Mongabay Newscast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

Hello listeners. This week on the Mongabay Newscast, we ask that you take a few minutes to fill out a brief survey to let us know what you think of our audio reporting, which you can do here.

Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler was recently awarded the Henry Shaw Medal by the Missouri Botanical Garden and named to the 2025 Forbes Sustainability Leaders list alongside conservation greats such as David Attenborough. The credit for this success belongs to Mongabay, Butler says on this week's podcast.

"While my name is on the award, it's for Mongabay. All that Mongabay achieves is not necessarily me. I'm the figurehead," Butler says of receiving the Henry Shaw Medal.

Butler also shares his thoughts and reflections on the passing of his longtime friend, and conservation icon, Jane Goodall, through whom he learned to see the value in hope and optimism.

"The biggest thing I took away from my relationship with Jane … is the importance of hope," he says. "She was truly a messenger for hope."

You can read Butler's obituary for Jane Goodall here.

Find the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify. All past episodes are also listed here at the Mongabay website.

Image Credit: The last photo taken between Rhett Butler and Jane Goodall, who shared a friendship for nearly 15 years, at the Forbes Sustainability Leadership Summit in New York. Image courtesy of Sofia Negron.

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Timecodes

(00:00) The importance of hope

(08:01) Rhett's awards and Mongabay's impact

(12:39) The role of independent journalism

(24:18) Expanding Mongabay's global reach

(31:44) State of the world's forests

News of Australia's "humpback comeback" is making waves globally. Numbers of humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) on the nation's east coast have rebounded to an estimated 50,000 from a historic low of just a few hundred before commercial whaling was outlawed in the 1970s. And wildlife scientist and whale expert Vanessa Pirotta joins the podcast to discuss this inspiring conservation achievement.

Pirotta emphasizes this is a good news story that deserves to be celebrated, and that it could also bolster action for other whale species that are struggling, including the southern right whale (Eubalaena australis) and blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus). However, she stresses that vigilant protection for all whale species remains necessary.

This good news is tempered by the fact that the key food source for humpbacks in this part of the world is Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba), which is now being heavily harvested by industrial fishing fleets after protections for the species recently lapsed. Pirotta notes that krill are a keystone species for both humpbacks and a much broader array of marine life, including penguins and seals.

Pirotta also discusses her cetacean health research based on the collection of "whale snot" (see Mongabay's explainer video about this method, which involves the use of drones, here) and whale monitoring work conducted with Indigenous conservation group Gamay Bay Rangers. Listeners can learn more about her work at vanessapirotta.com and find her book, Humpback Highway, here.

Find the Mongabay Newscast wherever you listen to podcasts, from Apple to Spotify. All past episodes are also listed here at the Mongabay website.

Image credit: A humpback whale. Image by ArtTower via Pixabay (Public domain).

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Timecodes

(00:00) The 'humpback comeback'

(14:50) Why krill need protection

(19:29) The Gamay Rangers sharing Indigenous knowledge

(28:05) Antarctica and whale snot

(32:12) Migaloo the white whale

(36:16) How whale populations impact all of us

On this episode of the Newscast we take a look at Natalie Kyriacou's widely praised new book, Nature's Last Dance: Tales of Wonder in an Age of Extinction, whose high-profile fans, like Paris climate agreement architect Christiana Figueres, call it a "lyrical call to awaken our love for the wild before the music stops."

Kyriacou, the founder of the environmental organization My Green World, shares her aim of the book, her thoughts on real solutions to our ecological problems, what she wishes more people understood about nature, and why they need to fall in love with it.

"If there's one simple thing that we can do, it is to just step outside and feel that wonder and look up and appreciate it … if we are going to protect nature, to protect something, you need to fall in love with it."

Always honest and often humorous, this deeply researched volume clearly outlines the economic, political and cultural drivers of our most significant ecological problems, and what the reader can do to effect meaningful change.

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: Natalie Kyriacou. Photo by Chloe Paul.

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Timecodes

(00:00) Making nature mainstream

(04:28) Challenging bias about nature

(12:38) Stories of recovery

(16:23) How we all depend on nature

(21:55) Porches and peacocks

(27:03) Your actions are a vote

(35:18) Inspiration from Costa Rica

(38:55) Lessons from the Montreal Protocol

(45:08) To protect it, you have to love it

Australia suffered catastrophic bushfires in 2019 - 2020, followed by intense rain and flooding from an ensuing La Niña which experts say may be linked to those bushfires. Despite the pleas of scientists to halt development, some governments, such as in the Northern Territories, continue to greenlight massive fossil fuel infrastructure projects.

All of this is 'demoralizing' says award-winning podcast host of 'A Rational Fear,' Dan Ilic. He joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss climate change policy in Australia, recent victories from Indigenous communities, and how comedy provides coverage and catharsis for citizens concerned about the climate crisis. Ilic, who previously made headlines for comedic billboards satirizing Australia's lack of action on climate policy, speaks with host Mike DiGirolamo in person in Sydney.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

Related Reading:

• Australia bushfires may have caused global climate phenomenon La Niña: Study
• Indigenous leader's court win halts one of Australia's 'dirtiest gas projects'

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Image Caption: A mother koala and her joey who survived the forest fires in Mallacoota. Australia, 2020. Photo by Jo-Anne McArthur / We Animals

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Scientists have discovered a series of hydrothermal vents in the Mid-Atlantic ridge spanning hundreds of miles and teeming with life adapted to scorching plumes of hot water like shrimp, crabs, mussels, anemones, fish, gastropods, and more.

