- Scientists have long suspected such a trend but have been unable to demonstrate it with data until now.
Scientists urge overhaul of the world’s parks to protect biodiversity
- A team of scientists argues that we should evaluate the effectiveness of protected areas based on the outcomes for biodiversity, not simple the area of land or ocean they protect.
- In a paper published April 11 in the journal Science, they outline the weaknesses of Aichi Biodiversity Target 11, which set goals of protecting 17 percent of the earth’s surface and 10 percent of its oceans by 2020.
- They propose monitoring the outcomes of protected areas that measure changes in biodiversity in comparison to agreed-upon “reference” levels and then using those figures to determine how well they are performing.
To stop extinctions, start with these 169 islands, new study finds
- New research shows that culling invasive, non-native animals on just 169 islands around the world over roughly the next decade could help save almost 10 percent of island-dwelling animals at risk of extinction.
- A team of scientists surveyed nearly 1,300 islands where 1,184 threatened native animals have collided with 184 invasive mammals.
- Their analyses gave them a list of 107 islands where conservationists could start eradication projects by 2020, potentially keeping 80 threatened species from sliding closer to extinction.
Leading Amazon dam rights activist, spouse and friend murdered in Brazil
- Dilma Ferreira Silva, long time regional coordinator of the Movement of People Affected by Dams (MAB) in the Tucuruí region of Pará state, was brutally murdered last Friday at her home, along with her husband, Claudionor Costa da Silva, and Hilton Lopes, a friend.
- Silva was one of 32,000 people displaced during the construction of the Tucuruí mega-dam. The internationally recognized activist has in recent years been pushing the Brazilian government to adopt legislation establishing the rights of those displaced by dams, providing them with compensation; the government has so far done little to create such laws.
- The killers of public officials, environmentalists, landless movement and indigenous activists in the Amazon are rarely found or brought to justice. However, in this case, Civil Police have arrested a large landowner, farmer and businessman, Fernando Ferreira Rosa Filho, known as Fernando Shalom.
- While the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and deputies in the Brazilian Congress, have condemned the killing of dam activist Silva, her husband and friend, the Bolsonaro administration has failed to issue a statement of any kind.
Malaysian state chief: Highway construction must not destroy forest
- The chief minister of Sabah, one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo, said that the Pan Borneo Highway project should expand existing roads where possible to minimize environmental impact.
- A coalition of local NGOs and scientific organizations applauded the announcement, saying that it could usher in a new era of collaboration between the government and civil society to look out for Sabah’s people and forests.
- These groups have raised concerns about the impacts on wildlife and communities of the proposed path of the highway, which will cover some 5,300 kilometers (3,300 miles) in the states of Sabah and Sarawak.
Madeira River dams may spell doom for Amazon’s marathon catfish: Studies
- Independent monitoring of a giant Amazon catfish population in the Madeira River, a major tributary of the Amazon, confirms that two hydroelectric dams have virtually blocked the species’ homing migration upstream — the longest known freshwater fish migration in the world.
- Research completed in 2018 indicates a serious decline in catches of the gilded catfish (Brachyplatystoma rousseauxii) and other key commercial species on the Madeira, both upstream and downstream of the two dams.
- New monitoring techniques show that the disruption of the migration route raises the risk of extinction for this species, for which researchers have recommended the conservation status be elevated from vulnerable to critically endangered.
- If the gilded catfish and other migratory species are to survive, mechanisms to assist their migration past the dams must be improved, researchers say.
New maps show where humans are pushing species closer to extinction
- A new study maps out how disruptive human changes to the environment affect the individual ranges of more than 5,400 mammal, bird and amphibian species around the world.
- Almost a quarter of the species are threatened by human impacts in more than 90 percent of their range, and at least one human impact occurred in an average of 38 percent of the range of a given species.
- The study also identified “cool” spots, where concentrations of species aren’t negatively impacted by humans.
- The researchers say these “refugia” are good targets for conservation efforts.
Defending the Amazon’s uncontacted peoples: Q&A with Julio Cusurichi
- Julio Cusurichi, a Shipibo-Conibo leader, has been working to protect the peoples and forests of his native Madre de Dios region in southeastern Peru.
- Increasingly, illegal gold miners as well as illegal loggers and drug traffickers are proving to be an existential threat for the indigenous people of the region, which concentrates some of the Amazon’s greatest biodiversity.
- In recent years Cusurichi led a successful campaign to create a legally recognized indigenous territory and helped establish a network of indigenous forest monitors when the government abandoned the effort.
- Now, he is working to gain a greater role for indigenous peoples in governing their territories. “The goal is for indigenous people to be the protagonists,” he told Mongabay on a recent visit to Peru’s capital, Lima. “We have to administer the Amazon regions that are our ancestral territories and not just leave it to the government.”
Proximity to towns stretches giraffe home ranges
- A recent study found that female giraffes that live close to towns have larger home ranges than those living further afield.
- The study’s authors believe that large human settlements reduce giraffes’ access to food and water.
- The team cites the importance of understanding the size of the area that giraffe populations need to survive to address the precipitous decline in the animal’s numbers across Africa in the past 30 years.
You’re gonna need a smaller boat: Media obscures shrinking ‘newsworthy’ fish
- The sizes of certain species of fish that qualify as “newsworthy” have diminished over time, a new study has found.
- The authors scoured English-language newspapers going back to 1869, searching for terms like “massive” and “giant” in mentions of noteworthy fish landings, and compared the reported lengths with the largest specimens on record for that species.
- They found that for some “charismatic megafish,” such as whale sharks and manta rays, the size that qualified as large has declined over time.
- That shifting baseline could pose a problem for conservation efforts because it gives the impression that “there are still a lot of very large fish in the sea,” marine ecologist Isabelle Côté said.
Indigenous hunters vital to robust food webs in Australia
- A new study has found that the removal of indigenous hunters from a food web in the Australian desert contributed to the local extinction of mammal species.
- The Martu people had subsisted in the deserts of western Australia for millennia before the government resettled them to make space for a missile test range in the 1950s.
- A team of researchers modeled the effects of this loss, revealing that the hunting fires used by the Martu helped maintain a diverse landscape that supported a variety of mammals and kept invasive species in check.
Blue whales remember best times and places to find prey
- A new study demonstrates that blue whales in the northern Pacific Ocean use their memories, instead of cues in the environment, to guide them to the best feeding spots.
- The researchers used 10 years of data to discern the movements of 60 blue whales.
