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Attracted by bait, sea turtles off the coast of southern Peru often get caught on fishing hooks intended for mahi-mahi. Releasing the turtles is complicated as they’re heavy animals, and some try to defend themselves from humans by flapping their flippers and biting. “It gives me great satisfaction to release them,” says Gustavo Rosales, a fisher from the city of Ilo. “If it weren’t for the turtles, there would be no balance. Everything is in a chain.” Rosales is one of 4,472 Peruvian fishers who have been trained by the government in best practices for releasing turtles, seabirds and other animals unintentionally caught by fishing gear, better known as bycatch. A hawksbill turtle, one of the species fishers have tried to rescue and release in southern Peru. Image courtesy of WWF. The training workshops, held along the country’s coastline, began in 2022 to implement a regulation aimed at the mahi-mahi (Coryphaena hippurus) fishery. The regulation requires that at least one crew member per boat has obtained a training certificate. Jesús Nieves, general director of technical development and training in artisanal fishing at the National Fund for Fisheries Development (FONDEPES), says there are approximately 4,500 fishing boats targeting mahi-mahi, with about one trained crew member per boat at present. The goal is to reach 10,000 trained fishers, so the workshops are ongoing. Gustavo Rosales during a training workshop aimed at implementing the regulation for the mahi-mahi fishery. Image courtesy of Prodelphinus Perú. Rosales says the training not only raises awareness among…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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The movie Jaws, released on June 20, 1975, was one of the very first Hollywood summer blockbusters, and remains one of the highest-grossing films of all time, adjusted for inflation. Its dramatic tension comes from a series of attacks by a massive shark in a fictional New England beach town. And yet, in the last 50 years, it’s the sharks that have been under attack: Sharks’ global abundance, along with closely related species, has declined by more than 70% since 1970, according to a 2021 study in the journal Nature. About one-third of sharks and closely related species are now threatened. Experts have different views on how much of this decline can be attributed to a single film, but even skeptics of Jaws’ role agree that it misrepresented the nature of sharks and likely had a net negative impact, however small, on their population sizes and conservation status. “It legitimized the killing of sharks, and … delegitimized any thoughts or concerns for the conservation of sharks,” Nick Dulvy, a professor of marine biodiversity at Simon Fraser University in Canada and a leading shark expert, told Mongabay. Dulvy, a co-author of the 2021 study, said Jaws was “probably an enormous” factor in the decline in global shark populations of the last half-century. A Jaws poster hangs in the Living Sharks Museum in Rhode Island in 2024. Universal Pictures spent $1.8 million marketing the film Jaws, which was among the very first summer blockbusters. Photo by Rebecca Kessler. Negative impacts The film…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives and story summaries. Conservation efforts often falter on the fault line between ecological ambition and human reality. A new initiative in southern Tanzania seeks to bridge that divide, reports contributor Ryan Truscott for Mongabay. The Udzungwa Landscape Strategy (ULS), launched in late 2023, is a 20-year plan to safeguard one of Africa’s most biodiverse mountain regions — not just by protecting its forests and wildlife, but by investing in the people who live among them. The Udzungwa Mountains, part of the Eastern Arc range, are famed for their endemic species, including the shaggy-haired kipunji monkey (Rungwecebus kipunji), the elusive Sanje mangabey (Cercocebus sanjei), and the once-extinct-in-the-wild Kihansi spray toad (Nectophrynoides asperginis). But they have also suffered centuries of forest loss driven by agriculture, logging and plantation expansion. Conservationists now aim not merely to slow deforestation, but to reverse it. At the heart of the strategy lies a shift in priorities: more than half of ULS’s projected $3 million annual budget is earmarked for community development and reducing human-wildlife conflict. Villages surrounding the protected areas will receive performance-based payments to curb forest loss and poaching. Village savings groups will offer residents access to capital for businesses and essentials like school fees. Fuel-efficient stoves, already distributed in five villages, aim to cut both household costs and pressure on local forests. Such community-focused approaches can be pragmatic as well as ethical, say supporters. “Safeguarding these precious forests whilst guaranteeing…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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As Linda Alvarado, a young Indigenous Yine leader, travels