This discovery, 40 years in the making, adds another layer of consideration to where deep sea mining can occur, which experts argue should not happen in these diverse underwater ecosystems, in part because they store vast amounts of marine genetic resources, besides their biodiversity.

Listen to the new report from Elizabeth Claire Alberts: Seafloor life abounds around hydrothermal vents hot enough to melt lead.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for Mongabay.

Image caption: A squat lobster perches atop a bubblegum coral in the deep sea. Image by Schmidt Ocean Institute (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening

This week we're sharing the first episode of a new season of Mongabay Explores, a deep dive into the Congo Basin which begins with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which contains 60% of central Africa's forest, but which also aims to open up protected areas and forested peatlands to oil and gas development. 

This is big because the Congo Basin contains the world's second-largest rainforest, a staggering 178 million hectares, containing myriad wildlife and giant trees plus numerous human communities: it is also one of the world's biggest carbon sinks. 

We speak with Adams Cassinga, a DRC resident and founder of Conserv Congo, and Joe Eisen, executive director of Rainforest Foundation UK, about the environmental and conservation challenges and opportunities faced by the DRC & the Congo Basin in general. 

For more Congo exploration coming on episode 2, find & follow/subscribe to Mongabay Explores via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Until episode 2 airs, please also enjoy the first three seasons of Explores, where we dove into the huge biodiversity and conservation challenges in Sumatra, New Guinea, and more. 

Episode Artwork: A female putty-nosed monkey. Image by C. Kolopp / WCS.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro: The call of a putty-nosed monkey (Cercopithecus nictitans). This soundscape was recorded in Ivindo National Park in Gabon by Zuzana Burivalova, Walter Mbamy, Tatiana Satchivi, and Serge Ekazama.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts.  If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! 

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for Mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

The South American nation of Guyana, whose economy has traditionally relied on tourism, agriculture, and fishing, has begun doing business with oil giant ExxonMobil to build a massive offshore oil drilling project along its coast. 

The president has argued that the profits could pay for the nation's clean energy transition, while others argue that the nation's traditional economic models, biodiversity, and coastal population are at risk of severe environmental impacts from the project. 

Award-winning journalist and podcast producer Amy Westervelt joins the Mongabay Newscast to share details of the situation, which is the focus of the 8th season of her acclaimed podcast series Drilled, and she opines about the power of podcasting and the current state of the global effort to tackle climate change:

• "What a total failure of international climate negotiations that Global South countries [are] in this position of having to use oil money to pay for climate adaptation. That's ridiculous," Westervelt says.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

Related Reading:

• Oil production or carbon neutrality? Why not both, Guyana says
• Guyana's future and challenges in oil: Q&A with filmmaker Shane Thomas McMillan
• Guyana seeks offshore oil wealth in a green economy

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image: Series artwork for "Drilled" Season 8 by Matt Fleming. 

Recent breeding success at a nature reserve in South Africa has given conservationists hope for the survival of Africa's only resident penguin species, whose population has dropped by nearly 65% since 1989.

Researchers are having success boosting breeding colonies near abundant food sources with the help of simple interventions like building nest boxes that mimic their guano burrows which keep the birds cool and safe in a world whose climate is becoming hotter and less predictable.

Listen to the popular article from Ryan Truscott here:

Breeding success raises hopes for future of endangered African penguin

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for Mongabay.

Image caption: African penguin. Image by Alberto Ziveri via Flickr (BY-SA 2.0)

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Conservation technology is a rapidly growing field with exciting potential. From eDNA to bioacoustics and AI, there's a lot to keep track of in an ever-changing environment.

Here to discuss it on the Newscast this week is new Mongabay staff writer Abhishyant "Abhi" Kidangoor who's joined our newsroom to focus on this quickly growing field: he shares details of his current conservation tech reporting projects and ones our readers can look forward to in the future. 

Related reading:

• Bioacoustics in your backyard: Q&A with conservation technologist Topher White
• On the roof of the world, water is life. Or a sign of it, thanks to eDNA
• Beyond bored apes: Blockchain polarizes wildlife conservation community

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image caption: Conservation technology and wildlife manager, Eleanor Flatt, installs a GSM camera trap in the Costa Rican forests protected and managed by Osa Conservation. Image by Marco Molina.

More than 15 years in the making, the United Nations has finally reached an agreement on a landmark, legally binding treaty to protect international waters, where a myriad of wildlife big and small live.

Why did it take so long, and what happens next?

Hear all about it by listening to this audio reading of the popular article by Elizabeth Fitt: 

As U.N. members clinch historic high seas biodiversity treaty, what's in it?

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Image caption: A humpback whale in Antarctica. Image by Christopher Michel via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.