- They compared the whales’ locations with spots with high concentrations of prey over the same period.
- The whales’ reliance on memory could make them vulnerable to changes in the ocean brought about by climate change.
Illegal gold mining destroys wetland forest in Madagascar park
- Over the last two years, small crews of miners using rudimentary hand tools have made repeated incursions into Ranomafana National Park in southeastern Madagascar, to dig hundreds of shallow pit mines.
- The wave of mining coincides with a steadily worsening security situation in the area, complicating attempts at enforcement and limiting researchers’ ability to quantify the problem.
- In a new paper, authors used satellite imagery to analyze changes in forest cover and drone photography to survey the wetlands in the heart of Ranomafana.
- The area affected is still relatively small, but experts fear the problem could easily become much worse.
Conservation groups press world leaders to protect 30% of the planet
- Thirteen nature conservation organizations are urging world leaders to back a plan to protect 30 percent of the world’s surface and oceans by 2030.
- Recent research has shown that less than a quarter of the world’s wilderness still remains.
- The group released a statement as negotiators were meeting in Japan to begin drafting a plan to meet that goal.
Community-based conservation offers hope for Amazon’s giant South American turtle
- Rural communities began protecting the threatened giant South American turtle (Podocnemis expansa) along a 1,500-kilometer (932-mile) stretch of the remote Juruá River in Brazil’s Amazonas state back in 1977 – becoming the largest community-based conservation management initiative ever conducted in the Brazilian Amazon.
- A new study shows that these community stewards – who protect turtle nests and receive payment only in food baskets – have had incredible success not only in preserving endangered turtle species, but also in conserving riverine invertebrate and vertebrate species, including migratory birds, large catfish, caiman, river dolphins and manatees.
- Today, the Middle Juruá River community-protected beaches are “true islands of biodiversity, while other unprotected beaches are inhabited by few species. They are empty of life,” say study authors. On the protected beaches, turtle egg predation is a mere 2 percent. On unprotected beaches on the same river, predation rates are as high as 99 percent.
- The study also helps debunk a Brazilian and international policy that proposed the eviction of local traditional communities from newly instituted conservation units because they would be detrimental to conservation goals. Instead, researchers agree, traditional communities should be allowed to keep their homes and recruited as environmental stewards.
In the belly of the beast: journalist delves into wildlife trafficking
- Rachel Nuwer, who has written for Mongabay, Smithsonian, the New York Times and other publications, published a new book in September, “Poached,” which delves deeply into the global wildlife trafficking epidemic.
- Her book looks into the origins of the wildlife trade, its mechanisms, markets, and solutions. It covers charismatic mammals (elephants, rhinos and tigers), as well as the non-charismatic (pangolins and snakes).
- In this exclusive Mongabay Q&A, the author shares some of her most harrowing moments on the trail of global wildlife traffickers. The scariest thing of all: how accepting people can often be to the slaughter of millions of wild animals, and to the extermination of species, so as to be served a rare meat or a bogus cure.
- Still, Nuwer finds hope in the courageous individuals who fight the trade.
Map pinpoints ‘last chance’ locations of endangered species
- A new assessment updates the last known ranges for nearly 1,500 species of animals and plants at 853 locations around the world.
- The three-year effort is aimed at helping scientists, governments and conservationists identify the threats that could lead to the extinction of these species and find ways to address them.
- Governments are already using this information to identify target areas for conservation to protect the last remaining habitats of threatened species.
- Nearly half of the sites identified lack formal protection, despite many of them having been flagged as important more than a decade ago.
Local fishers oppose $2.7 billion deal opening Madagascar to Chinese fishing
- Two months ago, a little-known private Malagasy association signed a 10-year, $2.7 billion fishing deal — the largest in the country’s history — with a group of Chinese companies that plans to send 330 fishing vessels to Madagascar.
- Critics of the deal include the country’s fisheries minister, who said he learned about it in the newspaper; environmental and government watchdog groups; and local fishers, who are already struggling with foreign competition for Madagascar’s dwindling marine stocks.
- Critics say no draft of the deal has been made public and the association that signed it did not conduct an environmental impact assessment or any public consultation.
- The issue has drawn media attention in the run-up to the presidential election on Wednesday. The incumbent and a leading candidate, Hery Rajaonarimampianina, was present at the fisheries deal’s signing, although he later claimed not to be familiar with it.
CITES rejects another Madagascar plan to sell illegal rosewood stockpiles
- At a meeting in Sochi, Russia, earlier this month, CITES’s standing committee rejected Madagascar’s latest plan to sell off its stockpiles of illegally harvested rosewood, largely because the plan called for local timber barons to be paid for their troves of wood.
- Environmental groups argued that operators who logged illegally should not be rewarded for it, and delegations from several African countries reportedly opposed the plan because they feared their own timber barons would learn the wrong lesson from the deal.
- Madagascar’s environment ministry released a statement after the meeting indicating that it would take the recommendations made by the CITES committee into account in revising the plan for submission again in 2019.
Top Madagascar shrimp co. moved millions among tax-haven shell companies
- Aziz Ismail, 85, a French citizen born in Madagascar, bought into Madagascar’s shrimp business in 1973. His empire, known generally as Unima, now includes at least eight privately held companies in Europe and Africa that are mainly involved in seafood from Madagascar, where operations are centered.
- Ismail has also owned a British Virgin Islands-based shell company called Ergia Limited since 2000. In the last decade, Ergia appears to have had financial transactions totaling several million dollars with another apparent shell company in Mauritius that has close ties to Unima, and with Unima companies in Europe.
- Although owning and using offshore companies is generally legal, tax and law enforcement officials are increasingly scrutinizing transactions through tax havens like the British Virgin Islands and Mauritius. Tax inspectors from Madagascar and other experts said Unima’s use of multiple offshore companies raises the risk of lost taxes for one of the world’s poorest countries.
- Files obtained from the now-defunct Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca as part of the “Panama Papers” were the basis for this investigation by Mongabay and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.
Bandits raid village near Madagascar park, killing conservation worker
- Armed bandits attacked a village on the edge of Ranomafana National Park in southeastern Madagascar in late July.
- They robbed residents and killed a technician for the Centre ValBio research institute.
- The incident is part of a growing pattern of banditry, both in the Ranomafana area and across Madagascar, where instability has increased in the run up to presidential elections scheduled for later this year.
Madagascar proposes paying illegal loggers to audit or buy their rosewood
- In June, the World Bank facilitated a workshop to discuss what Madagascar should do with its stockpiles of illegally logged rosewood.
