Amazon deforestation has a regional, not just local impact: study

It’s been well-documented that local temperatures rise in an area after the forest has been cleared. There’s no canopy to block the sun from hitting the soil directly and no trees to absorb moisture to stave off extreme heat. But could deforestation have a more regional impact, too? A new study found that deforestation in […]

Read More

Lifted sanctions on gold, oil could slow conservation efforts in Venezuela

Last month, the U.S. agreed to lift some sanctions on Venezuela in exchange for a roadmap to presidential elections, tentatively scheduled for the second half of next year. The deal required months of secret negotiations with the Nicolás Maduro regime, and involved easing restrictions on some of Venezuela’s largest industries, including oil and gas and […]

Read More

Plan to bring Mennonite farmers to Suriname sparks deforestation fears

Foreign land developers have spent the past several years working to bring Mennonite farming communities from across Latin America to Suriname with the plan of starting a series of agriculture projects — a major threat to conservation efforts in the country’s part of the Amazon Rainforest, environmentalists say. Investors from Argentina and the Netherlands launched […]

Read More

As Indonesia retakes land from developers, conservation is an afterthought

Rainforest in Sumatra. Photo credit: Rhett A. Butler / MongabayJAKARTA — Environmental activists have cautiously welcomed the Indonesian government’s move to revoke hundreds of permits for logging, plantations and mines, calling it an opportunity to conserve vast swaths of forest. The affected concessions include Ministry of Environment and Forestry permits for 192 logging, plantation, mining and ecotourism operations, totaling 3.13 million hectares (7.73 million […]

Read More

Mongabay’s top Amazon stories from 2021

Fire line moves through a degraded forest area in an undesignated public forest area in Porto Velho, Rondônia on July 29, 2021. Photo © Christian Braga / GreenpeaceThe world’s greatest tropical rainforest continued to come under pressure in 2021, due largely to the policies of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. Deforestation rates hit a 15-year-high, while fires flared up again, combining to turn Brazil’s portion of the Amazon into a net carbon source for the first time ever. But the rainforest as a […]

Read More