through the forest in the depths of the Peruvian Amazon, she collects clusters of murumuru seeds. These honeycomb-shaped structures fall from the Astrocaryum murumuru palms that reach heights of up to 10 meters (33 feet). Alvarado and her “sisters,” what she calls the other women from the community of Monte Salvado in the Madre de Dios region, use these seeds to craft necklaces and bracelets bearing the script of the Yine people. The Yine are an Amazonian Indigenous people from southern Peru. Since precolonial times they’ve traveled to exchange products with other Amazonian and Andean communities. The community of Monte Salvado, where Alvarado lives, borders Madre de Dios Territorial Reserve and is also within the buffer zone of Alto Purús National Park. Both protected areas are home to Indigenous peoples choosing to live in isolation. Over the past 20 years, sightings of these isolated communities have increased. One of the most recent sightings was in October 2024, when a group of about 100 members of the Mashco-Piro, an uncontacted Indigenous community, intercepted a boat whose passengers included Jorge Hernani Alvarado, the protection agent for FENAMAD, an association of Indigenous groups from the Madre de Dios region. Jorge is also the brother of Linda Alvarado. The murumuru palm forest in the community of Monte Salvado. Image courtesy of Cristina Soto for FZS Peru. “The Mashco-Piro are forced to move to other territories because illegal loggers are invading their land and affecting their…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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For the first time in six years, an elephant was seen in Senegal’s Niokolo-Koba National Park. Grainy black-and-white footage shows Ousmane, a bull 35 to 40 years old named after a park ranger, in the forest at night, stopping to look at the camera trap that recorded his presence. Ousmane hadn’t been seen since 2019. At the time, just five to 10 elephants remained out of the hundreds that once roamed there. With no recorded sightings for years, conservationists questioned whether any were left there. “[This video] reignited hope that elephants are in the park,” said Philipp Henschel, regional director for West Africa and Central Africa for the conservation nonprofit Panthera, which installed the cameras in Niokolo-Koba National Park in partnership with Senegal’s National Parks Directorate. “He might not be the last elephant currently alive in this ecosystem.” Henschel added that Ousmane is a hybrid, his ancestry a mix of critically endangered African forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis) and savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana). https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/17113910/Ousmane.mp4.mp4 Ousmane, the bull elephant that was captured by the camera trap in Niokolo-Koba National Park recently. Video courtesy of Panthera. Elephants’ demise across the region, and the continent, began during the colonial era. Intensive poaching for ivory, combined with disappearing habitat, decimated West African herds. Niokolo-Koba’s elephants were hit hard, dwindling from a few hundred in the 1960s to fewer than 10. Other wildlife numbers also declined so dramatically that UNESCO added Niokolo-Koba to the World Heritage in Danger List. But conservation and monitoring programs launched in…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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“The journalist should not be part of the story.” Jonathan Watts, British journalist based in Brazil, recalls the words of fellow British journalist Dom Phillips and the challenges they posed to finish his posthumous book. “Dom was not the kind of journalist who wanted to be in the story. He told me, ‘I don’t like this journalism where I did this and I did that.’” On June 5, 2022, Phillips and Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira were brutally killed in the Javari Valley region, in the Brazilian Amazon; Phillips was investigating illegal fishing in the region for his book. How to save the Amazon: A journalist’s fatal quest for answers, by Phillips with contributors, is being launched in the United Kingdom, the United States and Brazil, accompanied by dedicated events in the three countries. Watts, The Guardian’s global environment editor and a close friend of Phillips’, led a group of expert writers to finish Phillips’ book. “The really big challenge was how do we balance Dom’s original intentions with the reality that the world has changed and that the story has changed partly because Bruno and Dom were murdered changed the story, they became part of the story,” Watts, who wrote a chapter for Philips’ book, tells Mongabay in a video interview. “In this case, the story was so big, what happened to them, that we could not not write about it.” Despite Phillips’ “in some ways old fashioned or old school” way of thinking about never including the journalist in the…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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In September 2024, the government