- Madagascar has been grappling with the question for years, but has been unable to make a proper inventory of the stockpiled wood or control illegal exports.
- The rosewood could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars on the international market, but the country cannot sell it until it shows progress in enforcing its own environmental laws.
- At the workshop, Madagascar’s government proposed a radical solution: paying loggers for access to their illicit stockpiles in order to keep tabs on the wood, or even buying the wood back from them directly.
Another Cecil? Secrecy surrounds June trophy lion hunt
- A U.S. trophy hunter baited and killed a male lion on June 7th in Umbabat Private Nature Reserve, a part of Greater Kruger National Park, South Africa. Suspicions are that the animal shot was Skye, a beloved lion in the region.
- U.S. citizen Jared Whitworth allegedly paid nearly $80,000 for the hunt. Authorities say the animal killed wasn’t Skye, but have offered no proof. Skye hasn’t been seen since the day Whitworth made his kill, and one of the lion’s cubs was found dead, which often happens when other males take over a pride.
- If the killed lion was Skye, this would be a breach of South African regulations, because the lion was too young to be legally hunted. Authorities also say that if it is confirmed that the lion was baited, that could violate South African laws.
- In response, the U.S. Humane Society and Center for Biological Diversity sent a letter to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service asking it to reject importation of the mystery lion’s body. In March, the Trump administration’s USFWS announced a new policy to consider African trophy import permits on a case-by-case basis.
Species evolve more than twice as fast at poles as in tropics: study
- Considering the swarming biodiversity at the equator, and the lack of diversity near the poles, scientists have long assumed that species evolve more rapidly in warm waters. But a new study of the evolutionary development of 30,000 fish species has turned that idea on its head.
- Biologists found that a fish species in the tropics split into a new species on average every 10 to 20 million years. But near the poles, that average rate is roughly every four million years – more than twice as fast.
- The reason may be the far more extreme and less stable climatic conditions found near the poles. This results in more frequent extinctions, which clears out species diversity and empties ecological niches, setting the stage for the next new burst of species formation in other groups of organisms.
- But if species form faster at the poles than in the tropics, why isn’t there greater biodiversity in the Arctic and Antarctic than at the equator? One possibility: while speciation is more rapid at the poles, extinctions may be more numerous too. But this still isn’t clear, and more research will be needed to find out.
Rwandan people and mountain gorillas face changing climate together
- The Critically Endangered mountain gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei), has been brought back from extinction’s brink in Rwanda, with numbers in the Virunga Mountains around Volcanoes National Park estimated at 604 individuals in 2016, up from 480 in 2010. But long-time observers say climate change is bringing new survival challenges to the area.
- Longer and deeper droughts in recent years have caused serious water shortages, which impact both local farmers and the mountain gorillas. People now must often go deep into the park to find clean water, which increases the likelihood of contact with the great apes, which increases the likelihood for the transfer of human diseases to the animals.
- Hotter temps and dryer conditions could also pressure farmers to move into gorilla habitat in future, as they seek more productive cropland at higher altitudes. Also, as the climate changes, bamboo availability may be decreasing, depriving gorillas of a favorite food. This could force troops to forage outside the park in croplands, possibly leading to conflict.
- Forced changes in diet could impact gorilla nutrition, making the great apes more susceptible to disease. A major disease outbreak could be disastrous due to low population numbers. Scientists urge more research to understand how climate change affects human behavior, which then affects gorillas, and how the fate of the two primates intertwines.
Renowned wildlife conservationist Russell Mittermeier awarded 2018 Indianapolis Prize
- Mittermeier, a primatologist, herpetologist, and highly accomplished conservationist, is the seventh recipient of the prestigious prize, which has been awarded by the Indianapolis Zoological Society along with $250,000 in prize money every two years since 2006 to “the most successful animal conservationist in the world.”
- He spent 11 years at WWF–U.S. before becoming president of Conservation International (CI) in 1989. It was while he was at CI that Mittermeier first heard of the concept of “biodiversity hotspots” — a concept he would go on to popularize and utilize to achieve a number of conservation successes.
- “Russ Mittermeier is a consummate scientist, a visionary leader, a deft policy advocate and an inspiring mentor to many,” Michael Crowther, chief executive officer of the Indianapolis Zoological Society, said in a statement. “Perhaps most important, he is a consistent winner in the battles for species and ecosystem survival.”
Hunting, fishing causing dramatic decline in Amazon river dolphins
- Both species of Amazon river dolphin appear to be in deep decline, according to a recent study. Boto (Inia geoffrensis) populations fell by 94 percent and Tucuxi (Sotalia fluviatilis) numbers fell by 97 percent in the Mamirauá Reserve in Amazonas state, Brazil between 1994 and 2017, according to researchers.
- Difficult to detect in the Amazon’s murky waters, both species are listed as “Data Deficient” by the IUCN. But researchers maintain that if region-wide surveys were conducted both species would end up being listed as Critically Endangered.
- The team noticed scars from harpoon and machete injuries on the dolphins they caught. Interviews with fishermen confirmed the team’s suspicions: dolphins were being hunted for use as bait. The mammals also get entangled in nets and other fishing gear, are hunted as food, eliminated as pests, and suffer mercury poisoning.
- Researchers believe the passage and enforcement of new conservation laws could save Amazon river dolphins, and halt their plunge toward extinction. But a lack of political will, drastic draconian cuts to the Brazilian environmental ministry budget, and continued illegal dolphin hunting and fishing make action unlikely for now.
Hunters are wiping out hornbills in Ghana’s forests
- According to a new study, Ghana is losing hornbill species to “uncontrolled” hunting, mostly for meat, from its forested parks and reserves.
- The researchers found that the five largest species of hornbills in the Bia Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, have disappeared in recent decades.
- The authors of the paper suggest that increased enforcement will help protect threatened hornbills, as well as other wildlife species, in areas under intense pressure from humans.
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.”
Venezuela’s hungry hunt wildlife, zoo animals, as economic crisis grows
- Venezuela is suffering a disastrous economic crisis. With inflation expected to hit 13,000 percent in 2018, there has been a collapse of agricultural productivity, commercial transportation and other services, which has resulted in severe food shortages. As people starve, they are increasingly hunting wildlife, and sometimes zoo animals.
- Reports from the nation’s zoos say that animals are emaciated, with keepers sometimes forced to feed one form of wildlife to another, just to keep some animals alive. There have also been reports of mammals and birds being stolen from zoo collections. Zoos have reached out to Venezuelans, seeking donations to help feed their wild animals.
