Mongabay news app for Android now available
Mongabay now has a free app available in the Google Play Store. This app provides Android users with a quick and easy way to read and share Mongabay news and stories on their devices. Similarly, Apple customers can receive Mongabay stories on their iPhones, iPads, etc via that company’s news app, Apple News, more info here. If you have an Android device, please download the app and give it a try. If you like what you see, please give it a rating. Here’s what it looks like: ...
Mongabay in the News, March 2018
Our reporting appears in many places beyond Mongabay.com when other outlets republish, quote from, and re-report our findings. Highlights from this past month include Salon.com’s republishing of our exposé on sexual harassment in the natural science and environmental fields, and an appearance by a Mongabay-India editor on the BBC talking about a recent sea turtle hatching that amazed residents of Mumbai. Mongabay publishes on a creative commons basis and encourages other outlets to republish its features in their own publications. Learn how to do this here. Here’s a selection of where our reporting appeared in March 2018: Alternet, Asian Correspondent, BBC Indonesia, BBC World, Buffalo News, Cambodia Daily, Common Dreams, Dagens Nyheter, Daily Climate, Earth Island Journal, El Espectador, Eco-Business, Ecowatch, The Dodo, GenomeWeb, Guardian, Huffington Post, IDN Times, IFL Science, India Blooms, The Intercept-Brasil, Jakarta Post, LADbible, Metro Ecuador, Mexico News Daily, National Geographic Indonesia, News Lens International, Ooska News, Pacific Standard, RINF News, RPP Noticias, Salon, Sciences et Avenir, Scroll, Smithsonian Magazine, Spektrum, The Star-Kenya,Tarung News, Visayan Daily Star, Western Australia Today, and World Politics Review. Banner image: Indonesian rainforest. Photo by Rhett A. Butler for...
Saving jaguars in the Chaco (event recap)
Earlier this month Mongabay held a Bay Area Tropical Forest Network (BATFN) event at the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology at Stanford University. The event featured Anthony Giordano of S.P.E.C.I.E.S and the Chaco Jaguar Conservation Project, who spoke about his efforts to conserve jaguars and their habitat in the Chaco ecosystem of Paraguay, Bolivia, and Argentina. Giordano told the audience about the natural history of the jaguar, which is the third largest cat species in the world (and the most powerful of the big cats pound for pound) and once ranged from California to Patagonia. He explained that jaguars today face three major threats: loss of habitat, conflict with ranchers and farmers, and declining availability of prey. As a consequence, jaguars have gone functionally extinct in the United States, El Salvador, Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay, while suffering heavy losses across many other range countries. Jaguars now occupy less than half their early 1990s range. Giordano also spoke about the Chaco, which is the second largest biome after the Amazon in South America, with an original expanse topping a million square miles. While the Chaco is often characterized as a dry forest ecosystem, it is actually one of the world’s most diversified biomes, with habitats ranging from flooded swamps to savannas to humid forests. This variance supports a richness of species, including all three species of peccary. But like the jaguar, the Chaco is also under threat, primarily from cattle ranching and soy farms. Losses have been substantial in Argentina and Paraguay, which have some of the highest deforestation rates in the world since 2000. Given these dire trends, Giordano has launched a series of initiatives to study and protect the Chaco in Paraguay, including the first scientific survey of jaguar across the country, supporting the development of a national jaguar conservation plan, and leading workshops to to address human-jaguar conflict. Giordano says that jaguar conservation can support broader efforts to conserve the Chaco ecosystem by building good relationships with landowners and creating positive incentives for maintaining wildlife populations and encouraging habitat restoration. Mongabay’s next BATFN takes place in Palo Alto in May. More details to...
