forestdestruction
By Maxwell Radwin Indigenous communities across Brazil have suffered a wave of violence in recent weeks as the country reconsiders a controversial law that makes it harder to claim ancestral territory. The Supreme Court is studying a law that only recognizes territorial rights for Indigenous people if they occupied the land after a certain date. But critics say it delegitimizes many land claims and fuels conflicts with farmers, ranchers and private developers who see an opportunity to expand. “The right to traditionally occupied territory is an original right secured by the 1988 federal consti...
Mongabay
By Hans Nicholas Jong JAKARTA — The Indonesian government is working on improving and synchronizing its forest and supply chain data to comply with increasingly strict sustainability standards and requirements in markets where it exports to, including the European Union. Earlier this year, the Indonesian government discovered discrepancies between the forest map and data that it uses, and those used by the EU as a reference for the implementation of the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR). The EUDR bans imports of seven forest-related commodities — soy, palm oil, coffee, cocoa, timb...
Mongabay
By Maxwell Radwin A series of recently published data is shining a new light on patterns of deforestation in the Amazon, revealing where crops, cattle ranching and mining are encroaching on the rainforest. Several monitoring organizations — including the Spatial Production Allocation Model (SPAM), the Atlas of Pastures and Amazon Mining Watch — have released or updated satellite data and visualization tools this year that show what kinds of crops are being grown, where cattle ranching overlaps with other kinds of land use and how much of the rainforest is being cleared for mining. “We’re seein...
Mongabay
By Claire Asher The Amazon’s most fertile, productive forests, which are critical for supplying Brazil’s agricultural region with rainfall, are also the most vulnerable to drought, according to recent research that has mapped drought resilience across the basin. An international team of researchers analyzed 20 years of satellite data to understand why some forests might be more resilient to drought than others and focused on the underlying mechanisms behind different responses of forests across the basin. The study, published in Nature, used water-table depth, soil fertility and tree height to...
Mongabay
By Maxwell Radwin The lead up to Venezuela’s presidential election, scheduled for this Sunday, July 28, hasn’t been about the candidates’ experience or the viability of their policies. The focus has been on whether the elections will look anything close to free and fair. Critics have expressed concern about the disqualification of opposition candidates and the absence of outside electoral observers. President Nicolás Maduro is running for a third consecutive term despite overwhelming opposition to his regime, which came to power in 2013 as the successor to Hugo Chávez. This time around, Maduro...
Mongabay
By Daniel Shailer SAHUARIPA, Mexico — Where saguaro cacti give way to palm trees, some 130 miles south of the U.S. border, a small ranching town is quietly obsessed with jaguars (Panthera onca). Jaguar murals adorn walls, and local ranchers, usually demure and mustachioed, treasure their printouts of big cats caught on camera traps. Sahuaripa is the nearest town to the Northern Jaguar Reserve, 22,600 hectares (56,000 acres) of protected, privately owned land, where trail cameras have captured more than a dozen jaguars padding through the very northernmost reach of their range at any one time. ...
Mongabay
By Hans Nicholas Jong JAKARTA — Activists allege that two of the world’s biggest pulp and paper companies have violated their zero-deforestation pledge by clearing natural forests and peatlands in Indonesia. An investigation by a coalition of Indonesian NGOs found deforestation within and around the concessions of Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) and Asia Pacific Resources International Holdings Ltd. (APRIL) on the island of Sumatra. In the case of APRIL, the coalition alleged that two of its concessions had cleared natural forests and destroyed peatlands, with some of their activities suspected to hav...
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By Maxwell Radwin A lawsuit has temporarily stalled construction on a controversial highway project in north-central Panama, which allegedly bypassed environmental regulations and could damage several protected areas along the Caribbean coast. The highway, known as the “Caribbean Corridor,” is supposed to travel 28.4 kilometers (17.6 miles) from the towns of Quebrada Ancha to María Chiquita, with the goal of increasing tourism and local commerce on the coast of Colón province. But the highway would also pass by three protected areas and didn’t carry out adequate studies to make sure they won’t...
Mongabay
By Hans Nicholas Jong JAKARTA — NGOs working with Indonesian smallholder farmers have developed a set of guidelines aimed at helping oil palm farmers prove that their products are deforestation-free, allowing them a foothold in markets increasingly demanding sustainably produced goods. Launched on June 24, the deforestation-free smallholder toolkit, the first of its kind, is a participatory step-by-step guide for smallholder groups to protect their forests and cultivate their lands in a sustainable manner. To implement the toolkit, smallholders will have to go through six steps, beginning with...
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By Maxwell Radwin Suriname has some of the largest, most intact rainforests in the world. The Amazon covers around 93% of its surface area, making it one of the only countries with a net-negative carbon footprint. But at the same time, timber and mining concessions are expanding through the forest, with multinational companies moving in on Indigenous lands. Despite its environmental track record, Suriname is still the only country in South America that hasn’t formally recognized the territorial rights of Indigenous and Maroon peoples trying to conserve the rainforest. Years of legal challenges...
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