On March 6, Indigenous women from across the Ecuadorian Amazon traveled to Puyo for the inauguration event of the Casa de Mujeres Amazónicas, a gathering and healing space for Indigenous women defenders of the Amazon. It is a safe space where women can strategize, create, share, and heal together, including work on programming to support women’s...
As part of the 49th session of the UN Human Rights Council, more than 60 civil society organizations released a new report that evaluates 26 projects backed by Chinese companies and capital across nine Latin American countries. The investigation found a pattern of failure to comply with international standards on human rights and the environment...
If you have followed Amazon Watch’s campaigns over the years, the name Block 64 might ring a bell. Over the course of almost 30 years, the Peruvian government has encouraged a steady parade of international oil companies to explore and exploit the oil concession, located near the border with Ecuador. All have hit a major obstacle: the vehement...
Amid the onslaught of negative news, we welcome signs of progress. This Tuesday we received word that the confessed trigger-man in the fatal shooting of Indigenous leader Arbildo Meléndez has finally been captured. His widow, Zulema Guevara, has courageously fought for justice in her husband’s case, herself becoming the target of death threats.
2021 was full of highs and lows as we entered our second year in physical isolation from one another. We celebrated 25 years as an organization with our community, in deep solidarity with Indigenous peoples. We reflected on all that we have accomplished together and what challenges remain ahead.
Our Amazon Defenders Fund will continue mobilizing direct solidarity funds into the hands of Amazonian women wisdom keepers, healers, and ancestral authorities, who are resisting by practicing reciprocal and holistic interactions with the forest and Earth.
When you make a tax-deductible donation to Amazon Watch, you can count on your contribution being put to work effectively and immediately. As we work to achieve climate justice and a just transition for all, we always center Indigenous voices in the movement.
“Oil extraction in our Ecuadorian Amazon has brought pollution, diseases, deforestation, destruction of our cultures, and the colonization of our territories. It is an existential threat to us, and it violates our fundamental rights as Indigenous peoples."
NBC News | Waorani leader Nemo Guiquita has been fighting the expansion of oil drilling in her tribe’s ancestral homeland for years. She said her grandmother, Nayuma, was the first Waorani to make contact with the outside world 60 years ago. “The rainforest for us is home,” Guiquita said. “It’s our life, our pharmacy, our everything.”
“Oil drilling in our Amazon has brought contamination, disease, deforestation, destruction of our cultures, and the colonization of our territories. It is an existential threat for us and violates our fundamental rights as Indigenous peoples.”
New research shows that California is the world’s largest consumer of oil from the Amazon rainforest. California converts 50% of the Amazon oil exported globally into fuel for airports, corporations such as Amazon.com, trucking fleets such as PepsiCo, and retail gas giants such as COSTCO. This new investigation expands upon our previous research...
The Amazon is at a tipping point. It is not near, it’s here. To reverse/halt this tipping point, we have joined the call from Indigenous peoples and global scientists to protect 80% of the Amazon by 2025. Not 2030 and definitely not 2050. The time to act is now!
Over the last few decades, the Peruvian Amazon has become a hotspot for coca cultivation. Drug traffickers in the region have shown a willingness to destroy the rainforest and kill anyone in the name of profit. Indigenous leaders working to protect their Amazonian communities from land invasions, deforestation, and violence come into the cross...
Glasgow, UK – Undermining global hopes for meaningful action, the 26th annual Conference of Parties (COP26) climate summit in Glasgow concluded over the weekend without successfully addressing key drivers of the climate crisis, among them the destruction of the Amazon rainforest and the role of fossil fuels.
CONVOCA | More than 24,000 hectares of land occupied by three native communities in the Huanuco region are being taken over by invaders as runways used for drug trafficking and coca fields increase on their lands.
“The investigation clearly illustrates how Peruvian authorities violated Amazonian Indigenous peoples’ rights to their own territories, exposing them to land invasions, violence, and death."
The role of European lenders in backing the trade from the Amazon came under scrutiny in August 2020 after a report by advocacy groups Stand.earth and Amazon Watch looking at oil exports from the region to the United States.
Reuters | The role of European lenders in backing the trade from the Amazon came under scrutiny in August 2020 after a report by advocacy groups Stand.earth and Amazon Watch looking at oil exports from the region to the United States.
On November 1, climate activists and policy makers from all over the world will be convening at the 26th annual Conference of the Parties (COP) in Glasgow, Scotland to discuss global efforts to address the climate crisis.
Oakland, CA – Today, a broad coalition of over 170 NGOs, advocacy groups, and grassroots organizations spanning the globe released a statement opposing the usage of carbon offset programs, declaring that carbon offset programs are false solutions that will not solve the climate crisis.
We call on global policy makers to reject offset schemes and embrace real climate solutions that will keep fossil fuels in the ground, support sustainable food systems, and end deforestation, while eliminating pollution in frontline communities.
New York, NY – A virtual Climate Week event held today highlighted the critical role U.S. and European banks must play in ending oil and gas financing in the Amazon rainforest. The event, led by international environmental advocacy groups and Amazon Indigenous leaders, revealed a new "Exit Amazon Oil and Gas" campaign and exclusion policy that...
The Amazon has already lost 17 percent of its forest cover and an additional 17 percent of its rainforests have been degraded. If deforestation increases and surpasses the 20-25 percent threshold, this vital ecosystem will reach an irreversible tipping point of ecological collapse. The Amazon rainforest, as we've known it, could dive into the...
Marseille, France – Members of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) have approved motion 129, a call-to-action titled "Avoid the point of no return in the Amazon by protecting 80% by 2025." The motion – which was approved after several debates – was proposed by the Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin...
We are living in a world on fire. Over the past year, over 1,000 major fires have ravaged the Amazon rainforest, destroying millions of acres. At the same time, the North American west has seen its most destructive wildfire season in recorded history. Unlike the fires across North America and Europe, major fires in the Amazon are typically set...
In solidarity with Indigenous peoples and allies from around the world, we're launching a Global Week of Action for the Amazon from September 5 - 11 via the NooWorld app. NooWorld is a social platform made by activists, for activists to build worldwide solidarity for climate justice. By joining us, you'll gain a community of people who are also...
"Intesa's new commitment to exclude oil from the Amazon Headwaters region shows how banks can expand Amazon-specific exclusion policies beyond just trade financing. While the policy falls short of the call for banks to extend Amazon oil exclusions to the entire Amazon Biome, it illustrates how geographic exclusions are a necessary part of banks'...
The global climate and ecological crises are more alarming than ever. The Amazon rainforest now emits more carbon than it absorbs due to rampant burning and deforestation. As people around the globe suffer through worsening climate catastrophes, financial institutions continue to fund the corporations perpetuating ecological destruction and human...
Trading forest protection for continued greenhouse gas emissions presents a false and dangerous "solution" to the climate crisis. Instead, emissions must be drastically reduced, forests must be protected for their own sake, Indigenous forest stewardship must be recognized and respected, and the root causes of deforestation – namely commodity...
More than a decade after Avatar brought global attention to the destruction of Indigenous lands, Amazon Watch has released a new short video narrated by Oona Chaplin and featuring director James Cameron, legendary Chief Raoni Metuktire, and Goldman Prize winner Alessandra Korap Munduruku.
