Coffee drives tropical deforestation, but it doesn’t have to

Mongabay Newscast

#Science #Environment #Mongabay.com #Natural Sciences #Research #Natural #Animation

40:22

There’s only so much you can do in a week – or, according to Oliver Burkeman, in the roughly 4,000 weeks the average human lives. Oliver is a journalist and author of the books Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, Meditations for Mortals, and the newsletter “The Imperfectionist.” Chris and Oliver discuss the paradox of why change can only occur once we accept that we might not be able to change. Oliver also shares how life’s mishaps can become our most treasured memories and why sharing your imperfections is an act of generosity. For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts For a chance to give your own TED Talk, fill out the Idea Search Application: ted.com/ideasearch . Interested in learning more about upcoming TED events? Follow these links: TEDNext: ted.com/futureyou Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.…

about a year ago 45:10

MP3•Episode home

Etelle Higonnet is the founder of the NGO Coffee Watch, having formerly served as a senior adviser at the U.S. National Wildlife Federation. The main commodity on her radar now is coffee. On this podcast episode, she explains how the industry can — and should — reform its practices.

"It's so simple … pay a living [a] living income wage," she says, " and a lot of human rights violations will just dry up."

To target deforestation, Higonnet says the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is "a beautiful law" that "simply put, would bar imports of coffee into the European Union if that coffee is tainted by deforestation or illegality. So, two things that are illegal off the top of my head are slavery and child labor."

Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website.

Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com.

Image Credit: A cup of coffee with beans and a teaspoon on a stump tabletop. Image by Anja (cocoparisiene) from Pixabay (Pixabay Content License).

---

Timecodes

(00:00) Coffee tied to slavery and deforestation

(07:03) How we can stop it

(12:36) Why are prices soaring?

(19:25) How the EUDR can help

(25:56) When will the EUDR come into effect?

(29:40) Why the coffee supply chain is simple

(33:54) What about certification schemes?

(37:46) What coffee drinkers can do to act

322 episodes

Mongabay Newscast

Coffee drives tropical deforestation, but it doesn’t have to

Mongabay Newscast

40 subscribers

published about a year ago

MP3•Episode home

"It's so simple … pay a living [a] living income wage," she says, " and a lot of human rights violations will just dry up."

Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website.

Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com.

Image Credit: A cup of coffee with beans and a teaspoon on a stump tabletop. Image by Anja (cocoparisiene) from Pixabay (Pixabay Content License).

---

Timecodes

(00:00) Coffee tied to slavery and deforestation

(07:03) How we can stop it

(12:36) Why are prices soaring?

(19:25) How the EUDR can help

(25:56) When will the EUDR come into effect?

(29:40) Why the coffee supply chain is simple

(33:54) What about certification schemes?

(37:46) What coffee drinkers can do to act

322 episodes

#Science #Environment #Mongabay.com #Natural Sciences #Research #Natural #Animation

All episodes

Mongabay Newscast

1
Rewilding England and the world, one acre at a time 56:59

9 hours ago56:59

56:59

Rewilding advocate, financier and host of the popular podcast Rewilding the World , Ben Goldsmith, joins Mongabay’s podcast to discuss nature restoration in his home country of England, where a significant cultural change is taking hold toward reviving biodiversity, such as beavers . Once seen as a nuisance there, many farmers and planners now embrace the rebound of the huge rodent, thanks to its impressive ability to mitigate flooding events that the island nation now experiences with regularity, due to climate change. “If you stop a random person on the street now, in the city or in the countryside, they know that beavers are back, that [they] are native species, that they play a vital role in managing our rivers,” he says. However, he argues that while there has been some rewilding momentum in England, it’s not happening fast enough, particularly for larger carnivores like wolves. “The idea of reintroducing them is considered madness. Even though there are news reports of swelling populations of deer and growing incidents of Lyme disease and road traffic collisions and a disequilibrium in our forests,” Goldsmith says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: Chrome Hill in Yorkshire, England. Image by Tim Hill via Pixabay (Pixabay free content license ). Timecodes ------ (00:00) “We don’t have wildlife here” (11:46) England’s rewilding comeback (15:05) Cultural and economic shifts (25:24) Changing environment policy (30:52) Nitrogen and pollinators (37:43) Getting along with ‘difficult’ wildlife (47:51) Rewilding the World…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Alan Weisman’s ‘Hope Dies Last’ weaves stories of environmental hope 55:29