- The economic crisis makes scientific data gathering difficult, but a significant uptick in the harvesting of Guiana dolphin, known locally as tonina, has been observed. The dolphin is protected from commercial trade under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
- The grisly remains of hunted pink flamingos have been found repeatedly on Lake Maracaibo. Also within the estuary, there has also been a rise in the harvesting of sea turtle species, including the vulnerable leatherback (Dermochelys coriacea), and the critically endangered hawksbill (Eretmochelys imbricata).
Pangolins on the brink as Africa-China trafficking persists unabated
- Pangolins are the most trafficked mammal in the world, with more than a million snatched from the wild in the past decade, according to IUCN estimates. The four Asian species have been hunted nearly to extinction, while the four African species are being poached in record numbers.
- The illegal trade largely goes to China and other East Asian nations, where pangolin meat is an expensive delicacy served to flaunt wealth and influence. Pangolin is also a preferred ingredient in traditional medicine in Asia and Africa. Traditional healers in Sierra Leone use pangolin to treat 59 medical conditions, though there is no evidence of efficacy.
- In 2016, pangolins were given the highest level of protection under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), a multilateral treaty signed by 183 nations. But laws and enforcement in African nations, along illegal trade routes, and in Asia continue to be weak, with conservationists working hard to strengthen them.
- Pangolins don’t thrive in captivity, but the Tikki Hywood Foundation in Zimbabwe and Save Vietnam’s Wildlife have succeeded in rescuing confiscated pangolins and restoring them to the wild. Six U.S. zoos are trying to raise pangolins as part of the controversial Pangolin Consortium project — only 29 of 45 imported individuals remain alive.
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.
Will Madagascar’s industrial shrimp trawlers make way for local fishers?
- Shrimp is one of Madagascar’s most lucrative exports.
- But local fishers and environmental groups say shrimp trawlers are harming the country’s marine environment and leaving too few fish in the sea for the fishing communities that depend on them.
- Until now, relatively little has been done to address the issue.
- But there are small signs that may be starting to change, with fishing communities raising their voices to press for exclusive access to Madagascar’s coastal waters.
Cerrado: appreciation grows for Brazil’s savannah, even as it vanishes
- The Brazilian Cerrado – a vast savannah – once covered two million square kilometers (772,204 square miles), an area bigger than Great Britain, France and Germany combined, stretching to the east and south of the Amazon.
- Long undervalued by scientists and environmental activists, researchers are today realizing that the Cerrado is incredibly biodiverse. The biome supports more than 10,000 plant species, over 900 bird and 300 mammal species.
- The Cerrado’s deep-rooted plants and its soils also sequester huge amounts of carbon, making the region’s preservation key to curbing climate change, and to reducing Brazil’s deforestation and CO2 emissions to help meet its Paris carbon reduction pledge.
- Agribusiness – hampered by Brazilian laws in the Amazon – has moved into the Cerrado in a big way. More than half of the biome’s native vegetation has already disappeared, as soy and cattle production rapidly replace habitat. This series explores the dynamics of change convulsing the region.
Trump to allow elephant and lion trophies on case-by-case basis
- President Obama banned U.S. citizens from bringing home elephant and lion trophies from Zambia and Zimbabwe. In November, 2017, Trump’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reversed that ban until Trump himself overruled the USFWS, pausing the new rule until the president could make a final decision.
- This week, the USFWS said in a memorandum that it will permit U.S. citizens to bring lion and elephant hunting trophies home from Africa – potentially including Zimbabwe and Zambia – on a case-by-case basis.
- Conservationists largely responded negatively to the decision, critiquing it for offering little or no transparency, inviting corruption, and identifying no stated system or criteria for determining how permit selections will be made.
- A variety of lawsuits are ongoing which could still influence the shape of the new rule.
Amazon forest to savannah tipping point could be far closer than thought (commentary)
- In the 1970s, scientists recognized that the Amazon makes half of its own rainfall via evaporation and transpiration from vegetation. Researchers also recognized that escalating deforestation would reduce this rainfall producing effect.
- A 2007 study estimated that with 40 percent Amazon deforestation a tipping point could be reached, with large swathes of Amazonia switching from forest to savannah. Two newly considered factors in a 2016 study – climate change and fires – have now reduced that estimated tipping point to 20-25 percent. Current deforestation is at 17 percent, with an unknown amount of degraded forest adding less moisture.
- There is good reason to think that this Amazon forest to savannah tipping point is close at hand. Historically unprecedented droughts in 2005, 2010 and 2015 would seem to be the first flickers of such change.
- Noted Amazon scientists Tom Lovejoy and Carlos Nobre argue that it is critical to build in a margin of safety by keeping Amazon deforestation below 20 percent. To avoid this tipping point, Brazil needs to strongly control deforestation, and combine that effort with reforestation. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
Andes dams twice as numerous as thought are fragmenting the Amazon
- A new study identified 142 dams currently in operation or under construction in the Andes headwaters of the Amazon, twice the number previously estimated. An additional 160 are in the planning stages.
- If proposed Andes dams go ahead, sediment transport to the Amazon floodplains could cease, blocking freshwater fish migratory routes, disrupting flow and flood regimes, and threatening food security for downstream communities, impacting up to 30 million people.
- Most dams to date are on the tributary networks of Andean river main stems. But new dams are planned for five out of eight major Andean Amazon main stems, bringing connectivity reductions on the Marañón, Ucayali and Beni rivers of more than 50 percent; and on the Madre de Dios and Mamoré rivers of over 35 percent.
- Researchers conclude that proposed dams should be required to complete cumulative effects assessments at a basin-wide scale, and account for synergistic impacts of existing dams, utilizing the UN Watercourses Convention as a legal basis for international cooperation for sustainable water management between Amazon nations.
Pope’s message to Amazonia inspires hope, but will it bring action?
- On 19 January, Pope Francis spoke to a crowd of thousands, including many indigenous people, in Puerto Maldonado, Peru, the capital of Madre de Dios state in the Amazon, a region that has seen significant deforestation (62,500 hectares between 2012 and 2016), and significant violence due to illegal mining.
- Latin American analysts, while excited about the pope’s visit, and appreciative of his spotlighting of illegal mining in Madre de Dios and other environmental problems across Amazonia, expressed doubt that the papal visit will have much impact in the long run.
