Paraguay has provided updated information to the United Nations about the Chaco Biosphere Reserve, a protected area where deforestation from farming and cattle ranching threatens the survival of Indigenous communities. The country had until the end of September to respond to a UNESCO request to provide updated management plans and zoning, which critics say are only selectively enforced. There was no automatic consequence for not meeting the deadline, but UNESCO officials said they’re monitoring the site to ensure it doesn’t lose its designation. “We aim to provide member-states with the necessary technical support and opportunities to complete or improve their documentation, with the ultimate objective of ensuring strong and functional biosphere reserves,” a UNESCO official wrote in an email to Mongabay in September. The biosphere reserve covers approximately 7.5 million hectares (18.5 million acres) of the Gran Chaco, one of the largest tropical dry forests in the world. Millions of hectares of the biome have been deforested, most of it for farming and cattle ranching, over the last two decades. Much of the region is the ancestral territory of the Indigenous Ayoreo. The Ayoreo-Totobiegosode continue to live in voluntary isolation, making them especially vulnerable to outside disease where farms and ranches are expanding. They’re the last uncontacted Indigenous group in South America outside of the Amazon Rainforest. The biosphere reserve was established in 2001 and then expanded in 2011, partly due to the presence of Indigenous groups living in voluntary isolation. In 2005, it was included in UNESCO’s Man and…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Since Sept. 23, a group of rural producers has maintained a blockade on the road to the Paquiçamba Indigenous Land in the Volta Grande do Xingu region of Brazil’s Pará state. The blockade is supported by local politicians and aims to prevent government officials from physically demarcating the land traditionally occupied by the Juruna (Yudjá) Indigenous people. The protestors want to prevent the Indigenous Affairs Agency (Funai) from entering the area to physically mark the boundaries of the Paquiçamba. It’s a required step before the Indigenous territory can be officially approved by the president and formally registered. Paquiçamba is directly affected by the Belo Monte hydroelectric project and such federal demarcation of Indigenous land in the area was one of the conditions required for the project to receive environmental licensing. “The blockades have delayed the completion of physical demarcation work, which includes georeferencing, the placement of boundary markers on the Indigenous Land, and the installation of signage,” a Funai spokesperson told Mongabay over email. “Given this situation, Funai is seeking legal measures to guarantee the continuation of the work, access to the border areas of the Indigenous Land, and the safety and integrity of the teams responsible for the activities.” Even with support from the National Public Security Force, the spokesperson said clashes broke out between the blockaders and federal agents, interrupting their work. Ya Juruna, an Indigenous person from Paquiçamba, told Mongabay over WhatsApp messages that the protesters are trying to block her community from receiving legal rights to…This article was originally published on Mongabay
In Africa, high-quality seeds can produce improved crops with enhanced nutrition, pest-resistance, and drought tolerance. However, such seeds for maize, vegetables, and cereal crops can be indistinguishable from counterfeit, or “fake” seeds. That’s creating a massive potential for fraud in seed quality that can potentially deprive farmers of access to climate-resilient seeds while putting their harvests and incomes at risk. A group of researchers analyzed the efforts of 50 African countries to combat counterfeit seeds. They found a wide range of penalties for selling them across different governments, and concluded that a significant gap exists between government policy commitments and implementation, largely due to limited capacity. Study lead author Ed Mabaya, a professor of global development at Cornell University in the U.S., told Mongabay, “For most smallholder farmers in Africa, planting happens once a season, often timed to the first rains. A farmer who buys counterfeit seed usually finds out only after planting, when the seed fails to germinate or the crop grows poorly. By then it is usually too late to replant, so the loss is not a slightly smaller harvest but potentially the whole season’s food and income.” That can lead to food insecurity for the individual farmer and local markets more broadly. Counterfeiters can dye or repackage grain and sell it as branded, certified seed, Mabaya said. “The problem arises because certified seed looks exactly like ordinary grain but sells for a much higher price, in some cases several times more for hybrid maize. That price