of the Amazonian state of Pará signed a $180 million contract to sell 12 million carbon credits to international buyers, including companies such as Amazon, Bayer, H&M Group and the Walmart Foundation. The deal, which involves credits generated through Pará’s jurisdictional REDD+ program, made headlines as the world’s largest carbon credit sale to date. Nine months later, the contract, brokered by the nonprofit Emergent on behalf of corporate buyers, is being legally challenged in the Brazilian Federal Court and could be canceled altogether. On June 3, Brazil’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office filed a lawsuit seeking to nullify the agreement and demanding 200 million reais ($36 million) in moral damages for local communities. The lawsuit came after prosecutors raised a series of issues regarding the program and an attempted conciliation between the parties, to no avail. A federal judge has since shut down the request for an injunction, but the case is ongoing. The lawsuit alleges that the Pará government engaged in the advance sale of carbon credits — a violation of Brazil’s new legislation for the carbon market. The law enacted in 2024 established a set of rules to prevent the double-counting of credits when multiple projects are located in the same area. Felipe de Moura Palha e Silva, head of the Public Prosecutors’ Office in Pará, told Mongabay there is no question the contract constitutes a presale. The document lays out specific sale terms, including the volume of emissions reductions, a fixed price and a…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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JAVA — Indonesia. Throughout the misty mountains of central Java, the call of the Javan gibbon (Hylobates moloch) once echoed throughout the forest. Today, their voices are fading. Java is one of the most densely populated regions on Earth, and decades of logging, agriculture and infrastructure development have fragmented the forest, while rampant hunting and the illegal pet trade have also taken their toll. With only an estimated 4,000 Javan gibbons left in the wild, they are now listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List. Many of the remaining populations have been left stranded in disconnected patches of forest, unable to move without uninterrupted canopy cover. Conservationists warn this isolation makes them vulnerable to disease and limits their ability to find mates, leading to inbreeding. To address this, local NGO SwaraOwa has been working with local communities to reconnect these isolated areas of forest. By planting “forest corridors,” stretches of native trees that link up isolated forest blocks, they hope to provide a green pathway for gibbons to find their way back into larger areas of forest, and the other gibbons that live there. The corridors not only allow the gibbons to move, but also support countless other species that depend on Java’s forest ecosystems. SwaraOwa believes working with the local community is the key to success. Young farmers in Medolo village have taken the lead in growing native seedlings and restoring key areas between forests. As trees begin to take root and corridors expand, conservationists and locals alike…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives and story summaries. In the summer of 2024, searing ocean temperatures devastated much of Mesoamerica’s corals. But in Honduras’s Tela Bay, a reef known as Cocalito remains improbably intact — dominated by elkhorn corals so robust they scrape the water’s surface. The survival of this reef is baffling. Elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata), once common across the Caribbean, has declined by up to 98% in many areas due to warming seas, disease and pollution. Yet in Tela Bay, fed by a river heavy with fertilizer and waste, these corals not only endure, they flourish. Scientists have taken notice, reports contributor Fritz Pinnow for Mongabay. A team from the University of Miami in the U.S., suspecting the corals harbor heat-resistant algae or unique genetic traits, collected samples to crossbreed with Florida’s nearly extinct elkhorns. Early findings suggest Cocalito’s coral hosts an unusually resilient symbiont. Still, results are preliminary, and other theories abound. Some point to environmental quirks. Coastal currents may shield Cocalito from sedimentation and heat. Others cite human behavior: the reef’s shallow waters deter fishers, perhaps allowing a healthier ecological balance to persist. Whatever the explanation, Cocalito’s persistence stands in stark contrast to the regional picture. Tela Bay’s other reefs were not spared from the global bleaching event, now affecting 84% of reefs worldwide. Local conservationists have long been working to mitigate stressors — fighting pollution, managing tourism and monitoring reef health — but even they are…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Which provides more shelter for species biodiversity: a large, continuous tract of forest, or a number of small forest fragments that add up to the same land area? This