8 days ago55:29

55:29

On this week’s episode of Mongabay’s podcast, best-selling author Alan Weisman details the people and places he visited in reporting his new book, Hope Dies Last , a chronicle of miraculous accomplishments and resilience of the book’s protagonists, many of whom are working to solve humanity’s most intractable ecological problems. The book’s impetus was an accumulation of despair at the state of the world and how humanity treats it. “I started this book because I was really, really, really depressed about how I saw systems breaking down,” Weisman says. But as he uncovered each story, Weisman’s tune changed. He explains the ingenuity and bravery of the people and projects he visited that altered his perspective on what is possible. “By the end of this book, I was so uplifted by all these people — and by the variety of people — that I found, in the most extraordinarily different circumstances, each of them daring to hope and oftentimes succeeding, that I'm there with them. This ain't over.” Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: Kicker Rock in the Galápagos, Ecuador. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. Timecodes ------- (00:00) The Mesopotamian Revitalization Project (07:56) Why does Hope struggle against itself? (13:27) Creating food from thin air (24:06) Suing the government to protect species (31:03) The most dangerous country Alan visited, the U.S. (35:54) New forms of energy (45:39) Power is the most addictive drug (51:53) This ain’t over…

Mongabay Newscast

1
How empathy and spiritual ecology can heal humanity’s rift with nature 48:54

14 days ago48:54

48:54

The Nature Of is a new podcast series from the nonprofit nature and culture magazine Atmos that speaks with prominent figures in conservation and culture about how humans relate to the natural world, and how they might heal and strengthen that relationship. On this episode of Mongabay’s podcast, its host and Atmos editor-in-chief Willow Defebaugh details the series’ resulting revelations and why her publication covers the environment through the lens of community, identity, arts and culture. “From the beginning, we knew that we wanted to invite creative storytellers and artists into this conversation alongside scientists and journalists,” she explains. Storytelling and the arts, she says, house rarely tapped potential for helping people place themselves in the context of nature: “I think that what we need is to be changing people's hearts, not just minds.” Defebaugh also highlights how little individual action is actually needed to inspire greater collective action among the public, a fact that Harvard researchers revealed : only 3.5% of the public needs to be engaged in non-violent resistance for a movement to succeed. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: Willow Defebaugh, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Atmos. Image courtesy of Camila Falquez/Atmos. --- Timecodes (00:00) The nature of relationships (11:24) Why science and empathy go together (16:23) On ‘spiritual ecology’ (20:43) Meditations on how humans see nature (23:41) Willow’s inspiration (26:10) Identity, community & nature (28:43) Art & culture (31:10) Biomimicry (36:38) Collective vs individual action (43:14) Speaking of solutions…

