World Economic Forum Promoting Forest Conservation Palm oil is the fastest-growing commodity on the planet. Sales are expected to exceed $88 billion by 2022. Unfortunately, the industry and its supporters are still blowing smoke about deforestation, biodiversity and climate change. There’s a better way forward and we can help make it a reality. Palm oil […]
Defending Ecosystems Deforestation generates about 20 percent of greenhouse gasses, which contribute to global warming and climate change. Deforestation also cripples our planet’s ability to filter carbon dioxide from our air. Unfortunately, deforestation also threatens entire watersheds, endangered species and endangered cultures around the world. An international PR firm based in Phoenix, Arizona has launched a program to help […]
Forest Conservation, Reforestation Can Mitigate Climate Change Forest conservation is critical to life as we know it. Forests sequester carbon and release oxygen. They influence rainfall, filter fresh water and prevent flooding and soil erosion. They produce wild foods, fuelwood and medicines. While the pressures on our vanishing forests vary around the world, the biggest cause […]
Agriculture Driving Global Deforestation You might want to think twice about buying avocados the next time you’re at the grocery store. The delicious green fruit has become hugely popular in recent years, topping many a salad and burrito, not to mention its glorious transformation into guacamole, but unfortunately, the path avocados travel from Mexican groves […]
Vital Ecosystems Collapsing Africa has lost more than a third of its wild elephants to poachers in the past decade. The next decade might be their last without global interventions. Unfortunately, a bid to give the highest level of international legal protection to all African elephants was defeated on Monday at the CITES wildlife summit. The […]
Extinction Gaining Momentum Results of a new survey reveal that Africa’s savannah elephants are going fast. The Great Elephant Census estimates that about 352,000 elephants remain—down from previous estimates of 419,000 to 650,000 elephants in 2013. The authors estimate that they recorded 93 percent of all savannah elephants. Elephants in Africa are threatened by poaching for […]
Plantations Kill Endangered Species By Melati Kaye, Scientific American and Mongabay I have been hiking through a oil palm plantation in Borneo for hours but have yet to see a single oil palm. Instead, mahogany and other native tree species tower overhead. Mushrooms, flowers and huge pitcher plants line my trail, uniquely adapted to the island’s […]
Reforestation Can Help Save Tigers India has more wild tigers than any other nation, but these big cats need room to roam and hunt. In fact, India’s tigers have lost about half of their habitat in just the past decade. Because of dwindling tree cover in the buffer areas of tiger reserves, Satpuda Foundation, a […]
Rainforest Conservation Plans Indonesia has one of the highest rates of deforestation of any country in the world. According to Global Forest Watch, the country lost 16.88 million hectares of rainforest between 2001 and 2013, a chunk of forest nearly the size of France. Deforestation is not only a serious problem for global climate change, […]
Editorial Note: The following development is good news for the last forests, but it doesn’t appear to address the issue of endangered species and biodiversity. That is one of the weak links in the current RSPO scheme of smoke and mirrors. Presently, palm growers and buyers can kill endangered species and still conform. They have […]