question has divided the scientific community for more than 50 years, and a recently published study led by a Brazilian scientist has brought the topic back to the table. “It’s a debate dating back to the 1970s when researchers were trying to define the best way to plan conservation units [protected areas] so they would protect biodiversity,” says Thiago Gonçalves-Souza, a biologist at the University of Michigan, U.S., who authored the study together with more than two dozen other researchers from eight different countries. Some scientists say a region with many small forest fragments can be just as rich or richer in species diversity than a single large tract of forest. This is because each of these fragments has unique characteristics that favor the development of the different species living there. When added together, the sum is greater than that found in a large, continuous green space. “Those who defend this thesis say that, even with the loss of species on a local scale, the increase in heterogeneity between the different fragments would increase biodiversity in that region overall,” Gonçalves-Souza says. Very few large tracts of the Atlantic Rainforest remain, making it one of Brazil’s most deforested biomes. Image courtesy of Zig Koch/Fundação SOS Mata Atlântica. However, his study supports the hypothesis that conservation of large tracts of forests is actually…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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In response to rising human-elephant conflicts, Bangladesh is planning to declare the elephant habitats in its northeastern parts a protected area for the species. The country is one of the few where Indian elephants (Elephas maximus indicus) are found, with an estimated wild population of 268 resident elephants, all in the southern districts. The IUCN declared the species critically endangered within Bangladesh, where they primarily inhabit the southern hilly forests, and also the northeastern parts. The elephants of the northeastern habitat are considered “non-residents,” which weren’t counted in the census: They migrated from neighboring India’s Meghalaya state a few years ago as they’ve done for generations, but they haven’t been able to return since 2019 due to the closed elephant passage at the international border installed and maintained by India. Consequently, the trapped elephants roam the region in search of food through the seasons. Conflicts between humans and elephants thus rose over the years. Following a story about the crisis published by Mongabay on March 12 this year, the Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change (MoEFCC) sent a team of forest officials and experts to visit the region and subsequently made the decision to declare the zone “protected.” Syeda Rizwana Hasan, advisor to the ministry told Mongabay, “I personally visited the area on May 26, to understand the gravity of the situation. Initially, we are working on declaring the area as protected and finding ways to reduce conflicts and damages. At the same time, we will continue to talk…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Prochlorococcus, a genus of bacteria that’s key to oxygen production in the ocean, tends to disappear when faced with marine pollution. It lives throughout the sunlit layer of tropical oceans and, while it doesn’t necessarily play a key role in coral biology, its abundance is a sign of a healthy coral reef ecosystem. A growing number of scientists are studying it and other microorganisms to keep tabs on reef health. Two marine scientists explain the “why” and the “how” of microbial-based reef monitoring, which is still relatively rare, in a paper published May 23 in the journal Cell Reports Sustainability. Lead author Amy Apprill, an associate scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, a nonprofit research center in the United States, said this kind of monitoring is part of a larger effort to protect reefs. “Coral reefs are in decline worldwide, and I’m one of many scientists trying to do everything we can to help them, and so we were excited to put this article together because we think it’s an important way to examine the health of reefs,” Apprill told Mongabay. Apprill said the paper is aimed at coral reef conservation practitioners and managers. She’s given talks on the subject for the last two years, and a journal editor commissioned the paper after hearing her speak. She said the message of the talks is, “You all should think about using reef water microbes to understand more about what’s going on at your reef sites.” Amy Apprill collecting water in St.