Mongabay Newscast

1
How Singapore leads the way in urban-wildlife coexistence 42:15

21 days ago42:15

42:15

Singapore has come a long way since the 1880s, when only roughly 7% of its native forests remained. Since the 1960s, when the city-state gained independence, it has implemented a number of urban regreening initiatives, and today, nearly 47% of the city is considered green space, providing numerous benefits to human residents and wildlife, like heat mitigation, freshwater conservation and cleanliness, carbon sequestration, coastal climate adaptation, biodiversity protection, and public enjoyment. To discuss his city’s regreening efforts — from the philosophical to the practical applications of methods and mindset shifts that have allowed the city to revitalize its urban wildlife interface — Anuj Jain, director and principal ecologist at the biomimicry consultancy bioSEA and an adviser to BirdLife International, joins Mongabay’s latest podcast. “ Through the greening initiatives in Singapore, it's attracted a lot of species, many of which actually had declined before, some even had gone extinct, or locally extinct,” Jain says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: Supertree grove is part of the Gardens by the Bay (GBTB) urban park in Singapore, covering 105 hectares (260 acres). Image by Tien Tran (tientran0019) via Pixabay ( Pixabay Content License ). -- Timecodes (00:00) Making the ‘city in a garden’ (10:01) What Singapore looks like today (13:51) The many benefits of urban greenery (20:53) Ecology and biomimicry design (24:30) Cleaner, more plentiful water (25:55) Urban regreening in the Middle East (29:16) To densify, or not to densify? (33:04) Where Singapore still struggles (36:33) Living more harmoniously with wildlife…

Mongabay Newscast

1
How to change harmful narratives about nature and society 37:23

28 days ago37:23

37:23

Narratives help shape our society, culture and environment, entrenching beliefs that can help — or harm — our planet and human rights. Tsering Yangzom Lama , story manager at Greenpeace International , joins Mongabay's podcast to explain how dominant narratives — stories shaped by existing power structures and institutions — often undergird destructive industries and favor the powerful and the wealthy, and to discuss what people can do to counter such narratives. In this interview, she expands upon thoughts shared in the essay “How to Reject Dominant Narratives,” from the new book Tools to Save Our Home Planet , published by Patagonia Books . "A dominant narrative in reality would be anything that supports the status quo … what we have right now is a system in which we're trashing the world in which a small minority is profiting off of that destruction, and in which the vast majority of humanity does not have the basic necessities for a dignified human existence," she says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: Emergent tree in the Amazon Rainforest, Ecuador. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. --- Timecodes (00:00) What is a dominant narrative? (08:04) Understand how they work (12:56) Countering the narrative (17:56) Making a more compelling appeal (20:31) The real goal is to change our conditions (23:32) When movements get co-opted (26:20) Conversation is key (28:49) Creating a narrative where none exists…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Cash for community conservation is tight, but this nonprofit unlocks it 45:44

6 weeks ago45:44

45:44

Jean-Gaël "JG" Collomb says community-based conservation organizations know best how to tackle the complex conservation challenges unique to their ecosystems. However, they’re also among the most underserved in terms of funding of all stripes. On this week's episode of Mongabay's podcast, Collomb explains how his nonprofit, Wildlife Conservation Network (WCN), is working to change that. When it comes to funding conservation," it's really difficult to know who to give your money to besides a handful of organizations that a lot of people are familiar with," Collomb says. WCN facilitates partnerships between community-based conservation groups, primarily in Global South nations with funders, in what has previously been described as “‘venture capital for conservation,” or as Collomb says, “people invest in people.” They are “the first actors,” he says. “We're huge fans of being able to encourage people to give unrestricted [funding] … those organizations who are based on the ground in the field know best how to use that money.” Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Banner image: Beach on Mioskon Island in Raja Ampat. Photo by Rhett Bulter/Mongabay. ------ Timecodes (00:00) Why community-based conservation? (09:54) How WCN works (14:10) The importance of unrestricted funding (16:48) Transparency & ethics in philanthropy (19:59) 30x30 and Indigenous sovereignty (27:08) Scientific advancements (31:16) Either/or (35:33) USAID funding cuts (40:29) Connecting with WCN…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Are Rivers Alive? Author Robert Macfarlane argues they are. 1:04:07

