- There are many important conservation and environmental stories Mongabay isn’t able to cover.
- Here’s a digest of some of the significant developments from the week.
- If you think we’ve missed something, feel free to add it in the comments.
Here are a few stories published this week by other news outlets.
Tropical forests
Scientists find that plants make up most of the world’s biomass (The Economist, New Scientist).
Efforts to increase food security with a green revolution in Africa hit a roadblock in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters).
Illegal gold mining could be happening in Ghana’s cocoa plantations (BBC News).
A scientific “SWAT” team treks into the Honduran rainforest to catalog the species living there (The New Yorker).
Participatory conservation starts with school-age children in Indonesia (Landscape News).
Ecologists tally the number of species in a Bolivian national park that could be “the world’s most biodiverse” (The New York Times).
Liberia has a new protected area: the Gola Forest National Park (Rainforest Trust).
Rangers in Southern Cardamom National Park in Cambodia have found nearly 110,000 snares over the past six years (The Guardian).
How biochar could help farmers in the Amazon (Pacific Standard).
Other news
The U.K.’s Chester zoo has a new baby elephant, which came as a surprise to zookeepers (BBC News).
The Los Angeles Times lists the top 10 new species described in the past year (Los Angeles Times).
To protect threatened marsupials, crews in Australia have just finished a 44-kilometer (27-mile) fence to keep cats out of a sanctuary (The Guardian).
A report details the devastation that could arise from a massive dam on the Mekong River in Cambodia (The Guardian).
Limiting the global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) could save $20 trillion, a new study has found (Los Angeles Times).
Rice in a world with more carbon dioxide will pack fewer nutrients (The Guardian).
A new study predicts that climate change could boost the amount of arable land for agriculture by 44 percent by the end of the century (University of Leeds/Phys.Org).
Scientists hope to soften the damaging effects of coal mining on the Great Barrier Reef (News Deeply).
A mountain lion kills one cyclist and injures another in the state of Washington (National Geographic News).
Climate scientists suggest that the global temperature could rise by 4 degrees Celsius (7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels by 2100 (Institute of Atmospheric Physics/Chinese Academy of Sciences/EurekAlert).
Whale shark fishers in Gujarat, India, are now creating a haven for the world’s largest fish (The Hindu).
Biologists find the secrets behind the coyote’s expansion across North America (North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences/EurekAlert).
Conservation groups debate whether the trade in elephant body parts will help or hurt the animals in Africa and Asia (Conservation Action Trust).
Investigators trace the online sale of $4 million in illegal wildlife products (The Guardian).
Memo shows that the Trump administration has considered ignoring climate change research (The Washington Post).
The U.S. EPA keeps journalists out of a meeting on water contaminants in Washington, D.C. (The Guardian).
The plastic straw could become a thing of the past in New York City (The Guardian).
Being orphaned “dramatically” changes elephants’ behavior (Colorado State University/EurekAlert).
Noise in the ocean causes porpoises to flee (Hakai Magazine).
Researchers have sequenced the Bengal tiger’s genome (The Hindu).
Pollution and habitat loss could lead to an insect “armageddon” (The Guardian).
Fish feel pain, scientists say, potentially upending standard practices used to kill fish around the world (The Washington Post).
The Trump administration looks to repeal Obama-era regulations on “controversial” hunting and trapping practices in Alaska (The Guardian).
Banner image of a grizzly bear in Alaska via Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA-3.0).
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South Africa Today – Environment
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