…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Previous reports of drastic declines in the elusive angelshark in Wales, U.K., may be overestimated and may be partly explained by changes in fishing trends throughout the past decades, according to a recent study. The angelshark (Squatina squatina), listed as critically endangered on the IUCN Red List in 2006, is a bottom-dwelling shark that can grow up to 2.4 meters (8 feet) long. It was once a common predator in the sandy habitats of the Northeast Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea and Black Sea. However, over the past 50 years, the shark is reported to have declined dramatically in Wales — by as much as 70% between 1970 and 2016 — as it would often be caught as bycatch in nets used on the seabed to catch shellfish and other bottom-dwelling animals. Most data on the angelshark have come from chance encounters with it as bycatch, the authors write. But it is important to consider how socioeconomic fishing practices have evolved and influenced historical sightings and records of the angelshark, they add. To address this, researchers from the Zoological Society of London (ZSL), Natural Resources Wales and Welsh fishing organizations interviewed 27 Welsh commercial, recreational and charter fishers who actively fished within the Welsh Zone between 1968 and 2019. All of them recalled catching angelsharks incidentally, sometimes while fishing for thornback rays (Raja clavata), before the year 2000. One fisher told the researchers that angelsharks were a “nuisance” since they didn’t have commercial value and would damage fishing gear. However, over…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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The climate crisis demands urgent action by governments to reduce emissions and to transition to new renewable energy systems for people. This means that fossil fuel corporations must be forced to stop polluting and end their decades of destruction. I am writing this from the heart of the Ecuadorian Amazon, where the struggle of Indigenous and frontline communities offers a warning to the world: there is a dark legacy of devastation caused by the fossil fuel industry that must not be forgotten. Climate justice cannot be achieved so long as corporate impunity reigns. Chevron’s crimes in Ecuador are well documented. For nearly four decades, the transnational corporation extracted oil from our lands with utter disregard for life, intentionally dumping more than 60 billion liters (16 billion gallons) of toxic waste into rivers and leaving 880 open pits of poison across 480 hectares (nearly 1,200 acres) of rainforest. The company made tens of billions in profits from this devastation, and when it finally seemed like it was going to be held accountable, packed up and fled the country. Chevron on the run After years of legal struggle led by affected communities, Ecuador’s courts ordered Chevron to pay $9.5 billion to clean up its mess and compensate those harmed. Instead of honoring the ruling, Chevron launched a global campaign to escape accountability — one that reveals how today’s legal and financial systems are rigged to serve corporate interests, not human rights. Chevron has filed dozens of retaliatory lawsuits against Indigenous leaders, lawyers,…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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This is part five of a series on the operation to evict illegal gold miners from Munduruku Indigenous territories. Read part one, part two, part three, and part four. “We’re sicker than before.” This is how Indigenous leader Hidelmara Kirixi described health conditions in Munduruku communities despite the Brazilian government’s recent raids to halt illegal mining that caused widespread mercury contamination. “Pregnant women are no longer able to have a child by normal delivery because of this.” A wide range of diseases linked to pollution and ecological destruction caused by illegal gold mining spread in her community in the Amazonian state of Pará, she said. They include diarrhea, itchiness, flu, fever, childhood paralysis and brain problems. “Children are also born with these diseases,” Kirixi, one of the coordinators of the Wakoborũn Munduruku Women’s Association, told Mongabay in a video interview. In November 2024, the federal government launched an operation to oust illegal gold miners from the Munduruku Indigenous Territory. Authorities destroyed 90 mining camps, 15 vessels, 27 units of heavy machinery and 224 motorized pumps, and imposed fines totalling 24.2 million reais ($4.3 million). However, there was little government action to address the health issues in the aftermath of the destruction wrought by the gold mines, Indigenous leaders and experts say. “They didn’t bring any public policies to the territory, they didn’t bring health [programs], they didn’t bring food, they didn’t bring anything,” Alessandra Korap, a Munduruku leader and president of the Pariri Indigenous Association, told Mongabay on the sidelines…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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GENEVA (AP) — Swiss authorities cleared a village in the country’s east over a potential rockslide, three weeks after a mudslide submerged a vacated village in the southwest. Residents of Brienz/Brinzauls, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of Davos, were being barred from entering the village because a rock mass on a plateau overhead has “accelerated so rapidly that it threatens to collapse,” a statement