gap…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Authorities across nine Latin American and Caribbean countries have arrested hundreds of people and recovered more than 1,000 animals as part of a two-month coordinated operation against environmental crimes. Operation Madre Tierra was the eighth edition of a recurring Interpol-led initiative, and was conducted in June and July in Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Panama. Investigators found illegal timber and wildlife trafficking networks operating on an “industrial scale” along the corridor connecting Central and South America, Interpol announced in a press release. Many of the products were destined for markets in Europe and Asia, where South American wildlife is in demand as pets. Reptiles, rare insects, and exotic birds were the most commonly seized live wildlife. In Mexico, authorities seized several big cats along routes used by drug traffickers, including two endangered Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris), one of them a rare white tiger, as well as lions (Panthera leo), ocelots (Leopardus pardalis), and jaguars (Panthera onca). In Nicaragua, authorities confiscated several birds, including parrots and red-and-green macaws (Ara chloropterus), that are protected under CITES, the global wildlife trade treaty. They also seized about 165 kilograms (364 pounds) of dried shark fins, thought to be destined for the Asian market, where they could have fetched $280,000. Investigators also traced financial transactions to identify how criminals profited while evading detection. “Following the money, whether from an illegal gold mine in Panama to a buyer in North America, Europe or Asia, helps a case move…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Africa’s monitored wildlife populations have declined an average of 80% since 1970, according to a new global assessment. The report also points to pockets of recovery where conservation efforts have been maintained over decades. The report on the decline in the average size of monitored populations was released Oct. 8 in the Living Planet Report 2026. It tracked monitored populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians between 1970 and 2022. Africa’s 80% decline compares with a global average of 73%; Latin America and the Caribbean recorded the largest regional decline, at 95%. The findings come as governments prepare to assess progress on the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, whose 23 targets include commitments to halt human-induced extinctions and support the recovery of threatened species by 2030. The framework also calls for conserving at least 30% of the world’s land, inland waters and seas by 2030. The Living Planet Index, managed by the Zoological Society of London in partnership with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), draws on 35,803 population trends from 5,790 vertebrate species worldwide. The index measure changes in the average size of monitored populations, it does not mean that Africa lost 80% of its wild animals or wildlife species, a press release obtained by Mongabay cautions. Habitat destruction and degradation are the most frequently reported pressures on the wildlife populations tracked globally, the report finds. Overexploitation, climate change, pollution, disease and invasive species are among the other threats identified. In the Congo Basin, for example, those pressures…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Right-wing candidates made big gains in both houses of Congress in Brazil’s Oct. 4 general election. Brazil’s main Indigenous organization, the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil APIB, told Mongabay that the result will drive new attempts to strip constitutional protections from Indigenous peoples. “Unfortunately, what we saw today is, let’s say, a bleak moment,” Dinamam Tuxá, an executive coordinator with APIB, told Mongabay in an audio message. “We did not expect this result.” The far-right Liberal Party, affiliated with presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, won 19 of the 54 Senate seats up for election, bringing its total seats to 28 of the chamber’s 81, or 35%, starting from 2027. This is nearly double its current number and the largest bloc in the house. Other right-wing parties, namely the Progressistas (PP), Republicanos and Novo, secured 8 seats, bringing their total representation to 15 seats. This gives the four parties a majority in the Senate. Center-right parties now occupy 9 seats, and centrist parties, 13. Left and center-left hold 15 seats. The Liberal Party consistently cast votes against Indigenous rights between 2019 and 2026, according to an analysis of Congress’s voting records by the Indigenous Missionary Council (CIMI), a Catholic Church-affiliated advocacy organization. According to CIMI’s analysis, 95.9% of the party’s votes were against Indigenous rights. The other right-wing parties voted similarly: Republicanos at 90.5% and Progressistas (PP) at 85.6%. Novo cast anti-Indigenous votes 100% of the time. On Oct. 25, Flávio Bolsonaro will face off against incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da…This article was originally published on Mongabay
