Forests

"South America's vulnerable Amazon rainforest region is a rising frontier for oil and gas drilling."

"In a month’s time, nearly 200 countries will gather at the gates of the Amazon rainforest for a new round of United Nations-sponsored climate talks. But there is still intense discussion about what the main outcome ought to be."

"A U.S. Senate committee hearing Tuesday revealed the dramatically differing views regarding the potential benefits of the Fix Our Forests Act, a bipartisan proposal that critics say would lead to logging of old-growth trees and weaken the country's environmental laws."

"Brazilian farmers are lobbying to roll back deforestation restrictions in order to sell more soybeans to the huge Chinese market."

"Nations are not spending enough to ensure that the forests that cover nearly a third of the planet remain healthy, according to a new United Nations report. To meet various international climate, biodiversity and land restoration goals, annual global spending needs to triple to $300 billion by 2030, the report found."

"Global forest health has plunged to “dismal” levels and threatens the wellbeing of humanity, warns a damning report that highlights how financial systems are pouring money into land clearance and undermining efforts to reduce destruction."

"An environmental advocacy group has filed complaints under the Hatch Act against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Forest Service over what it described as “partisan” messaging blaming Democrats for the ongoing government shutdown."

"Countries in the Sahel region of Africa have made little progress on the “Great Green Wall,” a 5,000-mile-long band of trees planned for the southern edge of the Sahara Desert. Even where communities are planting new trees, few seedlings actually survive, new research shows."

"An illegal gold rush has cleared 140,000 hectares of rainforest in the Peruvian Amazon and is accelerating as foreign, armed groups move into the region to profit from record gold prices, according to a report."

"Critics say move to axe Bill Clinton’s ‘roadless rule’ that protected key old-growth forests will be devastating to environment"