7 weeks ago1:04:07

1:04:07

This week on Mongabay's podcast, celebrated author and repeat Nobel Prize in Literature candidate Robert Macfarlane discusses his fascinating new book, Is a River Alive? , which both asks and provides answers to this compelling question, in his signature flowing prose. Its absorbing narrative takes the reader to the frontlines of some of Earth's most embattled waterways, from northern Ecuador to southern India and northeastern Quebec, where he explores what makes a river more than just a body of water, but rather a living organism upon which many humans and myriad species are irrevocably dependent — a fact that is often forgotten. Regardless of whether humans see rivers as useful resources or living beings, Macfarlane says their great ability to rebound from degradation is demonstrable and is something to strive for. " When I think of how we have to imagine rivers otherwise, away from the pure resource model, I recognize that we can reverse the direction of 'shifting baseline’ syndrome. We can make it ‘lifting baseline’ syndrome. We can make our rivers touchable, then swimmable, then drinkable again. Drinkable rivers. Imagine that!" Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Banner image: The author Robert Macfarlane. Photo by Bryan Appleyard. Courtesy of Robert Macfarlane. -------- Timecodes (00:00) The liquid asset story (05:42) The beginning of the ‘hydrocene’ (12:49) Is a river alive? (20:01) ‘Rights of nature’ (30:02) Landmarks of hope & looming threats (35:41) ‘Slow violence’ (39:43) ‘A gathering that seeks the sea’ (45:13) Public waterways under private ownership (48:59) How the Cuyahoga River caught fire (53:58) Collective health over private wealth…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Coffee drives tropical deforestation, but it doesn’t have to 45:10

8 weeks ago45:10

45:10

Roughly a billion people enjoy coffee daily, and more than 100 million people rely on it for income. However, the coffee industry is the sixth-largest driver of deforestation and is also rife with human rights abuses , including the labor of enslaved persons and children. But it doesn't have to be this way, says this guest on the Mongabay Newscast. Etelle Higonnet is the founder of the NGO Coffee Watch , having formerly served as a senior adviser at the U.S. National Wildlife Federation. The main commodity on her radar now is coffee. On this podcast episode, she explains how the industry can — and should — reform its practices. "It's so simple … pay a living [a] living income wage," she says, " and a lot of human rights violations will just dry up." To target deforestation, Higonnet says the European Union Deforestation Regulation ( EUDR ) is "a beautiful law" that "simply put, would bar imports of coffee into the European Union if that coffee is tainted by deforestation or illegality. So, two things that are illegal off the top of my head are slavery and child labor." Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Image Credit: A cup of coffee with beans and a teaspoon on a stump tabletop. Image by Anja ( cocoparisiene ) from Pixabay ( Pixabay Content License ). --- Timecodes (00:00) Coffee tied to slavery and deforestation (07:03) How we can stop it (12:36) Why are prices soaring? (19:25) How the EUDR can help (25:56) When will the EUDR come into effect? (29:40) Why the coffee supply chain is simple (33:54) What about certification schemes? (37:46) What coffee drinkers can do to act…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Lessons from 30 years of successfully fending off mines in an Ecuadorian cloud forest 38:15

9 weeks ago38:15

38:15

Carlos Zorrilla has been living in an Ecuadorian cloud forest since the 1970s, and his last 30 years there have been spent fighting mining companies seeking to extract its large copper deposits. He and his community have successfully fought such proposals by multiple firms in one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet, but sometimes at great personal risk, he tells Mongabay's podcast. While his organization, Defensa y Conservación Ecológica de Intag ( DECOIN ), and allies in the local community notched a major victory against mining there in a 2023 court case, he explains they're still not out of the proverbial woods. "Every day, I have to think about mining [and] I'm not exaggerating, my life now revolves around mining. Even though we won a case, I know they're going to come back because the copper's there, and there's a lot of demand for copper." His advice to anyone who wants to protect their community from mining is to go on the offensive, early and aggressively , comparing the strategy to how one might view treating cancer. "You have to think of it like a cancer, that you need to treat it immediately and you need to look for signs that your body, in this case, your community, is sick,” Zorrilla says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Please send questions, feedback or comments to podcast[at]mongabay[dot]com. Banner image : Carlos Zorrilla in the DECOIN office in Apuela, Ecuador. Photo by Romi Castagnino. ----- Timecodes (00:00) A victory for Intag Valley (07:19) The influence of ‘rights of nature’ laws (09:57) The return of vulnerable fauna (15:56) Reprieve is only temporary (22:02) Mining companies omit important information (25:07) ‘How to stop’ mining before it starts (30:52) “Every day, I have to think about mining”…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Kim Stanley Robinson's 'Ministry for the Future' has lessons for the present 55:58