In Brazil’s general election on Oct. 4, incumbent leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva finished second to far-right Flávio Bolsonaro, a senator and son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who was barred from public office after being convicted of planning a coup d’état. The two candidates will face each other in a second-round vote on Oct. 25 as neither candidate won more than 50% of the vote needed for a first-round victory. Flávio Bolsonaro won the majority of votes in eight of the 10 Amazon municipalities that cleared the most rainforest over the last decade, according to an analysis by Sumaúma, an Amazon-based publication. Sumaúma compared official results from the first-round votes with satellite deforestation data from Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research. Jair Bolsonaro’s presidency coincided with a historic spike in deforestation. Lula took office in 2023. Starting in August 2025, Amazon deforestation fell to the lowest level in more than a decade. Novo Progresso in Pará state was the site of the 2019 “Day of Fire” when local residents, many Jair Bolsonaro supporters, purposely set hundreds of forest fires. Flávio Bolsonaro won 84% of the vote in Novo Progresso. In the municipality of Altamira, where the Lula administration blacklisted more than 500 farms for illegal deforestation last year, Flávio Bolsonaro won 63% of the vote. Nestled between Altamira and Novo Progresso is the site of the largest land grab in Brazilian Amazon history. Lula won the vote in two of the 10 most deforested municipalities. He won…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Oil slicks from ships and offshore oil platforms cover nearly 1.6 million square kilometers (618,000 square miles) of the ocean surface each year, an area slightly larger than the nation of Mongolia. The estimate comes from a recent report by Skytruth, a U.S.-based nonprofit that used satellite imagery, machine learning and vessel tracking data to trace global oil pollution in the oceans between 2023 and 2025. According to John Amos, CEO of Skytruth, this kind of pollution was largely invisible before satellite imagery made it possible to track. “Any vessel operator could be pretty confident that nobody was going to notice what they were doing out in the middle of the ocean,” Amos told Mongabay by phone. “So that’s changed. We can see it now.” Map courtesy of SkyTruth. Much of the vessel oil slicks come from bilge waste, a mix of oil and water that collects in the bottom of a ship’s hull during operation. Tankers sometimes also wash out their cargo holds and flush crude oil residue into the sea. “It’s nasty oily dirty gunk that you just want to get rid of,” Amos said. “And the easiest thing to do with it is just pump it out into the ocean while you’re at sea.” According to the report, most of these discharges are illegal under MARPOL, the international treaty on pollution from ships. A MARPOL treaty adopted in 1973 allows vessels to discharge bilge water containing no more than 15 parts of oil per million parts of…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Rising sea levels due to climate change could damage hundreds of thousands of properties and millions of hectares of land along Australia’s coastline by 2100, according to a recent study. This could cost the country an economic loss of $855 billion, researchers estimate. To calculate the costs, researchers in Australia used existing projections of sea level rise and storm surges to map out the areas that could suffer flooding by 2100. Then they identified all the houses, properties, agricultural land, and other land and infrastructure in the vulnerable areas and used real estate sources to estimate their values and arrive at what their damage could cost. The analysis showed that by 2100, under a scenario where greenhouse gas emissions remain moderate, sea level rise and storm surges could damage roughly 268,000 properties and 2 million hectares (4.9 million acres) of land in Australia. That’s a present-value economic loss of $855.1 billion. Under a high-emissions scenario, nearly 720,000 properties and 3.7 million hectares (9.1 million acres) of Australian coastal properties could suffer damage, amounting to present-value losses of up to $1.91 trillion. “Sea level rise may physically affect a large number of Australians who live near the coast, as the majority of Australians live within 50 kilometres [31 miles] of the coastline,” Tom Kompas, study lead author and a professor of environmental economics and biosecurity at the University of Melbourne, said in a statement. Australia’s coastline is massive, extending roughly 34,000 kilometers (21,000 miles). The analysis found that every region of…This article was originally published on Mongabay