from local officials said Monday. Farm work in the area was also being halted, and livestock owners moved their animals out of nearby pastures due to early warning signs on Sunday. Authorities said the region is closely monitored by early-warning systems in the town, which is no stranger to such evacuations: Villagers had been ordered out of Brienz/Brinzauls in November and in June two years ago — before a huge mass of rock tumbled down the mountain, narrowly missing the village. The mountain and the rocks on it have been moving since the last Ice Age. While glacier melt has affected the precariousness of the rocks over millennia, local authorities say melting glaciers due to “man-made” climate change in recent decades hasn’t been a factor. The centuries-old village straddles German- and Romansch-speaking parts of the eastern Graubünden region and sits at an altitude of about 1,150 meters (about 3,800 feet). Today, it has under 100 residents. Banner image: View of the village Brienz and the “Brienzer Rutsch”, taken in Brienz-Brinzauls, Switzerland, May 12, 2023. (AP Photo/Arnd Wiegmann, File).This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Roughly a billion people enjoy coffee daily, and more than 100 million people rely on it for income. However, the coffee industry is the sixth-largest driver of deforestation and is also rife with human rights abuses, including the labor of enslaved persons and children. But it doesn’t have to be this way, says this guest on the Mongabay Newscast. Etelle Higonnet is the founder of the NGO Coffee Watch, having formerly served as a senior adviser at the U.S. National Wildlife Federation with a focus on curbing deforestation, and before that as campaign director at Mighty Earth, focusing on advocacy for zero deforestation with an emphasis on the cocoa, palm oil, rubber, cattle and soy industries. The main commodity on her radar now is coffee. On this podcast episode, she explains how the industry can — and should — reform its practices. “It’s so simple … pay a living [a] living income wage,” she says, “ and a lot of human rights violations will just dry up.” To target deforestation, Higonnet says the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is “a beautiful law” that “simply put, would bar imports of coffee into the European Union if that coffee is tainted by deforestation or illegality. So, two things that are illegal off the top of my head are slavery and child labor.” The bill is perhaps the first of its kind to target illegality linked to coffee, which has historically been absent from similar legislation targeting other commodities such as palm oil, timber…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study says climate change has tripled the frequency of atmospheric wave events linked to extreme summer weather in the last 75 years. And the research indicates that may explain why long-range computer forecasts keep underestimating the surge in killer heat waves, droughts and floods. Monday’s study says that in the 1950s, Earth averaged about one extreme weather-inducing planetary wave event a summer. But now it’s getting about three each summer. Planetary waves are connected to 2021’s deadly and unprecedented Pacific Northwest heat wave and wildfires, the 2010 Russian heatwave and Pakistan flooding and the 2003 killer European heatwave. Reporting by Seth Borenstein, Associated Press Banner image: Survivors wade through water in their village Khairpur Nathan Shah, Pakistan, on Nov. 2, 2010, which is surrounded by floodwaters. (AP Photo/Shakil Adil, File)This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Glaciers melting rapidly, fields of moss expanding, water streaming off ice shelves once frozen solid: these are just a few of the impacts of climate change observed by a team of 57 researchers during a 70-day voyage around the Antarctic coast on the Russian icebreaker Akademik Tryoshnikov. The expedition also revealed the presence of microplastics on the southern continent, and that the salinity of the Southern Ocean has decreased due to melting ice. The icebreaker Akademik Tryoshnikov. Image courtesy ICCE/Anderson Astor and Marcelo Curia. Antarctica is Earth’s fifth-largest continent and a key climate regulator. Together with the much smaller Arctic region, Antarctica redistributes the heat absorbed in the equatorial zone, balancing thermal energy. In other words, the ice masses in these two extreme locations of the planet are part of a huge circulatory machine that regulates energy, affecting the global climate. Led by Brazilian glaciologist Jefferson Cardia Simões, from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul’s Polar and Climate Center (CPC–UFRGS), the International Antarctic Coastal Circumnavigation Expedition (ICCE) took place in 2024. A total of 57 researchers from seven countries traveled 29,000 kilometers (about 18,000 miles), circling Antarctica and collecting snow, ice samples and seawater, to understand how the microbial life that inhabits this region is responding to climate change. An ice core collected for analysis. Image courtesy of