Bolivia Forestry Officials Profit from Harvest of Illegal Wood

Yuri Neves reports for InSight Crime: Officials within the agency entrusted with protecting Bolivia’s forests falsified data and provided documents legitimizing the illegal harvesting of timber, a scheme that occurs throughout South America. René Noel Sivila Céspedes is accused of signing more than 2,096 documents that allowed for the clearing of protected areas while he was the…

Bolivia lost 18.7 million hectares of its Amazon forest in 13 years

Berthy Vaca reports for El Deber: The damage is revealed by a report called Amazonia at the crossroads, which looks at six activities that pressure and threaten the Amazon in nine countries. Agricultural expansion is one of the main causes of deforestation in the country. On June 5 of this year, an international report was…

Fracking in the Bolivian jungle

Stefan Cramer writes in the Ecologist: Bolivian farmers have been resisting gas exploration in the invaluable Tariquía National Reserve – but they need international support. Bolivian president Evo Morales was inaugurated in 2006 as the first indigenous person to be sworn in as a president of a sovereign nation. Since then, he has shown extraordinary…

Bolivia must practice what it preaches

Shannon Biggs and Nick Buxton report for The Ecologist: Bolivia’s first indigenous president set out a bold and inspiring vision to save the planet from climate and environmental breakdown just over ten years ago. In an open letter, Evo Morales said “Mother Earth is ill.” He urged the industrialised countries to drastically reduce emissions, increase technology…

Bolivia: Nature rights tribunal condemns TIPNIS project

Bolivian Thoughts opinion: evo’s acolytes have been disregarding this ruling … the production of coca leaves is far more interesting to them ,,, and of course for narcotrafficking … I would be extremely surprised to see evo back tracking to his relentless desire to cut in half the TIPNIS … he is pushing an illegitimate…