Amazon deforestation trend on the increase
Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon forests has flipped from a decreasing to an increasing trend, according to new annual figures released yesterday by the country's space agency INPE. Brazil's government has meanwhile confirmed that it will be issuing forest related carbon emission reduction targets on Monday.
Sustainable shipment opens new palm oil options
The arrival of the first certified sustainable palm oil shipment in Europe opens up possibilities for palm oil users to move away from subsidising forest destruction and social disruption from expanding palm oil plantations.
Demand for African natural resources can ensure sustainable use
African nations could turn the demand for their natural resources currently driving deforestation and other destruction into a force for higher returns from sustainable development, WWF has said today.
Ministers, governors commit to saving Sumatra
New hope was extended to some of the world's most diverse and endangered forests today as WWF, four Indonesian ministers and ten provincial governors announced a bold commitment to protect the remaining forests and critical ecosystems of Sumatra.
Basic food crops dangerously vulnerable
Bonn, Germany, May 22, 2008 – As a deadly new strain of Black Stem Rust devastates wheat harvests across Africa and Arabia, and threatens the staple food supply of a billion people from Egypt to Pakistan, the areas where potentially crop and life-saving remnant wild wheat relatives grow are only minimally protected.
Extinct Javan elephants may have been found again - in Borneo
Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia: The Borneo pygmy elephant may not be native to Borneo after all. Instead, the population could be the last survivors of the Javan elephant race – accidentally saved from extinction by the Sultan of Sulu centuries ago, a new publication suggests.
If the Borneo pygmy elephants are in fact elephants from Java, an island more than 1,200 km (800 miles) south of their current range, it could be the first known elephant translocation in history, providing scientists with critical data from a centuries-long experiment.
APP irregularities threaten massive climate and tiger impact
Pekanbaru, INDONESIA – One of the world’s biggest carbon stores and a key tiger habitat are threatened by a new logging road in Riau Province, Sumatra, according to an investigative report published today.
An absence of permits and other irregularities suggest that the new road cutting into Kampar peninsula is likely to be illegal, says Riau’s Eyes on the Forest group, a coalition of local NGO network Jikalahari, Walhi Riau, and WWF-Indonesia.
More of Africa urged to boost rhino numbers
After bringing Africa’s black rhinos spectacularly back from the brink of extinction one of the world’s most successful conservation programmes is to celebrate its first decade by seeking to extend its operations to more of Africa.
“What we know from looking back at the last ten years is that sustained conservation can and does work,” says George Kampamba, WWF International’s African Rhino Programme Coordinator.
Search for "night time spinach" threatens wildlife, local livelihoods
Meat hungry refugees are sustaining a thriving wildlife poaching trade in Tanzania, according to a report by the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.
WWF statement on Greenpeace's Cooking the Climate report
WWF’s statement on Greenpeace’s “Cooking the Climate” report