Mongabay Latam a finalist for One World Media Award
UPDATE: Mongabay Latam has now been named a finalist for the award. Congratulations to the whole team. Mongabay Latam has been named to the longlist in the Special Award category of the One World Media Awards, for its environmental coverage in Latin America. This award recognizes an independent media organization based in a developing country using media to address social, cultural, political and economic issues. The Award seeks to recognize and encourage outstanding reporting that informs the public, provides an outlet for local people’s voices, creates a space for critical information, and holds those in power to account. Other nominees include Myanmar Now (Myanmar), Nasha Niva (Belarus), and Reporter At-Large (India). The judging panels will meet in late April to decide the final nominees in each category. View the longlists for the Special Award and the other...
Mongabay – Now Accepting Summer Internship Applications
Mongabay.org offers two exciting internship opportunities. The first opportunity primarily involves writing environmental news stories for our affiliated news site – Mongabay.com. Our interns will have the opportunity to develop their writing skills and have their news stories be published on our renowned website which boasts over two million global readers every month. The second opportunity is similar but it focuses on technology that plays a crucial role in improving our understanding and protection of nature on our Mongabay Wildtech news site. Mongabay’s Wildtech section identifies potentially valuable tools, as well as the scientists and resource managers using technology in their work. Wildtech interns will apply their research, critical thinking and writing skills to produce stories about the development and innovative use of technology to improve research and conservation outcomes. Full internship details here! Deadline to apply is June...
“Conservation Effectiveness” series wins award
A feature on how conservation NGOs use evidence to guide their decisions, by staff writer Shreya Dasgupta, is the winner in the environment category of the 2018 Science Seeker Awards. Scientists have long urged conservation NGOs to make decisions based on scientific evidence, Shreya writes in the piece. However, big conservation NGOs run into many problems in trying to use the available science. So she sets out to explain what is known about the topic by looking at the published evidence: “Overall, there has been a rise in peer-reviewed studies looking into the effectiveness of conservation strategies. But NGOs don’t seem to be using them,” she writes in the piece. Read on for her full analysis of why this is and what can be done, here, Experience or evidence: How do big conservation NGOs make decisions? The feature was part 4 of “Conservation Effectiveness,” Mongabay’s multi-part series investigating the effectiveness of some of the most popular strategies to conserve tropical forests around the world. The series was the result of a collaboration between Mongabay staff reporters Shreya Dasgupta and Mike Gaworecki, their editor Rebecca Kessler, and a team of conservation scientists led by tropical forest ecologist Zuzana Burivalova of Princeton University. Wonderfully interactive infographics were created for most features in the series by GreenInfo Network, whose team was led by Tom Allnutt. Banner image: Crested black macaque. Photo by Rhett A. Butler /...
Mongabay in the News, February 2018
Our reporting appears in many places beyond Mongabay.com when other outlets republish, quote from, and re-report our findings. Highlights from this past month included the Associated Press wire service picking up on our report about an orangutan which was shot 130 times by farmers who were later arrested; many dozens of media outlets around the world published that AP newswire article based on our report, too many to list in full, but they ranged from the Washington Post to The Independent, Asian Correspondent, and The Evening Standard. In February there was also an appearance on the popular American environmental radio show Living on Earth with a Mongabay correspondent discussing her article about Brazil’s move to end the building of megadams in the Amazon, listen to that here. Here’s a selection of where our reporting appeared in February 2018: AFK Insider, Alternet, The Argus, Asian Correspondent, Belfast Telegraph, Burnham Weekly, Bridport News, CBC, CBS News, CFJC Today, Chat News Today, Chronicle Journal, Common Dreams, Crewe Guardian, Daily Echo, Daily Gazette & Standard, The Daily Mail, Dorset Echo, Droitwich Advertiser, Earth Island Journal, East Lothian Courier, Eco-Business, Epsom Guardian, Evening Standard, Express and Star, Fox News, Gazette and Herald, Guardian, Halstead Gazette, Hereford Times, Hollywood.com, Ilkley Gazette, The Independent, International News Lens, Irvine Times, Kidderminster Shuttle, Leigh Review, Living on Earth, Local Guardian, Malaysian Insight, New Security Beat, New York Daily News, The News Minute, News Shopper, North Wales Chronicle, Northern Echo, Pacific Standard, Powys County Times, Publimetro, El Pueblo, Pulitzer Center, RPP Noticias, The Republic, Scroll, Seattle Times, Spokane Spokesman Review, La Semana, South Wales Guardian, Stourbridge News, Surrey Comet, Swindon Advertiser, Telegraph & Argus, Times Colonist, Times of India, Times of Malta, Toronto Metro News, Truthout, VOA News, Vancouver Sun, WESA Pittsburgh 90.5 FM, WTOP DC 103.5 FM, WCF Courier, Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard, Wirral Globe, Worcester News, Yahoo News, and the Yeovil Express. Mongabay publishes on a creative commons basis and encourages other outlets to republish its features in their own publications. Learn more about how to do this here. Banner image: A birdnest fern, by Rhett Butler for...