- The pope singled out large corporations in his address: “[G]reat business interests… want to lay hands on [the Amazon’s] petroleum, gas, lumber, gold and other forms of agro-industrial monocultivation,” he said. “We have to break with the historical paradigm that views Amazonia as an inexhaustible source of supplies for other countries without concern for its inhabitants.”
- The pope invited a top-down and bottom-up response by Catholics to the Amazon crisis, calling on indigenous people “to shape the culture of local churches in Amazonia,” and announcing next year’s first-ever Synod for Amazonia – a gathering of global bishops who will put papal doctrine such as Laudato Si, his landmark 2015 papal encyclical, into action.
Natural World Heritage Sites in trouble, especially in the Tropics
- From the Great Barrier Reef to the Galapagos Islands and the forests of central Africa, over a third of Natural World Heritage Sites designated by UNESCO are under threat from myriad problems.
- Of the seventeen locations with a critical conservation outlook, sixteen are in the Tropics, and the majority of those are in Africa. Less than half of African World Heritage sites received a “good” outlook. Lack of funding in developing nations is a major problem.
- Sites harboring rich biodiversity, such as Virunga and Garamba national parks in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Rio Platano Biosphere Reserve in Honduras, are especially at risk.
- The most common threats to Natural World Heritage Sites are invasive non-native species, unsustainable tourism, poaching, hydroelectric dams, and logging, with climate change the fastest growing threat.
Study: Amazon dams are disrupting ecologically vital flood pulses
- Flood pulses are critical to the way the Amazon, its tributaries and other tropical rivers function – and these seasonal flood pulses are a huge driver of ecological productivity and diversity.
- Floodplain forests depend upon annual flood pulses to bring nutrients and sediment from river channels out into the surrounding terrestrial habitat.
- Reductions to flood pulses, brought by Amazon dams both large and small, could lead to shifts in tree species diversity and composition, with implications for carbon storage and emissions.
- Unreliable flood regimes, as created by dams of all sizes, significantly impact Amazon river systems and species’ life cycles, population dynamics, food sources, and habitats above and below the water line.
Brazil 2018: Amazon under attack, resistance grows, courts to act, elections
- While forecasts are always difficult, it seems likely that Brazilian President Michel Temer will remain in power for the last year of his term, despite on-going corruption investigations.
- Elections for president, the house of deputies, and most of the senate are scheduled for October. Former President Lula has led the presidential polls, though right wing candidate Jair Bolsonaro has grown strong. Lula’s environmental record is mixed; Bolsonaro would almost certainly be bad news for the environment, indigenous groups and the Amazon.
- During 2018, Temer, Congress and the bancada ruralista (a lobby representing agribusiness, cattle ranchers, land thieves and other wealthy rural elites) will likely seek to undermine environmental laws and indigenous land rights further. Potential paving of the BR 319 in the heart of the Amazon is considered one of the biggest threats.
- However, grassroots environmental and indigenous resistance continues to grow, and important Brazilian Supreme Court decisions are expected in the weeks and months ahead, which could undo some of the major gains made by the ruralists under Temer.
U.S. zoos learn how to keep captive pangolins alive, helping wild ones
- The Pangolin Consortium, a partnership between six U.S. zoos and Pangolin Conservation, an NGO, launched a project in 2014 which today houses fifty White-bellied tree pangolins (Phataginus tricuspis).
- Common knowledge says that pangolins are almost impossible to keep alive in captivity, but the consortium has done basic research to boost survival rates, traveling to Africa and working with a company, EnviroFlight, to develop a natural nutritious insect-derived diet for pangolins in captivity.
- While some conservationists are critical of the project, actions by the Pangolin Consortium have resulted in high captive survival rates, and even in the successful breeding of pangolins in captivity.
- The Pangolin Consortium is able to conduct basic research under controlled conditions at zoos on pangolin behavior and health – research that can’t be done in the wild. Zoos can also present pangolins to the public, educating about their endangered status, improving conservation funding.
U.S. court ruling complicates Trump’s elephant and lion policy
- A federal appeals court has found that the Obama administration did not follow proper procedures in 2014 when it banned importing elephant trophies from Zimbabwe. The USFWS failed to seek public comment at the time, among other infractions.
- This new ruling puts the Trump administration decision, made in November, ending the ban and allowing elephant trophy hunting imports, into question.
- Further complicating matters is Trump’s dubbing of the November USFWS decision as a “horror show,” and his putting of the policy on hold awaiting his response. To date, Trump has said nothing further.
- The way things stand now, U.S. hunters can import elephant trophies from South Africa and Namibia. They can import lion body parts from South Africa, Zimbabwe and Zambia. But the legality of importing elephant trophies from Zambia and Zimbabwe remains in limbo.
Brazil 2017: environmental and indigenous rollbacks, rising violence
- The bancada ruralista, or ruralist lobby, in Brazil’s congress flexed its muscles in 2017, making numerous demands on President Michel Temer to make presidential decrees weakening environmental protections and revoking land rights to indigenous and traditional communities in Brazil – decisions especially impacting the Amazon.
- Emboldened ruralists – including agribusiness, cattle ranchers, land thieves and loggers – stepped up violent attacks in 2017, making Brazil the most dangerous country in the world for social or environmental activists. There were 63 assassinations by the end of October.
- Budgets to FUNAI, the indigenous agency; IBAMA, the environmental agency; and other institutions, were reduced so severely this year that these government regulatory agencies were largely unable to do their enforcement and protection work.
- In 2017, Temer led attempts to dismember Jimanxim National Forest and National Park, and to open the vast RENCA preserve in the Amazon to mining – efforts that have failed to date, but are still being pursued. Resistance has remained fierce, especially among indigenous groups, with Temer sometimes forced to backtrack on his initiatives.
Selective logging reduces biodiversity, disrupts Amazon ecosystems: study
- Reduced-impact logging, also called selective logging, which gained popularity in the 1990s, aims to balance biodiversity impacts with global demand for timber by extracting fewer trees. But the success of this approach is coming under increasing scrutiny.
- A new study in the Brazilian Amazon found that dung beetle communities, and their important role as “ecosystem engineers,” is severely disrupted by even low-level timber extraction, with sharp reductions in species richness.
- Multitudes of studies on birds, mammals, amphibians and invertebrates around the globe demonstrate the same finding: that even low-levels of timber extraction have significant impact on species diversity.
- This extensive research suggests that selective logging techniques should be shelved in favor of “land-sparing” timber extraction strategies, which create a patchwork of highly logged sites and intact forest reserves.
