Conservation news feed

- The recent killing of a forest officer by illegal quarriers in Bangladesh has raised questions about the effectiveness of law enforcement amid intensifying encroachment into protected forests.- Sajjaduzzaman, 30, was struck by the quarriers’ truck after confronting them for digging up a hillside in the southern district of Cox’s Bazar.- Attacks on forest officers by people illegally logging, quarrying, hunting or carrying out other forms of natural resource extraction are a long-running problem, with around 140 officers attacked over the past five years.- Experts have called for a more coordinated approach from various government law enforcement agencies to support the Forest Department in keeping encroachers out of protected areas.

- The many environmental, social, and health impacts of extracting minerals that power renewable energy, mobile phones and electric vehicles need more debate and detailed media coverage, an Indigenous rights activist and journalist say on the podcast.- Mongabay speaks with Galina Angarova, Indigenous executive director of the SIRGE Coalition, and environmental journalist Ian Morse about critical questions to ask about the demand for certain minerals and who benefits from their extraction.- Research indicates as much as 54% of all transition minerals are on or near Indigenous land, however, no nation has properly implemented the protocols of Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC), a framework that’s key to ensuring that local communities are aware of, benefit from – and especially are not harmed by – such activities.- The risk of global supply chain disruptions due to the concentration of minerals in relatively few countries, or the potential formation of cartels restricting their supply, adds further complexity to the situation, the two podcast guests say.

- Many of India’s more than 4 million fishers are sailing beyond the country’s exclusive economic zone into the high seas in search of a better catch.- Rising sea surface temperatures, overfishing near the shore, and the destruction of reefs have decimated nearshore fisheries, forcing India’s fishers farther out to sea where they face greater risk.- A common danger they run is straying into the waters of another country, which can lead to their boats being seized and the crew being jailed or even killed.- The Indian government has issued policies to protect and recover nearshore fish stocks, even as it encourages fishing in the high seas.

- In 2020, over 40 Kichwa women began organizing themselves to defend their territory and expel mining from the Ecuadorian Amazon. This is how Yuturi Warmi, the first Indigenous guard led by women in the region, began.- María José Andrade Cerda, one of the leaders of Yuturi Warmi, explains that Indigenous women have an integral vision for territorial defense. Accordingly, Yuturi Warmi’s work includes not only physically guarding and overseeing their territory but also the defense of their culture, ancestrality, language, education, and health.- In May 2023, María José Andrade Cerda spoke with Mongabay Latam about how they organize themselves and the challenges that women face when defending their territory.

- Researcher Shyam Thapa, who recently completed his Ph.D. in ecology, highlights flaws in traditional grassland management methods, particularly in Bardiya National Park.- Thapa’s findings suggest the need for improved grassland management to enhance the health and numbers of tiger prey species.- He emphasizes the importance of tailored management approaches based on grassland functionality.- Implementing his study’s recommendations could potentially increase herbivore numbers in tiger habitats, reducing human-wildlife conflicts, Thapa says.

- The number of fires shows no signs of easing as Brazil’s Roraima faces unprecedented blazes, and several Amazonian countries, including Guyana, Suriname and Venezuela, registered record-high outbreaks in the first quarter this year.- Fire outbreaks in primary (old-growth) forest in Brazil’s Amazon soared by 152% in 2023, according to a recent study, rising from 13,477 in 2022 to 34,012 in 2023.- Fires in the mature forest regions are the leading drivers of degradation of the Amazon Rainforest because the biome hasn’t evolved to adapt to such blazes, according to the researchers.- The fires are a result of a drought that has been fueled by climate change and worsened by natural weather phenomena, such as El Niño, which has intensified dry conditions already aggravated by high temperatures across the world, experts say.

- Lawyers for Indonesia’s main Indigenous alliance have initiated legal proceedings against the government for its failure to pass a long-awaited bill on Indigenous rights.- The suit seeks to compel Indonesia’s parliament to expedite passage of the bill, which has remained deadlocked for more than a decade amid intransigence by elected representatives.- “It still needs to be discussed,” a senior parliamentarian from the Golkar party said earlier this month.- However, few expect any progress over the next few months, with a new parliament to be sworn in on Oct. 1 and a new president on Oct. 20.

- Emerging research shows that plant-based plastics — just like petroleum-based plastics — contain many thousands of synthetic chemicals, with large numbers of them extremely toxic. However, the bioplastics industry strongly denies that bio-based plastics contain hazardous substances.- Scientists are finding that while plant sources for bioplastics, such as corn or cane sugar, may not themselves be toxic or have adverse health impacts, the chemical processes to manufacture bioplastics and the many performance additives needed to give them their attributes (hardness, flexibility, color, etc.) can be quite toxic.- Those doing the research no longer see bioplastics as a solution to the global plastic pollution crisis and would like to see them regulated. However, a very large number of petroleum-based plastics and the chemicals they contain also lack tough government oversight.- This week, representatives from the world’s nations gather for a fourth session to hammer out an international treaty to curb the global plastic pollution crisis. The High Ambition Coalition (including 65 countries) hopes to achieve a binding global ban on the worst toxins in plastics. But the U.S., China and other nations are resisting.