Op-ed for Sydney Morning Herald about Sumatran rhinos penned by Mongabay senior correspondent
Senior correspondent Jeremy Hance argued in an opinion piece for the Sydney Morning Herald that we should save the Sumatran rhino, the world’s oldest, smallest, and cutest rhino from extinction not only because losing biodiversity is bad for the health of humanity’s environment, but also “because we can.” Mongabay sent Hance to Indonesia in 2017 to visit the remaining Sumatran rhinos (estimates vary from 30 left on the one hand, to maybe 100 on the optimistic side) in the forests and protected sanctuaries where captive breeding is having some limited success. He produced a 4-part series on the issue, learn more about that and read his op-ed for the Herald here. Banner image: Female Sumatran rhino with calf in Way Kambas, Sumatra, Indonesia. Photo by Rhett A. Butler for...
New Special Reporting Project: Indigenous Peoples and Conservation
Indigenous peoples’ stewardship of natural resources is increasingly being recognized as a critical priority in efforts to combat climate change, protect biodiversity, and maintain the ecosystems that sustain the planet. Yet indigenous communities continue to face grave threats when it comes to protecting their lands: a 2016 report by Global Witness found that 40 percent of those killed defending the environment in 2015 were members of indigenous communities. Some indigenous peoples are challenged by governments’ failure to recognize their land rights and the loss of traditional knowledge, which erodes cultural identity. To raise greater awareness of these issues, Mongabay is undertaking a special reporting project to focus specifically on the intersection of indigenous peoples and conservation. The Indigenous Peoples and Conservation project will produce a series of journalistic stories that explore threats to indigenous peoples’ territories and showcase successful indigenous-led conservation initiatives. Click here for full details on the Indigenous Peoples and Conservation...
Mongabay’s reporting now available on Apple News
We’re always trying to reach Mongabay readers wherever they like to consume news, and Apple News is the latest destination we’ve added. Readers who have Apple devices like iPhones or iPads with an iOS 9 or later operating system can now find our features there, just tap the search button and look for Mongabay (or click on this link to go directly there). Other places we make our news available include at Flipboard.com, on our social media channels (follow/like our Facebook page, Twitter feed, and/or our Instagram profile for regular updates), via email alerts or RSS feed, and also via audio on our podcast and video on our Youtube channel....
Mongabay CEO speaks about conservation April 10th in San Francisco
Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett A. Butler will speak at the Battery in San Francisco, CA on April 10th. The event centers on the question “How can we conserve Earth’s most important ecosystems so humanity and nature can flourish?” Rhett will be sharing the floor with Enrique Ortiz, a noted biologist who co-founded the Andes Amazon Fund and the Amazon Conservation Association. Rhett and Enrique will be discussing forests. The Battery is a private club so tickets are not available to the public....
