Latest Amazon River News
Brazilian state law overturns soy moratorium that helped curb Amazon deforestation
AGUA CLARA, Brazil (AP) — A historic agreement that's helped curb deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon for nearly two decades suffered a major blow after Mato Grosso, the country´s largest soybean-producing state, passed a law ending incentives for participating processing and trade companies. ...
Brazil fines meatpacking companies, including giant JBS, for buying illegally raised cattle
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — Brazil's environmental agency has levied $64 million in fines against 23 meatpacking companies and their suppliers for buying and selling cattle raised illegally on deforested land in the Amazon. The operation, dubbed Cold Meat 2, launched last week. It...
Criminals may be leveraging climate change as record acreage burns in Brazil's Amazon
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — Wildfires in Brazil have swept through an area the size of Switzerland, a level of destruction that will take decades to recover, if it ever does, according to a new satellite assessment. The breadth of forest that has been lost or degraded was revealed as...
In Colombia, Amazon River's extreme drought falls hard on Indigenous communities
LETICIA, Colombia (AP) — Marciano Flores stood knee-deep in the Amazon River with the rest of his crew, ready to haul in a giant net as a man in a canoe circled in an attempt to drive fish their way. At 69, after a life of working the river, Flores can tell at a glance just the right spots to...
A Brazilian artist uses ash and mud for a massive Sao Paulo mural lamenting climate disasters
SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazilian artist Mundano on Wednesday is presenting a massive street mural in Sao Paulo that uses ash from wildfires and mud from floods to highlight extreme weather events wreaking devastation across the country — as well as their causes. Over 30 meters (98.4...
Efforts to combat deforestation in Colombia hindered because of armed groups, report finds
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Armed groups operating in Colombia's Amazon are tightening their grip on the region and that's stalling government efforts to tackle deforestation, according to a think tank report Thursday. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) dissidents,...
Drought has dried a major Amazon River tributary to its lowest level in over 122 years
MANAUS, Brazil (AP) — One of the Amazon River’s main tributaries has dropped to its lowest level ever recorded, Brazil’s geological service said Friday, reflecting a severe drought that has devastated the Amazon rainforest and other parts of the country. The level of the Negro...
Dramatic images show drought's toll on Amazon and its rivers
MANAUS, Brazil (AP) — Drought is devastating Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, and some rivers are falling to historic lows. Images of one of the Amazon River’s main tributaries, the Negro River, show just how dramatically water is dwindling. When The Associated Press photographed...
Brazil's Lula talks climate at UN, but Amazon fires back home undermine his message
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva opened the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday with a call for the world to do more to combat climate change. He mentioned the fires ravaging the rainforest back home — but not the fact they're adding to criticism of his...
Brazil court drops a suspect in Amazon slayings of a British journalist and an Indigenous advocate
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — A federal court in Brazil dismissed charges Tuesday against one of three men arrested for the killings of Indigenous peoples expert Bruno Pereira and British journalist Dom Phillips in the Amazon, ruling there wasn’t enough evidence to try him. Oseney da...