CITES rejects Madagascar’s bid to sell rosewood and ebony stockpiles
- The standing committee of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) had its annual meeting in Geneva November 27 through December 1.
- The committee rejected Madagascar’s petition to sell its stockpiles of seized rosewood and ebony that had been illegally cut from the country’s rainforests.
- CITES delegates agreed that while a future sale of the stockpiles might be possible, Madagascar was not yet ready for such a risky undertaking, which could allow newly chopped logs to be laundered and traded overseas.
- Other notable outcomes of the CITES meeting dealt with the sei whale (Balaenoptera borealis), pangolins, and the critically endangered vaquita porpoise (Phocoena sinus).
As 2017 hurricane season ends, scientists assess tropical forest harm
- This year’s Atlantic hurricane season – one for the record books – ended on 30 November, seeing six Category 3 to 5 storms wreaking massive destruction across the Caribbean, in the U.S. and Mexico. While damage to the built environment is fairly easy to assess, harm to conserved areas and species is more difficult to determine.
- Satellite images show extensive damage to the 28,400-acre El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico, the United States’ only national tropical rainforest. However, observers on the ground say the forest is showing signs of a quick recovery.
- More serious is harm to already stressed, endangered species with small populations. El Yunque’s Critically Endangered Puerto Rican parrot was hard hit: out of 50 endemic wild parrots, 16 are known dead. Likewise, the Endangered imperial parrot endemic to Dominica, spotted just three times since Hurricane Maria.
- Ecosystems and species need time to recover between storms. If the intensity of hurricanes continues to increase due to escalating global warming as predicted, tropical ecosystem and species resilience may be seriously tested.
Militarization and mining a dangerous mix in Venezuelan Amazon
- Venezuela today is gripped by a catastrophic economic crisis, born out of corruption on a vast scale, government mismanagement and a failed petro-economy.
- In 2016, President Nicolás Maduro announced the opening of the Orinoco Mining Arc, a vast region in the southern part of the nation perhaps boasting $100 billion in untapped gold, diamonds and coltan, as well as being one of the most biodiverse parts of the Amazon.
- Maduro also created an “Economic Military Zone” to protect the region. Today, the army has a huge presence there, ostensibly to reduce the influence of organized gangs doing illegal mining.
- In reality, the military is heavily involved in mining itself, often allegedly competing with gangs for resources, with violent conflict a result. Small-scale miners, indigenous and traditional communities, and the environment could be the big losers in this struggle for power and wealth.
Forced out or killed: rare chimps go missing from Cameroon mountain forest
- The Endangered Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes ellioti) is the least numerous subspecies of chimpanzee, with a total population almost certainly less than 9,000, and probably less than 6,000 individuals.
- The estimated population is far smaller in Cameroon, where just four known populations number some 250 individuals, all located in the Northwest region.
- One of those groups, known as “The Great Apes of Tubah” was until recently found in the unprotected Kejom-Keku Mountain Forest.
- But the chimps haven’t been seen in three years, and conservationists fear they’ve been killed or forced to move on. A new road into the Kejom-Keku area has resulted in the loss of half its forest, as herders, farmers, loggers and poachers move in.
Carbon dreams: Can REDD+ save a Yosemite-size forest in Madagascar?
- When Makira Natural Park launched in 2005, it seemed to present a solution to one of the most intractable problems in conservation: finding a source of funding that could be counted on year after year.
- The sale of carbon offset credits would fund the park itself as well as development projects aimed at helping nearby communities improve their standard of living and curtail deforestation.
- But more than a decade later, carbon buyers are scarce and much of the funding for community development has been held up. And although deforestation has slowed considerably in and around Makira, it is falling well short of deforestation targets set at the outset of the project.
- This is the seventh story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Trump’s indecision on trophy hunting reignites heated debate
- On November 15, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lifted a ban on the U.S. import of elephant trophies from Zimbabwe and Zambia. The president put a hold on the order two days later, calling trophy hunting in a tweet a “horror show.” He has yet to make a final determination regarding the USFWS order.
- At the same time, Interior Department Secretary Ryan Zinke announced the establishment of the International Wildlife Conservation Council. One goal of the body will be to promote with the U.S. public the “economic benefits that result from U.S. citizens traveling abroad to [trophy] hunt.”
- While trophy hunting does provide revenue for land and wildlife conservation in some special cases in Africa, the new U.S. council will likely have its work cut out for it, since many Americans no longer see trophy hunting of endangered species as ethical.
- Conservationists counter pro-trophy hunting advocates by noting that rampant government corruption in nations like Zimbabwe and Zambia make it unlikely that most trophy hunting revenues ever reach the African preserves, local communities or rangers that need the funding.
More big mammals found in high-carbon forests, says new study
- The researchers used satellite data to measure forest carbon values and camera trap photographs to tally the mammal species present in forests and oil palm plantations.
- Finer-scale data did reveal that high-carbon areas do support more species of medium and large mammals that are threatened with extinction.
- Experts say that this research validates the high carbon stock approach for identifying priority areas for conservation.
- Still, further research is required to better understand the role of connectivity between high-carbon forests in supporting biodiversity.
Madagascar petitions CITES to sell millions in stolen rosewood
- The Madagascar government has petitioned wildlife regulators under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) for permission to sell its stockpiles of seized rainforest wood.
- Some campaigners warn that traffickers stand to benefit from any such sale and fear it could herald a “logging boom” in the country’s remaining rainforests.
- The CITES committee will consider the proposal at the end of this month.
Logjam: Inside Madagascar’s illegal-rosewood stockpiles
- Over the past six years, Madagascar has spent millions of dollars and devoted countless person hours to figuring out how to dispose of vast stockpiles of highly valuable, illegally logged rosewood, much of it cut from the country’s rainforests following a 2009 coup.
- To do so, the government must conduct a comprehensive inventory of the stockpiles, among other requirements issued by CITES. The World Bank has supported the effort with at least $3 million to $4 million in murky ad hoc loans.
- The current state of affairs, with untold thousands of rosewood logs still unaccounted for, and tens of thousands more stacked outside government offices, is widely seen as facilitating continued corruption and illicit activity.
- This is the sixth story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Betting on agroforestry in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest
- Guapiruvu is a rural neighborhood in the Vale do Ribeira, home to the largest remaining stretch of Atlantic Forest in Brazil, and listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.
- The area has implemented a sustainable development plan, with many farmers opting for organic agriculture and agroforestry since they can sell their produce at a 30 percent premium.
- This system grows bananas in combination with “pé de ata” (Annona squamosa) and juçara, an endangered species endemic to the region.