Mongabay in the news, January 2018
Among the most popular of our features that were referenced and republished elsewhere in the news media during January 2018 was the huge story Mongabay broke concerning a policy shift away from the building of mega-dams in the Amazon — such as here at Business Insider — these dam proposals have energized resistance among indigenous groups, NGOs, activists, and residents of the affected regions, so the change in direction by Brazil was a major announcement. Also of note in January was coverage of Mongabay’s opening of a new bureau in India, and a Mongabay report from a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh which was republished by numerous outlets including Pacific Standard: refugees in the camp are forced to strip the surrounding forests for building materials and cooking fuel, putting the camp at risk for mudslides when the rains return. Here’s a selection of where Mongabay features appeared in January 2018: AFK Insider, Asia Sentinel, Asian Correspondent, BBC Indonesia, Brazzil.com, Business Insider, Catch News, Curacao Chronicle, Daily Maverick, Die Tageszeitung, The Diplomat, EFE, El Deber, El Espectador, El Nacional, Eco-Business, Ecowatch, Hawaii Public Radio, India Blooms News Service, IntellAsia, Gizmodo Brasil, International Business Times, International News Lens, Jakarta Post, L’Express, La Mula, La Red 21, Lado B, Malaysian Insight, Metro News Russia, The New Arab, New York Daily News, Noticias Venezuela, Pacific Standard, Pulitzer Center, RPP Noticias, Science Alert, Scroll, The Star, United Press International, and The Wire. Mongabay publishes on a creative commons basis and encourages other outlets to republish its features in their own publications. Learn more about how to do this here. Banner image: A wild orchid in the Ebano Verde Scientific Reserve in the Dominican Republic, by Rhett Butler for...
Mongabay welcomes new board member, Jeanne Sedgwick
Mongabay is pleased to announce its newest board member, Jeanne Sedgwick. Jeanne brings deep and varied experience in the conservation field, and is currently vice chair of the Resources Legacy Fund, a Sacramento-based conservation organization and environmental philanthropy platform. “We’re very excited to have Jeanne join the board,” said Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler. “Jeanne brings passion, strategic thinking, and an extensive network of contacts in the conservation world that will help accelerate Mongabay’s growth and impact.” Jeanne grew up in New York, where her connection to nature was sparked by spending many hours exploring the estuaries that feed Long Island Sound — from a tender age, she was captivated by seeing baby sharks, rays, horseshoe crabs, and all the rich bird life. She later studied at Stanford University and has lived in northern California ever since. Her interest in working on behalf of the natural world was catalyzed by a trip she took to Borneo with her husband in the early 1980s. The couple spent a week upriver trying to get back to an area where he had found interesting invertebrates on a prior trip, but when they finally arrived, they discovered that loggers for a foreign company had cut nearly every tree in the watershed, silting the river up and devastating wildlife that the Iban people depended on for their livelihood. The idea that a place this rich and remote could be so utterly ruined for short term profit set her on a trajectory to help change this narrative. As Director of the Conservation Program at the David and Lucile Packard Foundation in Los Altos, California, she oversaw the program’s growth from an annual grants budget of $500,000 in 1989 to over $100 million annually. She also has brought her passion to the Consultative Group on Biological Diversity, for which she acted as chair, and also became a trustee for WildAid, a San Francisco-based organization working internationally to reduce demand for wildlife products. “It’s an honor to be part of such a high-quality, high-integrity news organization like Mongabay,” Jeanne said after officially joining its board. She is also vice chair of the Stanford Habitat Conservation Board, which oversees implementation of habitat plans that protect endangered species on Stanford University lands, and is a member of the Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve Coordinating Council for the university. She lives in Woodside, CA, with her husband, where they’ve been enjoying the recent arrival of 40 great blue herons, who are busily setting up a rookery adjacent to their home. Banner image of a great blue heron courtesy of Rick McMeechan, US National Park...