10 weeks ago55:58

55:58

Five years since Kim Stanley Robinson's groundbreaking climate fiction novel, The Ministry for the Future , hit The New York Times bestseller list, the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning writer shares reflections on themes explored in the book and how they apply directly to the world today. The utopian novel set in a not-so-distant future depicts how humans address climate change and the biodiversity crisis , toppling oligarchic control of governments and addressing chronic inequality. Robinson explains how the novel works as ”a kind of cognitive map of the way the world is going now, the way things work and the way things might be bettered. And also a sort of sense of hope or resiliency in the face of the reversals that will inevitably come along the way.“ In this conversation, he also explains how storytelling can help humans fight a “war of ideas” and speaks about challenging economic inequities with what he calls “postcapitalism.” Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. For general questions or comments, email us at podcasts[at]mongabay[dot]com . Image Credit: Screenshot of the book cover for ‘The Ministry for the Future’ by Kim Stanley Robinson, published by Orbit. Cover art by Trevillion Images. Cover design by Lauren Panepinto. --- Timecodes (00:00) What Stan would change about the book today (07:56) We’re all ‘in a sci-fi novel we’re co-authoring together’ (13:37) Challenging capitalism with ‘post-capitalism’ (19:43) Is ‘Degrowth’ part of the Ministry for the Future? (23:45) About Frank (27:24) The inspiration for Mary Murphy (30:34) The threat of ‘wet bulb’ 35C temps (36:37) How to fight a ‘war of ideas’ (42:21) You cannot kill the future (46:26) Before you read the book… (49:27) Looking to Antarctica…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Why protected Congo rainforests look 'like a war zone' 30:09

12 weeks ago30:09

30:09

Nearly half of the Republic of Congo’s dense rainforests are protected under the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) framework to receive climate finance payments, but Mongabay Africa staff writer Elodie Toto’s recent investigation revealed the nation has also granted nearly 80 gold mining and exploration permits in areas covered by the project, driving deforestation and negatively impacting local people and wildlife. As the world scrambles for new sources of gold during these uncertain economic times, she joins the podcast to explain what her Pulitzer Center-supported reporting uncovered: "It was beyond words, if I may say. I could see people using excavators to uproot trees. I could see them washing the earth and it basically looked [like] a war zone," Toto says on this episode of the podcast. Toto is also part of Mongabay Africa's team producing a new French-language podcast, Planète Mongabay , and discusses how the program makes environmental news more accessible to audiences who often prefer to get their news via audio or video. Subscribe to or follow theMongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Cover image: An excavator digs for gold at the Alangong-Bamegod-Inès mining site in the Sangha. According to environmentalist Justin Chekoua, “nothing seems to be done” to preserve biodiversity at the site. Image by Elodie Toto for Mongabay. ---- Timecodes (00:00) Rainforest given over to gold mining (10:17) Curious connections & justifications (17:34) The law of the land (22:03) In plain sight (25:33) Planète Mongabay…

