• Much of the landscape of Indonesia’s East Kalimantan province has been transformed, its formerly vast forests razed for logging, monocrop agriculture and open-cast coal mining.
• A recently published study analyzes how waves of extractive industries have affected the inhabitants of one village in the province
• The cumulative impacts of these industries were found to be severe, but also to vary depending on multiple factors including ethnicity, gender, wealth and age.

Main photo: the roots of mangrove trees are seen along a river in Pitas, Sabah, Malaysia, July 6, 2018

Pristine parts of northern Kachin State are under threat as demand grows for high-tech devices that rely on rare earth.

Main photo: The leaching ponds at a rare earth mining site in Kachin State, where toxic chemicals are applied to dissolve the metals. (PHOTO: Maran)

Kachin State’s Chipwi Township in northernmost Myanmar is known for its pristine forests and crystal-clear water.

International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)  and the Land Portal are launching a new blog series on the governance of land-based investments in the Global South. The series will explore practical strategies and approaches adopted by rights defenders and others to address common challenges surrounding these investments.

• A subsidiary of South Korean paper company Moorim has cleared natural forests a tenth the size of Seoul in Indonesia’s Papua region over the past six years, a new report alleges.
• The report, published by various NGOs, alleges that the cleared areas consisted of primary forests serving as a habitat for threatened species and a source of livelihood for Indigenous Papuans.

Photo: South Sudan's Deputy Minister for Foreign and International Cooperation Deng Dau Deng Malek met Agriculture Minister Muhammad Abdur Razzaque in Dhaka on Tuesday. Photo: Collected

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African country South Sudan wants to lease its vast fallow land to Bangladesh for producing crops.

South Sudan's Deputy Minister for Foreign and International Cooperation Deng Dau Deng Malek placed the proposal in a meeting with Agriculture Minister Muhammad Abdur Razzaque in Dhaka today.

Almost half (46%) of investors surveyed in sub-Saharan Africa have experienced disputes with local communities over land, new research from the ODI and TMP Systems has found.

As part of an ongoing initiative to facilitate responsible land investment, experts have warned companies are failing to avoid serious risks both to themselves and local communities, even though it makes financial sense to do so.

The inside story of Sun Guangxin’s plan for a wind farm in the Lone Star state and how it incurred the wrath of U.S. lawmakers and environmentalists, becoming a flashpoint in U.S.-China relations.

The Chinese contractor has said it cannot start work on Kalanki-Maharajgunj section until the electricity poles are removed. The work is already delayed by a year.

The second phase of Ring Road widening work involving the 8.2 km Kalanki-Maharajgunj section is still in limbo as the high-voltage power lines in the Samakhusi area have yet to be shifted.

The Department of Roads blames the Nepal Electricity Authority for the delay.

When a small group of armed insurgents in cars arrived in a village in the Wakhan Corridor, it put a sharp focus on Beijing’s role in this nation shattered by more than four decades of war.

Main photo: A Kyrgyz family in the Wakhan Corridor, a narrow strip of land that connects Afghanistan to China. CREDIT: MARTA PASCUAL JUANOLA

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