Board member Holt Thrasher to receive Environmental Leadership Award
Mongabay board member Holt Thrasher is set to receive the 2018 Environmental Leadership Award from Audubon Connecticut, which he was a founding member of in 2001. Holt is an active conservationist with deep leadership in the sector, and also has decades of experience in investment banking, IT, and consulting. From the release: “Holt Thrasher will receive Audubon Connecticut’s Environmental Leadership Award. Holt has been an active conservationist and nature enthusiast for more than 25 years. He is Chairman Emeritus of the National Audubon Society. In 2001, he was a founding member and Chair of the Board of Audubon Connecticut. He joined Audubon’s National Board five years later and was named Chair in 2008. His leadership played a critical role in advancing Audubon’s legislative, educational, and conservation operations; guiding it to re-establish its science-based mission to conserve birds and their habitats; and strengthening Audubon’s place as one of the nation’s foremost environmental organizations. He currently serves as Trustee and Treasurer of the National Marine Sanctuaries Foundation and is a Director of Mongabay, an environmental media organization.”...
Mongabay in the news, December 2017
Mongabay’s reporting was quoted, discussed, and republished widely by other media outlets in December 2017, including our reporter being interviewed by National Public Radio’s “The Takeaway” in the U.S. for his feature about the country losing climate scientists to other countries, due to Donald Trump’s anti-science policies. The first part of our collaborative investigative series with the Gecko Project of the palm oil industry in Indonesia (“The palm oil fiefdom”) enjoyed further republication in peer outlets, including here in the ASEAN Post. Here’s a selection of where our work appeared in December, from Gizmodo to The Guardian and Sydney Morning Herald: ASEAN Post, The Age, Alternet, Asian Correspondent, Bangkok Post, Catch News, City Paper Bogota, El Diario Nacional, The Dodo, Down to Earth, Eco-Business, Ecowatch, El Espectador, Gizmodo Japan, Gizmodo Brasil, The Guardian, International News Lens, Iran Daily, Jornal do Brasil , Latin America Bureau, Metro Ecuador, La Mula, Publimetro, RPP Noticias, Saigoneer, Science, Scroll, La Semana, Sputnik-Brasil, Sydney Morning Herald, and The Takeaway. Mongabay publishes on a creative commons basis and encourages other outlets to republish its features in their own publications. Learn more about this here. Banner image of a wreathed hornbill courtesy of the Atlanta Zoo. ...
Mongabay Latam now hiring for an Editor
Mongabay Latam is hiring for a contributing editor in Peru or Colombia. The editor will commission, edit and publish Spanish-language environmental journalism articles on topics related to environment and conservation. Must be a native speaker of Spanish and have 6 years of experience in writing and editing + 1 in environmental issues. Knowledge of WordPress and HTML appreciated. Click here for a full detailed job description and how to apply (in Spanish). Deadline 5...
Mongabay-India is hiring for three new positions
Mongabay-India is a conservation and environment news and features service that aims to bring high quality, original reports from nature’s frontline in India. As the India-specific portal of the global news platform mongabay.com, this website follows the format of Mongabay’s dedicated Indonesia and Latin America news outlets. Mongabay-India is hiring for three new positions including a Staff Writer, Content Coordinator, and a Digital Content Editor. To learn more about the opportunity, position requirements, and how to apply, please visit our opportunities page under jobs for a full detailed job...
Mongabay investigation makes “Best Nonprofit Journalism of 2017” list
Congratulations to the reporting team of Sue Branford, Maurício Torres, and Thais Borges: the third feature in their multi-part investigation from the Tapajós River Basin in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon carried out in cooperation with The Intercept-Brasil was selected by the Institute for Nonprofit News for their ‘Best Nonprofit Journalism of 2017‘ list. The feature, “Day of Terror,” revealed how a raid by federal police on an indigenous Munduruku village resulted in one death and multiple injuries, and prompted a prosecutor to open a new investigation and recommend the award of $2.9 million (US) in compensation to the village. Read the feature and watch the harrowing video here. Banner image: Adenilson Krixi Mundurku’s family watches in solemn grief as Mongabay journalists are told how he was killed by Brazil’s Federal Police. Photo by Thais...