A case has been brought to the East African Court of Justice (EACJ) over the Kenyan government’s plan to build a 2,000-5,000-megawatt nuclear power plant in Bondo, near the eastern shore of Victoria Lake, Africa’s largest freshwater lake. The project has been the source of numerous protests from residents since it was announced. A Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) report produced in 2023 by Kenya’s nuclear power program noted that nuclear power should be avoided in the Victoria Lake region, citing volcanic hazards that could impair nuclear safety. However, the nuclear plant project is proceeding, despite the SEA finding. “I filed a reference at the East African Court of Justice on two grounds,” Dickens Ochieng, told Mongabay in a phone call. Ochieng is a resident of Siaya County, where the facility is located, and a human rights lawyer with J. Henry and Company Advocates, the law firm that filed the case on Sept. 23. “First, I want the court to determine if we should even have that nuclear power plant in Victoria Lake given the ecological and environmental risk that may be associated with it,” Ochieng said. “Then, I am asking for the project to have a transboundary environmental impact assessment, as Victoria Lake is not only a Kenyan matter.” Victoria Lake is shared by Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Roughly 40 million people across the three countries depend on the lake for their livelihoods, food security and drinking water. Millions more depend on the river that drains from Lake Victoria and…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Plastic pollution could disrupt the bioluminescent light produced by deep-sea organisms, researchers warn in a letter in the journal Cambridge Prisms: Plastics. When deep-sea organisms ingest plastics, it could disrupt the chemical pathways that create bioluminescence and damage the tissues in their bodies, impairing their ability to find food and a mate, the authors said. In the deep sea, up to 80% of organisms with complex cells are believed to be bioluminescent, the only source of light in the darkest parts of the ocean. The light these organisms create is essential for their survival and reproduction, the letter notes. Disruption of their bioluminescence could negatively impact food webs and ecosystem functions in the deep sea, the largest and least-explored biome on Earth, the letter says. In an email to Mongabay, co-author Renjith VishnuRadhan of Amity University in India offered the example of an anglerfish. “It is widely recognizable from documentaries and films such as Finding Nemo,” he said. “Female deep-sea anglerfish have a modified dorsal spine ending in a luminous lure called the esca. Light produced by symbiotic bacteria helps attract prey and may also assist with recognition or communication in darkness.” It’s well-established that bacterial bioluminescence can be affected by pollutants, VishnuRadhan said, and ingestion of toxic plastic additives by anglerfish could disrupt the bacterial symbiosis in the lure, theoretically affecting its luminous signaling. The authors note there’s some evidence of plastic pollution impacts on deep-sea ecosystems, but scientists lack the high-quality data and observations needed to understand the…This article was originally published on Mongabay
Lulingu, a Grauer’s gorilla (Gorilla beringei graueri), was reintroduced to Virunga National Park, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in 2024. In May 2026, Lulingu gave birth to a new baby, bringing hope for the species and excitement for the conservationists working there. “The baby and the mother are doing perfectly well. It really makes us happy. We are proud of her, it is also a bit of our success. Imagine, we knew her as a baby, we watched her grow, be rehabilitated and now she is a mother,” Jackson Kabuyaya Mbeke, country director of the DRC Gorilla Rehabilitation and Conservation Education Center (GRACE), told Mongabay by phone. Lulingu arrived at GRACE, a 16-hectare (40-acre) wildlife sanctuary, in 2016 when she was 18 months old. She was rescued from an illegal wildlife trafficking network by the Congolese Wildlife Authority (ICCN) and the NGO Gorilla Doctors. The sanctuary gave her space to socialize and play in a setting close to her natural habitat, under the watchful eyes of adoptive gorilla mothers. Lulingu was later reintroduced into the wild near Mount Tshiaberimu, a remote part of Virunga National Park. “The purpose of our sanctuary is to take in rescued gorillas, but also to care for them until they can be released into the wild. The fact that Lulingu has had a baby is a sign that she has adapted well to life in the wild,” Kabuyaya Mbeke explained. “By reintroducing them into the wild, we also hope to repopulate forests that have been…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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