Conservation is key for planetary health & preventing pandemics
Release Date: 11/26/2024
Paul Hawken says the climate movement should center human connection
Mongabay Newscast
Renowned author, activist and entrepreneur Paul Hawken joins Mongabay’s podcast to discuss his new book, , and argues that the jargon and fear-based terms broadly used by the climate movement alienate the broader public and fail to communicate the nuance and complexity of the larger ecological crises that humans are causing. Instead, Hawken argues that real change begins in, and is propelled by, communities: "Community is the source of change, and what we have [are] obviously systems that are destroying community everywhere." The title of Hawken's book, carbon, is also the fourth most...
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Why has Australia paused key environment commitments?
Mongabay Newscast
The Australian government recently key environmental protection commitments indefinitely, including the establishment of an environmental protection agency, and a robust accounting of the nation’s ecological health via an environmental information authority. The latest suspension was announced by the Prime Minister just ahead of a federal election. Australia initially proposed these “nature positive” in 2022 and hosted the first in 2024 to great fanfare, but has not implemented any substantial domestic legislation to overhaul its old environmental laws. Joining the podcast to...
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What environmental history says about our current ‘planetary risk’
Mongabay Newscast
Recent and major shifts in international environmental policies and programs have historical precedent, but the context of global environmental degradation and climate change presents a planetary risk that’s new, say Sunil Amrith. A professor of history at Yale University, he joins this week’s Mongabay Newscast to discuss the current political moment and what history can teach us about it. " When we look at examples from the past, [societies’ ecological impacts] have tended to be confined to a particular region, to those states, and perhaps to their neighbors. Because of where we are...
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How ‘ecological empathy’ might help shape a better world
Mongabay Newscast
A new framework for considering the needs of the “more-than-human world” when designing human-made systems is “ecological empathy,” the focus of , founder of , a sustainability consulting firm. Her research, , was published in the journal Ecosystems and People in late 2024, when she was at Arizona State University. She joins the podcast to detail the concept and its potential for reconnecting humans with nature for mutual benefit. "Ecological empathy as I define it [is] essentially a framework of practice for how to use empathy as a guide to connect to the more-than-human world, and...
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Degrowth’s benefits in Barcelona are getting noticed across the globe
Mongabay Newscast
Middle and working-class citizens in nations across the globe are feeling their purchasing power diminish while billionaires historically high levels of wealth. People are looking for economic solutions out of the inequity that are in line with their ecological values and planetary boundaries. "People are really hungry for solutions [and] really hungry to find alternatives," says Alvaro Alvarez, the documentary filmmaker of the new BBC documentary Alvarez joins Mongabay's podcast to detail real-life solutions using the concepts behind “degrowth” in the city of Barcelona, which he...
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How corporations meet their climate targets, on paper
Mongabay Newscast
A in the journal Nature Climate Change concludes there is limited accountability for corporations that fail to achieve their climate change mitigation targets. The analysis shows 9% of company decarbonization plans missed their goals, while 31% “disappeared.” However, 60% of companies met their targets. While this might initially seem like good news, it may not be leading to genuine climate action. This week's podcast guest, , a consultant and researcher for nonprofit organizations in the climate sector, explains that many corporations are not actually decarbonizing their supply chains,...
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Bobcats provide health benefits for ecosystems and humans, but are largely misunderstood
Mongabay Newscast
The bobcat population has over the past century, making it North America’s most common wildcat: as of 2011, there were an 3.5 million bobcats in the United States alone, a significant increase from the late 1990s. These felids, Lynx rufus, have benefited from conservation efforts that have increased their natural habitat. The species also thrives at the edges of towns and cities, where their presence can even reduce the spread of pathogens like Lyme disease that affect people, says podcast guest Zara McDonald, founder of the . McDonald shares her thoughts on how the bobcat manages to...
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How law enforcement in Africa's protected areas is part of a larger culture in conservation
Mongabay Newscast
Nations across the world are working to expand their protected areas to include . In Africa, this would encompass an additional 1 million square miles. Mongabay's Ashoka Mukpo recently traveled to three nations to assess the current state of conservation practices in key protected areas, to get a better picture of what an expansion might look like, and how the crucial role of rangers in enforcing their protection is evolving. While there, he traveled with passionate and dedicated rangers, but also documented allegations of ranger involvement in violent incidents in Queen Elizabeth National...
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Justice for people, animals and environment are closely linked
Mongabay Newscast
Bryan Simmons, the vice president of communications for the Arcus Foundation, joins the Mongabay Newscast this week to share the philosophy behind the 25-year-old foundation, which funds grantees that work on LGBTQ rights and great apes and gibbons conservation. In this conversation with co-host Mike DiGirolamo, Simmons explains the link between economic development and justice for people and how this is correlated with conservation outcomes. “When people are not able to have their economic needs met, conservation begins to pay the price right away,” says Simmons. He encourages listeners...
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Turning problems into solutions for culture and agriculture, with Anthony James
Mongabay Newscast
This week, Anthony James, host of , joins Mongabay’s podcast to share stories of community resilience and land regeneration in the Americas and Australia. James explains how donkeys (seen as invasive pests) are now being managed to benefit the land in Kachana Station in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. In this episode, James emphasizes the importance of harnessing what’s in front of us, rather than fighting it. Across the many interviews he’s conducted, it’s become clear that this concept is something Aboriginal Traditional Owners are keenly aware of. “If you’re there,...
info_outlineNeil Vora MD is a former epidemic intelligence service officer with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with experience combating outbreaks of the deadly Ebola virus and running the New York City contact tracing program for COVID-19. He advocates supporting public health infrastructure to respond to diseases.
He much prefers preventing outbreaks before they occur instead of rushing to respond to them, though, and the best way to do this, he says, is by investing in nature.
On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, Vora shares his knowledge of why the “spillover” of zoonotic diseases — when a pathogen jumps from wildlife to humans — is increasingly occurring due to deforestation and land-use change.
He also says that despite science's importance in studying and combating viruses, art and philosophy are necessary tools to drive the global change needed to prevent further outbreaks.
“If we want to see societal transformation, we're going to need people feeling inspired, and that's where art and philosophy come in,” Vora says.
Listen to Mongabay’s previous Newscast episode covering the recent outbreak of avian influenza here.
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Image Credit: Rainbow over Jambi, Indonesia. Photo credit: Rhett Ayers Butler / Mongabay
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Timecodes
(00:00) Introduction
(01:06) Medical doctor and conservationist: Neil Vora
(04:27) The link between deforestation and disease
(07:33) The 'One Health' movement
(09:41) How disease 'spillover' happens
(13:06) What's happening with marburg and 'bird flu'?
(23:10) Why we need art & philosophy to protect nature
(26:31) Apocalyptic horror films as scenario explorations
(30:04) Solutions and 'radical listening'
(35:09) A rejection of nihilism