Mongabay in the news, November 2017
At Mongabay, we’re usually the ones interviewing other people about the environmental news of the day, but sometimes the microphone gets turned around, such as in November 2017, when members of the team appeared on Al Jazeera, National Public Radio, WUNC, Radio Ecoshock, and Heritage Radio Network to discuss our work. Otherwise, our original reports were republished or referenced widely as usual by other media outlets ranging from The Guardian to The Weather Channel and the New York Times, the latter of which relied in part on a recent Mongabay feature about the rise of ‘great ape circuses’ in Asia in a November 4 cover story. Here’s a selection of outlets where Mongabay turned up in the news last month: AFK Insider, Al Jazeera, Almanac News, Alternet, Animal Politico, Asia Sentinel, Asian Correspondent, China Dialogue, Courrier International, Digital Journal,The Dodo, Eco-Business, Ecowatch, El Espectador, The Guardian, Heritage Radio Network, The Independent, Kumparan News, La Mula, National Geographic Indonesia, National Public Radio, Netral News, Nieman Lab, Nusantara News, Pacific Standard, RPP Noticias, Radio Ecoshock, Scroll, La Semana, WUNC/The State of Things, Truthdig, The Weather Channel, Weather Underground, and The Wire. Image: Young three-toed sloth hugging a stuffed panda in a Trio indigenous community in...
Mongabay welcomes new board member, Holt Thrasher
Mongabay is pleased to announce its newest board member, Holt Thrasher. Holt is an active conservationist and brings deep leadership in that sector as well as decades of experience in investment banking, IT, and consulting. “Holt’s unparalleled experience at the intersection of conservation, finance, and technology brings an invaluable perspective as we continue to scale Mongabay’s platform,” said board chair Brodie Ferguson. “We’re excited that Holt will join us as we enter this exciting new stage of growth.” Echoing board chair Ferguson, Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler said, “We’re thrilled to welcome Holt to the Mongabay board. His passion for nature, deep knowledge of conservation issues and trends in technology, strategic thinking, and strong network will be tremendous resources for Mongabay as it continues its rapid expansion into new media markets.” Holt has been an active conservationist and nature enthusiast for more than 25 years. He currently serves as Trustee and Treasurer of the National Marine Sanctuaries Foundation, supporting the 640,000 square miles of national marine sanctuaries and monuments managed by NOAA and the US Department of Interior. He is also Chairman Emeritus of the National Audubon Society. In 2001, he was a founding member and Chair of the Board of Audubon Connecticut. He joined Audubon’s national board five years later and was named Chair in 2008. His leadership played a critical role in advancing Audubon’s legislative, educational and conservation operations; guiding it to re-establish its science-based mission to conserve birds and their habitats; and strengthening Audubon’s place as one of the nation’s foremost environmental organizations. “I am very excited to be able to work with the Mongabay board and team to help increase their global activities,” said Thrasher. “Now more than ever, we need objective sources of environmental reporting.” Holt has more than 35 years’ experience in investment banking, information technology, and consulting. He currently is Founder and CEO of Synovia Capital, an investment fund focused on ecosystem management within the data analytics sector. He recently served as Group CEO of Permian Global, a Luxembourg-based investment fund focused on climate change mitigation through the effective management of large areas of tropical forest (avoiding deforestation and restoring degraded forests). Prior to Permian Global, he founded and served as Managing Partner of Mooreland Partners, an information technology sector-focused investment bank. Holt previously was a Partner at Broadview Holdings, a global merger and acquisition advisory and investment firm. He has a B.A. from Colby College and an M.B.A. from the International Institute of Management Development in Switzerland, and lives with his family in Greenwich, CT. Banner image of Yellow-rumped Warbler by Peter Pearsall of U.S. Fish and Wildlife...
