In a series of previous reports, and in collaboration with SOS Orinoco, we have tracked the illegal gold mining deforestation and related impacts in Yapacana National Park, located in the Venezuelan Amazon. Critically, some of this illegal mining activity has been happening on top of the Yapacana tepui (see red circles in Intro Image). Tepuis are […]
Last year, in collaboration with the organization SOS Orinoco, we published an urgent report about illegal mining on top of a sacred tepui in the heart of Yapacana National Park in Venezuela (MAAP #169). Tepuis are stunning table-top mountains found in northern South America. They are considered sacred by indigenous groups of the region; in fact, the word tepui means “house […]
We continue our series on the Venezuelan Amazon (see MAAP #155), with a special focus on the key protected area of Yapacana National Park. In recent reports, we showed that Yapacana is currently experiencing intense illegal mining activity with likely thousands of miners (see MAAP #156), including on top of the sacred Yapacana Tepui (see […]
Tepuis are stunning table-top mountains found in northern South America. They are considered sacred by indigenous groups of the region; in fact, the word tepui means “house of the gods” in a local indigenous language. Tepuis also have high levels of endemism since they are not connected to other ranges. However, we have documented active […]
We present the second report in our series focused on the Venezuelan Amazon. The first (MAAP #155) documented the loss of over 140,000 hectares (345,000 acres) of primary forest over the past four years. We also zoomed in on the major hotspots, showing that mining is one of the primary deforestation drivers, including in protected areas. Here we […]
As gold prices continue to increase, small-scale gold mining activity also continues to be one of the major deforestation drivers across the Amazon. It often targets remote areas, thus impacting carbon-rich primary forests. Moreover, in many cases, we presume that this mining is illegal based on its location within conservation areas (such as protected areas and […]
Gold Mining is one of the major deforestation drivers across the Amazon.* It often targets remote areas, thus impacting carbon-rich primary forests. Moreover, in most cases, this mining is illegal, given that it is occurring in protected areas and indigenous territories. Given the vastness of the Amazon, however, it has been a challenge to accurately monitor mining deforestation across the […]
The first MAAP report, published in March 2015, took a detailed look at the escalating gold mining deforestation in the Peruvian Amazon. The following 198 reports, over the past 8.5 years, continued to examine the most urgent deforestation-related issues across the Amazon. For our 200th report, we provide our rapid assessment of the current state […]
Illegal Gold Mining continues to be one of the major issues facing nearly all Amazonian countries. In fact, following the recent high-level summit of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization, the nations’ leaders signed the Belém Declaration, which contains a commitment to prevent and combat illegal mining, including strengthened regional and international cooperation (Objective 32). Illegal […]
We present a detailed look at the major 2022 Amazon forest loss hotspots, based on the final annual data recently released by the University of Maryland (and featured on Global Forest Watch). This dataset is unique in that it is consistent across all nine countries of the Amazon, and distinguishes forest loss from fire, leaving the rest as […]
