Eye on the Amazon

December 6, 2018 – While Ecuadorian government officials were busy touting the country's advances to reduce emissions at COP 24 in Poland, activists gathered outside the country's Environment Ministry to protest government plans to greatly expand oil drilling in its remote Amazon rainforest and indigenous lands. These are fossil fuels the planet can ill afford to burn.

November 27, 2018 – Not only do offset programs allow continued pollution, but these particular forest protection schemes have a poor track record of actually protecting forests and often lead to the displacement of indigenous peoples who have stewarded their lands for millennia. Plus, offset schemes hurt the communities – predominantly people of color and indigenous peoples – who live on the fence lines of industrial polluters around the world because they allow those polluters to continue spewing toxins into the air.

November 1, 2018 – Día de los Muertos is traditionally a day for remembering and honoring those who have come before us. For those of us committed to environmental justice, that often includes remembering those who have lost their lives resisting the impacts of pollution, deforestation, and land grabbing. In this celebration of resistance, of course we also took action: we delivered over one million petitions calling on California Governor Jerry Brown to phase out fossil fuel drilling and production in California.

October 31, 2018 – The extreme right-wing candidate Jair Bolsonaro was elected Brazil's president on Sunday in a victory that hands him a powerful mandate to enact a series of sweeping changes to the country's political, economic, social, and environmental order. His victory represents a profound setback for human rights and ecological preservation in the world's fourth largest democracy, with implications for the entire planet, particularly global climate stability.

October 24, 2018 – Now more than ever, Amazon Watch will redouble its work in solidarity with our embattled partners, from remote communities in the Brazilian Amazon to national organizations. Together, we shall power a resistance movement against the abomination of Jair Bolsonaro, forging solutions in defense of the rainforest's irreplaceable ecosystems and cultures.

We find hope in indigenous solutions

October 19, 2018 – Scientists have finally caught up with the lived experience and traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples. As the Florida Panhandle picks up the pieces and North Carolina recovers from its second hurricane in less than a month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has issued its most dire warning yet.