Environment

A moratorium on fishing the piracatinga catfish in the Brazilian Amazon was extended for the third time since its introduction in 2014. There’s now no expiry date for the ban, although the ministries of environment and fishing have a period of three years to reevaluate it. The moratorium was instituted to protect the pink river dolphin (Inia geoffrensis), known locally as the boto.

LAB speaks to Natalia Greene, who was instrumental in bringing the Rights of Nature into Ecuador’s Constitution in 2008, about the environmental movement in Ecuador, the complexities of the current political situation and deteriorating security.

Edivan Guajajara is a filmmaker and activist from the Arariboia Indigenous Land whose work centres on the natural world and Indigenous struggle. He has come together with Chelsea Greene and Rob Grobman from One Forest in the documentary We Are Guardians, released this year, to tell the story of Indigenous struggle against illegal encroachments in the Amazon.

In August this year, the owners of two fincas in the Gualivá province of Cundinamarca, just outside of Bogota, were sent expropriation orders by...

Seven months ago, the residents of Santa María Chi, a precinct of the Yucatán city of Mérida in southern Mexico with a small population...

The community of San Juan Bautista struggles against a gas pipeline and in defence of their lagoon, their land, and their existence as an Indigenous people. This is the story of the women embodying their resistance.

Ledy Pech Martín is a Mexican Indigenous beekeeper who led the fight against the multinational giant, Monsanto, and won. She is an environmental defender who has worked tirelessly to raise awareness over pesticide use and its effects on the natural habitat of bees, as well as the honey supply that is crucial to the livelihoods of indigenous Mayans in the Yucatán peninsula. 

Colombian President Gustavo Petro is interviewed at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai by Sumaúma. He takes a radical stand against oil exploration and drilling, in contrast to Brazil's Lula, who has signed his country up to OPEC+

Suriname is the most forested country on earth, with 93 percent forest cover. At COP-23 in Bonn, the Suriname government pledged to work towards keeping 93 percent forest cover, forever. The Forest93 campaign is leading the way.

Interviewed by Mongabay, Yuly Velásquez, a local fisher and president of an environmental organization, has spent years documenting water contamination and corruption linked to the Ecopetrol refinery in Colombia and she faces consistent threats and attacks.