ICCE/Anderson Astor and Marcelo Curia. The team drilled into the ice, collecting samples that will shed light on the nature of the atmosphere at different times in history, as well…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives and story summaries. A decade ago, Rwanda had more crowned cranes in living rooms than in the wild. They were brought back from the brink by a coordinated effort of conservation and public outreach, reports Mongabay contributor Musinguzi Blanshe. Just 10 years ago, Rwanda’s gray crowned cranes (Balearica regulorum) were vanishing. Once a familiar sight in wetlands across East Africa, their numbers in Rwanda had collapsed, driven by habitat loss and capture for the exotic pet trade. By 2017, there were more cranes in private homes than in the wild. That grim picture has changed, thanks largely to the work of Olivier Nsengimana, a veterinarian and founder of the Rwanda Wildlife Conservation Association (RWCA). His group has led a national campaign to rescue captive cranes, rehabilitate them and reintroduce them to the wild. Rather than punishing bird owners, RWCA offered amnesty — an approach that led to a wave of voluntary handovers. Their efforts have paid off. Rwanda’s crane population has nearly tripled since 2017. Wetlands, which are crucial breeding grounds, are now better protected through community involvement. RWCA trains local residents to monitor wetlands, raise awareness and reduce pressures on the habitat. Most of the organization’s 270 staff come from these communities. Nsengimana’s work has also expanded across borders. Cranes do not recognize national boundaries, so RWCA is partnering with groups in Uganda, Tanzania and, soon, Burundi to track and protect birds that migrate regionally. Uganda’s…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Several people have been killed after heavy rains hit parts of Asia over the past week, brought by the latest in a series of typhoons that scientists warn are growing more frequent under climate change. Typhoon Wutip started out as an area of convection west of Micronesia, according to a June 5 weather advisory from the U.S. Joint Typhoon Warning Center. It developed into a low-pressure area the next day, causing heavy rains and fueling the southwest monsoon in the Philippines. At least three people drowned after attempting to swim across an overflowed spillway in the province of Misamis Oriental. As Mongabay has previously reported, scientists say climate change is making such extreme weather events in the Philippines more common. By June 9, the storm had developed into a tropical depression over the South China Sea. It intensified into Tropical Storm Wutip on June 11 and flooded parts of Vietnam, where at least seven people were killed. The number of deaths caused by disasters in Vietnam tripled in 2024 compared to the year before. More than 100 houses were damaged and at least 70,000 hectares (173,000 acres) of farmlands were flooded. A number of roads were also flooded, including parts of a national highway. Rescue operations were still underway for missing people over the weekend, local media reported. The bad weather forced the Miss Vietnam beauty pageant to reschedule its final event, which was supposed to be held outdoors. By June 14, Wutip had intensified into a typhoon and made…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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MEXICO CITY — In 2024, six Latin American countries were in the top 10 nations with the highest loss of tropical primary forest, according to recent data from the University of Maryland, U.S. Topping the list were Brazil and Bolivia, in a year that saw the record-breaking loss of 6.7 million hectares (16.6 million acres) of forest, 80% more than in 2023. In the Amazon, forest loss jumped by 110% compared to 2023, the biggest increase since 2016. Although tropical forest loss rose globally, some countries, like Indonesia and Malaysia, saw improvements. In Latin America, however, even countries that had previously curbed forest loss, such as Brazil and Colombia, experienced dramatic losses. Wildfires encroach on tropical forests In 2024, wildfires burned five times more tropical primary forest than the year before. Brazil, Bolivia and Mexico saw particularly high numbers of wildfires. “The rapid loss of forest is very sad news at a time when we need our forests more than ever,” says Marlene Quintanilla Palacios, director of research and knowledge management at Bolivian conservation NGO Fundación Amigos de la Naturaleza (Friends of Nature Foundation). Last year was also the hottest year on record, with Latin America experiencing intense droughts due to a strong El Niño, a recurring climate pattern marked by warmer Pacific waters. “Climate change is accelerating all of this,” Quintanilla Palacios says. Hotspots show areas in Latin America that were newly affected by fires in 2024. Source: Global Forest Watch. If wildfires become the main driver of tropical…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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Poaching has