- This is the second feature in a year-long series on agroforestry, an increasingly popular solution to challenges like climate change, food insecurity, and the biodiversity crisis. Agroforestry systems cover over a billion hectares of land worldwide.
Fish vs. forests? Madagascar’s marine conservation boom
- Inspired by early successes in marine conservation, locally controlled fisheries projects have expanded quickly along Madagascar’s 3,000-mile-long coastline over the past 15 years.
- Now that growth is poised to skyrocket, with rising interest in fisheries management and conservation from international donors, including a planned injection of more than $70 million by the World Bank.
- But the scale of funding for marine conservation has prompted concerns from both small NGOs that already work on fisheries and advocates of terrestrial conservation, who point to the uneven track record of locally controlled fisheries projects around the country.
- This is the fifth story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Carbon sequestration role of savanna soils key to climate goals
- Savannas and grasslands cover a vast area, some 20 percent of the earth’s land surface — from sub-Saharan Africa, to the Cerrado in Brazil, to North America’s heartland. They also offer an enormous and underappreciated capacity for carbon sequestration.
- However, the role of forests in storing carbon has long been emphasized over the role of savannas (and savanna soils) by international climate negotiators, resulting in policies such as REDD+ for preserving and restoring forests, with no such incentives for protecting grasslands.
- Scientists warn that the planting of trees, such as nonnative eucalyptus in Africa and Brazil, could be counterproductive in the long term, potentially contributing to climate change emissions while harming grassland biodiversity and altering ecosystems.
- As participants prepare to meet for the COP23 climate summit in Bonn, Germany next week, grassland scientists are urging that policymakers turn an eye toward savannas, and begin to develop incentives for preserving them and their carbon storing soils. More research is also needed to fully understand the role savannas can play in carbon sequestration.
Trump budget undercuts U.S. commitment to global wildlife conservation
- President Donald Trump’s proposed 2018 budget would make extensive cuts to already underfunded programs to combat wildlife trafficking and to aid African and Asian nations in protecting elephants, rhinos, tigers, pangolins and other endangered wildlife.
- Trump’s budget proposes a 32 percent across-the-board cut in U.S. foreign assistance, affecting hundreds of sustainability, health and environmental programs.
- Major cuts would come to the Department of State, USAID, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service programs.
- Congress needs to approve a 2018 budget by December, and no one knows if it will approve the president’s desired deep cuts. However, hostility from the administration and many in the GOP to wildlife programs is unlikely to go away any time soon, with more and larger reductions in years to come.
As Grauer’s gorillas cling to survival, new population found
- Since 1994, civil war has left over 5 million people dead and wildlife decimated in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Today, heavily armed militia and illegal miners prospect for “conflict minerals” needed for modern electronic devices made and sold in the U.S. and around the globe.
- Hunters have targeted Grauer’s gorillas to feed miners and militias: in just two decades, these great apes have declined by 77 percent. A 2016 survey found only 3,800 Grauer’s gorillas, the world’s largest primates, still hanging on in the most rugged parts of eastern DRC.
- The good news: a bold group of scientists, under the protection of armed rangers, has found 50 previously uncounted Grauer’s gorillas in DRC’s Maiko National Park. And more may exist within the 4,000 square-mile park.
- The bad news: the US House of Representatives voted last month to defund the “Conflict Mineral Rule,” which required US companies to report where conflict minerals, such as coltan used in cell phones and computers, were sourced. The Senate has yet to take action on the legislation.
Building conservation’s brain trust in Madagascar
- Foreigners have dominated scientific research in Madagascar, with more than 9 out of 10 publications on biodiversity led by foreigners from 1960 to 2015.
- A series of programs aimed at boosting early career Malagasy scientists is now bearing fruit as local researchers take on leadership roles in conservation.
- But Madagascar’s higher education system remains weak and deeply under-funded, so that the best chance of rigorous training and support for graduate work often comes through connections overseas.
- This is the fourth story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Amazonian manatee migration at risk from disruption by proposed dams
- Amazonian manatees (Trichechus inunguis) spend the high-water season feeding in flooded forests, but migrate to deeper permanent water bodies to see out the dry season.
- Researchers have found that as the dry season approaches, manatees time their migration out of the floodplain to avoid bottlenecks that would block their route, and doom them.
- But, the scientists warn, those bottlenecks will become far more common, and less predictable, if the hundreds of hydropower dams planned for the Amazon go forward.
- The dams, and the bottleneck problem they create, “generates profound concern for the conservation of manatees,” the scientists write.
How small is too small? The uncertain fate of Madagascar’s forest fragments
- Madagascar’s total forest cover fell by 40 percent in the second half of the 20th century, but fragmentation of the forests that remained progressed even more quickly.
- Conservation groups are working to conserve a number of small fragments. In Ankafobe, the local community has come together to reconnect three scraps of forest and defend them against fire.
- The risk that both animates this work and threatens to make it obsolete is that fire, agriculture, or other pressures could reduce the size of these fragments below some basic threshold of ecological viability.
- This is the third story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Study maps out reptiles’ ranges, completing the ‘atlas of life’
- The study’s 39 authors, from 30 institutions around the world, pulled together data on the habitats of more than 10,000 species of reptiles.
- They found little overlap with current conservation areas, many of which have used the numbers of mammal and bird species present as proxies for overall biodiversity.
- In particular, lizards and turtles aren’t afforded much protection under current schemes.
- The authors report that they’ve identified high-priority areas for conservation that protects reptile diversity, ranging from deserts in the Middle East, Africa and Australia, to grass- and scrublands in Asia and Brazil.
Trump’s global resorts put profit first, environment last, critics say
- Donald Trump’s negative environmental record in Scotland and elsewhere has conservationists concerned in Bali, where Trump firms are developing a major resort and golf facility known as Trump International Hotel & Tower Bali.
- Another resort under development, the Trump International Hotel & Tower Lido, a 700-hectare facility including a six-star luxury resort, theme park, country club, spa, villas, condos and 18-hole golf course threatens the nearby Gunung Gede Pangrango National Park, one of Java’s last virgin tropical forests.
- Mongabay looked into Trump’s claims that he is an environmentalist, winning “many, many environmental awards.” We were able to locate just two — one a local New York award, and another granted by a golf business association. The Trump Organization did not respond to requests to list Mr. Trump’s awards.
