• The Harita Group holds a nickel mining concession covering about 1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) on Wawonii Island.
• The arrival of the mine has divided the community between those who support the development and farmers hoping to retain their fruit and nut trees.
• One man described his grief as the grave of his son was exhumed and moved as a result of the mine.

WAWONII ISLAND, Indonesia — The coconut palm has been a source of food and identity for centuries among the people of Wawonii Island.

(AFP)

El gobierno hondureño de Xiomara Castro declaró al país "libre de minería a cielo abierto" y anunció la "cancelación" de las licencias, permisos y concesiones, hecho celebrado por ambientalistas y que pone en jaque a la industria.

"Se declara todo el territorio hondureño libre de minería a cielo abierto (...) y se procederá a la revisión, suspensión y cancelación de las licencias ambientales, permisos y concesiones", dijo el lunes en un comunicado la Secretaría de Energía, Recursos Naturales, Ambiente y Minas.

ONE year ago, on July 27, 2020, three tribes who live around the border between Indonesia’s Kampung Naga area in Boven Digoel, Papua, and Kampung Kuem in Papua New Guinea, sent a claim letter to Tunas Timber Lestari. Representatives of the Kuranop, Ekogi, and Gembenop tribes protested against operations carried out by the subsidiary of the Korindo Group, as it infringed their customary land.

President Joko Widodo claimed that deforestation in Indonesia is at its lowest point in the past 20 years. Indonesia’s Nationally Determined Contribution emissions reduction report to the United Nations said that there were only 39,285 hectares of deforested areas in 2013 to 2020. A Tempo investigation in Papua found otherwise: The area of deforestation from 2019 to 2020 alone covered 19,807 hectares. Timber companies have violated some regulations about forest conservation management and have illegally produced wood.

In July 2021, a French court ruled against a group of Indigenous Bunong farmers from Mondulkiri in Northeastern Cambodia. Represented by French Laywer Fiodor Rilov, and with civil society support, the group accused the French Bolloré Group and their subsidiary company, Compagnie du Cambodge (controlled by Socfinasia) of illegal land seizures and the wanton destruction of Bunong sacred forests and their way of life.

• Botum Sakor National Park in southern Cambodia has lost at least 30,000 hectares of forest over the past three decades.
• Decades of environmental degradation go back to the late 1990s when the Cambodian government began handing out economic land concessions for the development of commercial plantations and tourist infrastructure.
• NGOs in Cambodia are said to be unwilling to speak out against the destruction of Botum Sakor because they are afraid they will not be allowed to operate in the country if they do.

The Congo Basin contains the world's second-largest rainforest, crucial for regulating the world's climate. Inside it, a plan to halt the forest's decline is bearing fruit.

With a gentle tug of his left hand, Patrick Wasa-Nziabo eases dozens of kernels from a sun-dried cob and into a large plastic bucket brimming with lemon-yellow corn at his bare feet.

• Reconnaissance Energy Africa, an oil and gas company with headquarters in Canada, has recently begun exploratory drilling in northern Namibia.
• Conservationists and local communities are concerned over the potential environmental impact that oil and gas extraction could have on such an important ecosystem.
• Northern Namibia and Botswana have a number of interconnected watersheds including the Okavango Delta – the potential for pollutants to enter watercourses and spread throughout the region are a particular concern.

On December 21, Reconnaissance Energy Af