decimated rhino populations across Africa, but a new study finds that dehorning the animals, or surgically removing their horns, drastically reduces poaching. The study focused on 11 reserves in the Greater Kruger ecosystem that sprawls across the border of South Africa and Mozambique. Poachers killed nearly 2,000 rhinos here, 6.5% of the reserves’ population, from 2017-2023, reducing populations of both black (Diceros bicornis) and white (Ceratotherium simum) rhinos, according to Tim Kuiper, study lead and conservation scientist at Nelson Mandela University. Poachers target rhinos for their keratin horns, incorrectly believed in traditional Asian medicine to hold medicinal properties. To deter poachers, many African reserves have tried dehorning, a procedure where veterinarians tranquilize rhinos and saw off their horns, leaving only a stump behind. In eight of the 11 reserves the study examined, park authorities and researchers (some involved in the study) have dehorned rhinos in batches since 2017. This allowed the researchers to compare the impact of dehorning on poaching rates over time, against the three reserves where rhinos weren’t dehorned, and against conventional measures implemented prior to dehorning. The study found a 78% reduction in poaching rates in the parks after dehorning — and it was cost-effective, too. From 2017-2023, the reserves spent $74 million on antipoaching measures, including rangers, tracking dogs, cameras, better fences and access control. But dehorning accounted for just 1.2% of the budget, the study found. “So, it’s very clear that our study demonstrated massive declines in poaching in response to dehorning,” Kuiper…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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A recent report surveying seizures of pangolin scales and elephant ivory over the past decade has found a sharp decline following the COVID-19 pandemic. Using data from media reports, public documents, and criminal intelligence and investigations, analysts at the Wildlife Justice Commission (WJC) found authorities seized more than 370 metric tons of pangolin scales and 193 metric tons of elephant ivory between 2015 and 2024. Seizures began to ramp up in 2015, peaked in 2019, and then declined sharply in 2020. The report found that the pandemic disruption to trade and travel, coinciding with increased enforcement based on intelligence, prompted these declines. Post-pandemic, the decline in trade has continued to hold as countries intensify law enforcement and intelligence gathering. “The report was motivated by a need to present up-to-date findings and offer a current assessment of the evolving criminal dynamics surrounding ivory and pangolin scale trafficking,” Olivia Swaak-Goldman, WJC’s executive director, told Mongabay by email. “From our investigations, we knew there had been some major changes since our last reports … so it was timely to publish updated analysis and highlight these shifts.” Pangolin scales act as armor to protect their body. The WJC report estimates that the 370 tons of pangolin scales seized over the past decade would have come from anywhere between 100,000 and a million pangolins. Image by flowcomm via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0). Pangolin scales, used in traditional medicine, are in high demand in East Asia. Over the past decade, as Asian pangolin numbers plummeted,…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Ocean Reporting Network, where Elizabeth Claire Alberts is a fellow. NICE, France — James Marape, the prime minister of Papua New Guinea, voiced his government’s rejection of seabed mining at the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference that took place between June 9 and 13, in Nice, France. His position stands in sharp contrast to the situation unfolding in the country’s New Ireland province, where local authorities are paving the way for foreign companies to begin mining the seabed, despite long-standing, community-led opposition to these developments. “As a country, we don’t want any deep-sea mining in Papua New Guinea,” Marape told Mongabay in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the U.N. Ocean Conference (UNOC) on June 10. He said his country would uphold its moratoria against the industry — one of which was announced in 2019, and another in 2023. The main reason for this position, he said, is that the seas around Papua New Guinea (PNG) are “sensitive and fragile” and are home to important fisheries. “Our waters are very fertile in as far as marine life is concerned,” he said, adding that scientific evidence on how mining might affect marine ecosystems is scant. A recent brief from the U.N. secretary-general’s scientific advisory board warns of “irreversible” potential impacts on sea life due to the destruction of seafloor habitat, sediment plumes and the release of toxins by deep-sea mining. While Marape publicly asserted his opposition to the nascent industry, a proposed project…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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