- Trump’s environmental record as president, and as a businessman, is abysmal, say critics. His attempt to defund the U.S. Energy Star program, they say, is typical of a compulsion to protect his self interest: Energy Star has given poor ratings to nearly all Trump’s hotels, which experts note has possibly impacted his bottom line.
Conservation in a weak state: Madagascar struggles with enforcement
- In the years since Madagascar’s 2009 coup d’état, the area around Ranomafana National Park has faced security threats from illegal gold miners, armed cattle rustlers, and bandits that have made it increasingly difficult to operate parts of the park.
- Elsewhere in the country illegal logging and mining, corruption, impunity and other breaches threaten to undermine conservation efforts, and limited funds make enforcement difficult.
- The problem underscores a broad challenge for conservationists across Madagascar: how to make progress on a set of environmental goals that depend fundamentally on the rule of law?
- This is the second story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Colombia, an example to world, balances conservation and development
- Colombia, under the leadership of President Juan Santos, has more than doubled its national conserved area — from 13 million hectares (50,193 square miles) in 2010, to 28.4 million hectares (109,653 square miles) today — an extraordinary achievement for any country.*
- In an exclusive interview with Mongabay, Luis Gilberto Murillo, Colombia’s minister of the environment and sustainable development, tells how that goal was achieved, and what it will take to keep those conserved lands and waters protected for all time.
- The country, first off, has a constitutional provision which assures that protected areas can’t be dismembered by future incoming administrations. The Santos administration has protected many areas that once were FARC rebel strongholds during the 50-year civil war.
- Colombia will need significant international financial assistance if it is to continue conserving land, and also enforcing protections. But, says Murillo, that is only proper since the entire world benefits from Colombia’s efforts to conserve forests, which sequester carbon.
Booming legal Amazon wildlife trade documented in new report
- Wildlife trade attention has recently focused on Africa. But a new report spotlights the brisk legal international trade in plants and animals from eight Amazon nations. The report did not look at the illegal trade, whose scope is largely unknown.
- The US$128 million industry exports 14 million animals and plants annually, plus one million kilograms by weight, including caiman and peccary skins for the fashion industry, live turtles and parrots for the pet trade, and arapaima for the food industry.
- The report authors note that such trade, conducted properly, can have benefits for national economies, for livelihoods, and even for wildlife — animals bred in captivity, for example, can provide scientists with vital data for sustaining wild populations.
- The report strongly emphasizes the need for monitoring, regulating and enforcing sustainable harvest levels of wild animals and plants if the legal trade is to continue to thrive, and if Amazonian forests and rivers are not to be emptied of their wildlife.
Amazon deforestation linked to McDonald’s and British retail giants
- British fast food restaurants and grocery chains, including Tesco, Morrisons and McDonald’s, buy their chicken from Cargill, which feeds its poultry with imported soy, much of it apparently coming from the Bolivian Amazon and Brazilian Cerrado — areas rapidly being deforested for new soy plantations.
- A decade ago, Cargill and other global commodities companies agreed to stop buying soy from the Brazilian Amazon and established a Soy Moratorium in the region.
- But a recent study showed that Cargill and other companies simply began sourcing their soy purchases from nearby areas, including the Bolivian Amazon and Brazilian Cerrado, a vast area of savanna, part of which is included in Brazil’s definition of Legal Amazonia.
- That shift has resulted in rapid deforestation in both areas; a Mighty Earth report revealed that U.S. soy distributor Cargill is a major soy buyer there. Efforts to extend the soy moratorium to the Bolivian Amazon and Brazilian Cerrado have long been opposed by Cargill, despite calls to do so by NGOs, scientists and the Brazilian environment minister.
Can community forestry deliver for Madagascar’s forests and people?
- In recent years “managed resource protected areas”— forests where local people control the use of natural resources — have sprung up across Madagascar, aiming to spark both economic development and conservation, and to include nearby communities in important decision-making.
- But the community groups managing these forests often struggle to exert real control over the landscapes they’ve been asked to protect, and complain that promised development assistance has never materialized.
- Nevertheless, proponents say the approach can succeed with the right project design, and sufficient funding and support.
- This is the first story in Mongabay’s multi-part series “Conservation in Madagascar.”
Brazil: a world champion in political and environmental devastation (commentary)
- Brazil, the fifth largest country in the world is heir to a fabulously rich heritage in its natural wealth and natural wonders.
- It is also heir to a corrupt colonial tradition that today still rewards the nation’s wealthiest most privileged elites, as they overexploit forests, rivers, soils and local communities in the name of exorbitant profits.
- These vast profits are made via intense deforestation, cattle ranching, mining, agribusiness, dam and road building and other development, with little or no regard for the wellbeing of the environment or the people.
- Brazil’s landed elites, known today as ruralists, are well protected by state and federal governments, and remain largely exempt from prosecution for crimes against the environment and public good. This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.
How effective is conservation in Madagascar? Series starts next week
- Madagascar has received more than $700 million in international funding for conservation since 1990, arrayed across more than 500 projects, yet the overall trajectory across the country still seems to be towards rapid declines in biodiversity and natural landscapes.
- “Conservation in Madagascar” is an in-depth series by Rowan Moore Gerety that digs into the reasons behind the successes and failures of conservation projects across the highly biodiverse island.
- Moore Gerety criss-crossed Madagascar this summer visiting conservation sites and speaking with Malagasy people and conservationists about their experiences.
- “Conservation in Madagascar” launches next Monday, October 2.
Andes dams could threaten food security for millions in Amazon basin
- More than 275 hydroelectric projects are planned for the Amazon basin, the majority of which could be constructed in the Andes whose rivers supply over 90 percent of the basin’s sediments and over half its nutrients.
- A new study projects huge environmental costs for six of these dams, which together will retain 900 million tons of river sediment annually, reducing supplies of phosphorus and nitrogen, and threatening fish populations and soil quality downstream.
- Accumulating sediments upstream of dams are projected to release 10 million tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year, significantly contributing to global warming, and would contaminate waters and the aquatic life they support with mercury.
- The construction of these dams should be reconsidered to preserve food security and the livelihoods of millions of people in the Amazon Basin.
Ecologist wins Heinz environment prize for airborne mapping that informs policy
- Ecologist Greg Asner of the Carnegie Airborne Observatory will receive a $250,000 award from the Heinz Family Foundation for his work to map rainforests and coral reefs around the world.
- Lawmakers and other key decision-makers use Asner’s research to guide policy in the United States, South America and Southeast Asia.
- Asner said he intends to put the funds toward marine education and outreach in Hawaii, where he began his career.
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