Mongabay Newscast

1
Inspiring action for the ocean wins top environmental prize for ex-engineer 25:08

13 weeks ago25:08

25:08

Carlos Mallo Molina has been awarded the 2025 Goldman Environmental Prize for protecting the marine biodiversity of Tenerife, the most populated of the Canary Islands. On this episode of Mongabay's podcast, Molina explains what led him to quit his job as a civil engineer on a road project impacting the Teno-Rasca marine protected area (MPA) and his subsequent campaign to stop the port project it was planned to connect to, which would have impacted the biodiversity of the area. His successful campaign contributed to the decision of the Canary Islands government to abandon the port plan. Now, Molina and his nonprofit Innoceana are helping set up an environmental education center in its place. "I was going diving every weekend in my free time, and it was full of sea turtles, it was full of whales, it was full of marine life. And so, I think understanding how my impact was going to destroy [a] marine protected area … I think that was where I had my biggest click in my brain … I need to do something to change what I'm doing, in [a] way that I can protect this ocean," he says. Image Credit: Pinnacles of Fonsalía, Tenerife, Canary Islands. Photo by Innoceana. B-roll Credit: Goldman Environmental Prize Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. --- Timecodes (00:00) From engineer to activist (05:31) The biodiversity of Teno-Rasca (06:58) Fighting for protection (12:13) Shutting the port down (16:29) A future of sustainable tourism? (21:02) Future projects (22:19) Carlos’ connection to the ocean…

Mongabay Newscast

1
‘De-extinction’ is misleading and dangerous, ecologist says 42:26

14 weeks ago42:26

42:26

A biotech company in the United States made headlines last month by revealing photos of genetically modified gray wolves, calling them “dire wolves,” a species that hasn’t existed for more than 10,000 years. Colossal Biosciences edited 14 genes among millions of base pairs in gray wolf DNA to arrive at the pups that were shown, leaving millions of genetic differences between these wolves and real dire wolves. This hasn’t stopped some observers from asserting to the public that “de-extinction” is real. But it’s not , says podcast guest Dieter Hochuli, a professor at the Integrative Ecology Lab at the University of Sydney. Hochuli explains why ecologists like him say de-extinction isn’t just a misleading term, but a dangerous one that promotes false hope and perverse incentives at the expense of existing conservation efforts that are proven to work. "The problem with the word de-extinction for many ecologists is that we see extinction [as] being an irreversible event that has finality about it, a bit like death. The idea that you can reverse those sorts of things is anathema, I think, biologically, but also philosophically and ethically," Hochuli says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Image Credit : Thylacines, female and male in the National Zoo Washington D.C. Mike DiGirolamo is a host & associate producer for Mongabay based in Sydney. He co-hosts and edits the Mongabay Newscast. Find him on LinkedIn and Bluesky . ------ Time codes (00:00) They aren’t dire wolves (03:57) Why extinction is final (04:50) Ecological barriers to ‘de-extinction’ (12:25) Problems with species reintroduction (20:25) How ‘de-extinction’ can mislead (25:32) Is conservation a zero-sum game? (31:58) Can this technology truly aid conservation? (39:24) Is the marketing hype justified?…

Mongabay Newscast

1
How the sounds of whales guide conservation efforts 38:39

15 weeks ago38:39

38:39

Biological oceanographer John Ryan joins Mongabay’s podcast to discuss his team’s multiyear study that examined vocalizations of baleen whales, including blue ( Balaenoptera musculus ), humpback ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) and fin whales ( Balaenoptera physalus ), and how this science is critical for understanding their feeding habits, and thus informing their conservation. The study found that these whales’ songs rise and fall with their food supply , which provides valuable insights into how changing ocean conditions can affect their health and guide management measures. “Some of the research we did tracking the movement and ecology of blue whales helped our sanctuary [to] act on this long-term concern about ship strikes, and to join a program that is called Protecting Blue Whales and Blue Skies ,” the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) researcher says. Subscribe to or follow the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify , and you can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. This episode is dedicated to the memory of Mongabay’s East Africa editor, Ochieng’ Ogodo. Read here about his life, legacy and achievements. Audio credit: Blue and humpback whale calls featured in this episode are courtesy of MBARI and John Ryan. Image credit: A humpback whale dips back beneath the surface of the ocean. Image courtesy of Cristina Mittermeier/SeaLegacy. ------- Timecodes (00:00) Marine heatwaves and their impact (06:33) Analyzing whale songs (12:30) A change in tune (20:13) Interspecies communication? (25:16) The reason behind the heat (27:36) Informing conservation (36:52) Credits…

Mongabay Newscast

1
How a prize-winning project brought saiga antelope back from the brink 31:02

17 weeks ago31:02