- A recent meeting of the intergovernmental body that manages fisheries in the North Pacific Ocean failed to confer new protections for the Emperor Seamount Chain, a massive and richly biodiverse set of underwater mountains south of the Aleutian Islands.- Bottom trawlers plied the Emperors aggressively in the past, decimating deep-sea coral communities and fish stocks.- A proposal by the U.S. and Canadian delegations at the meeting of the North Pacific Fisheries Commission (NPFC) would have temporarily paused the limited trawling that continues there today, but failed to reach a vote.- The NPFC did pass a separate proposal to regulate fishing of the Pacific saury (Cololabis saira), a severely depleted silvery fish that Japanese people traditionally eat in the fall.

- Following widespread protests, Uttarakhand’s Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami has issued orders to district magistrates to deny permission to sell agricultural lands to those outside the state.- With just 14% of its land designated for agriculture and more than 65% of the population relying on agriculture, calls for legislation to safeguard residents’ land rights have intensified.- With a lack of comprehensive, updated land records, monitoring the usage of farmlands for nonagricultural purposes has become challenging.- Lack of employment opportunities and resources as well as shifting weather patterns and climate change have pushed numerous farmers to sell their land holdings.

- A paper trail left by a notorious land grabber reveals how he used relatives and an employee as fronts to evade environmental fines and lawsuits, shedding light on this widespread practice in the Brazilian Amazon.- Fronts prevent the real criminals from having their assets seized to pay for environmental fines, besides consuming time and resources from the authorities, who spend years trying to prove who the real financier of the deforestation is.- Experts say it’s best to go after environmental offenders where it hurts the most, by seizing their assets, rather than to chase down their true identity.- This investigation is part of a partnership between Mongabay and Repórter Brasil.

- Every winter, monarch butterflies from across eastern North America migrate to the mountain forests in Mexico, but those forests are threatened by the rapidly expanding avocado industry.- Avocado production in Mexico is tied to deforestation, water hoarding and violence, and much of the resulting crop is exported to the U.S.- Conservation groups are urging the U.S. State Department, USDA and USTR to ban imports of avocados from recently deforested lands in Mexico.- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

- On March 13, the Bangladesh forest department tagged satellite transmitters on two saltwater crocodiles for the first time in Asia and released them in the Sundarbans waters.- So far, four saltwater crocodiles — three from captivity and one from the wild — have been tagged and the preparation is in place to tag more.- The forest department has already started collecting data using the satellite transmitters to understand the crocodile’s habits in this ecosystem and identify nesting its hotspots, ecology, mortality rate and habitat range.- Experts say the satellite data will play an important role in crocodile conservation in Bangladesh, where the species is critically endangered, and will help the authorities make proper conservation management plans to protect it.

- A new study from Indonesia’s Leuser forests challenges the traditional use of charismatic “umbrella species” like tigers and rhinos to represent ecosystem biodiversity.- Researchers found that focusing on these well-known species neglects other important wildlife and may not accurately represent overall biodiversity.- Instead, the study proposes a data-driven approach using camera-trap data to identify the most suitable umbrella species based on their association with higher levels of community occupancy and diversity.- The study identified the sambar deer and Sunda clouded leopard as better umbrella species than tigers and rhinos in the Leuser Ecosystem, highlighting the need for a more comprehensive approach to wildlife conservation that includes multiple species, not just the most charismatic ones.

- Recent camera-trap images of a Javan rhino calf, estimated to be 3-5 months old in March, demonstrate that the species continues to reproduce despite being beset by challenges.- The species is confined to a single habitat, and while its population is officially estimated at more than 70 individuals, a report last year cast doubt on those figures, alleging that 18 of those rhinos had not been spotted on camera for years.- The peninsula of Ujung Kulon National Park, where all Javan rhinos live, has been closed to all visitors since September 2023 after poaching activity was detected.

- The 9th Our Ocean Conference (OOC) took place in Athens from April 15-17.- Government, NGO and philanthropic delegates made 469 new commitments worth more than $11.3 billion to help protect the oceans, which was lower than in previous years.- While some conference hosts and attendees celebrated the many successes of the OOC, there was also a shared concern that decision-makers aren’t moving fast enough to secure a sustainable future for the global ocean.

- The state of Pará has created two new conservation areas along the Amazonian coastline, placing almost all of its mangroves under federal protection.- The two reserves mean that an additional 74,700 hectares (184,600 acres) have been included in the largest and most conserved continuous belt of mangroves on the planet.- The process to create the reserves took more than 13 years and faced several setbacks; the final outcome has been celebrated by environmentalists as a victory for local communities and biodiversity.- The new extractive reserves allow resident populations to engage in traditional and sustainable extractive practices such as fishing and hunting, while keeping out big businesses, such as commercial aquaculture or logging.

- Mindanao, the Philippines’ second largest island group, has a troubled history of conflict dating back to the Spanish colonial era in the 16th century.- A recent study of Mindanao found that higher levels of both state and non-state conflict correlated with reduced biodiversity and forest cover.- The security problems associated with conflict also mean there are gaps in knowledge about the biodiversity of conflict-affected areas, and difficulties in implementing and monitoring programs to protect natural resources.

- 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.

- Forest clearing detected by Brazil’s deforestation alert system fell to the lowest level in nearly five years.- According to data released last week by the country’s space agency, INPE, deforestation registered over the past twelve months amounts to 4,816 square kilometers, 53% below the level this time last year.- The drop in deforestation has occurred despite a severe drought affecting much of the Amazon basin.