The Worker’s Party knew weeks ago that Congress would undercut the environmental area. But not only did the party abandon ministers. It also condoned changes that make the organizational structure of Lula’s administration look similar to Bolsonaro’s

Between heavy fire from a predatory Congress and friendly fire from figures like the leader of the government, Marina Silva and the ministry she leads are suffering their first major attack. But it’s not about Marina. It’s about our children and our existence on this planet-house.

Marina Silva, the minister who lends international ballast to the environmental agenda of the Workers’ Party, went to bed Tuesday night feeling victorious in the debate over the environmental license to explore for oil at the mouth of the Amazon, but the next day she saw her power undermined and was blitzed by a predatory Congress that represents the interests of denialist agribusiness. And worst of all, with the Brazilian president’s consent

In denying the oil giant Petrobras a license to drill at the mouth of the Amazon, the president of Brazil’s environmental agency has shown that the Lula administration is willing to maintain its commitment to protecting the rainforest and combatting global heating. The greatest backlash has come from an ally, the government’s leader in Congress, heralding the onset of “friendly fire.”

Indigenous leaders feel Lula hasn’t said anything about the so-called timeframe thesis because he’s afraid of Congress. As a result, they are promising continuous mobilization

At the Free Land Camp in Brasilia, Brazil’s president stated that he “would not leave any Indigenous land without demarcation,” but so far, he has ratified only six of the 251 Indigenous territories now in the process, while he has inherited an agency of Indigenous affairs 1,200 employees short and is governing under enormous pressure from a Congress where the majority are anti-Indigenous

Ibama chief Rodrigo Agostinho says Petrobras oil project is “infeasible” from an environmental standpoint, in line with technical report first covered exclusively by SUMAÚMA. The decision is a boost to Environment Minister Marina Silva

A selection of news stories about the Amazon to be read in two minutes

In a single week, at least 14 people were murdered inside the indigenous territory, including a member of Brazil’s largest criminal organization – First Capital Command (PCC). In retaliation, the faction has sent out a message telling its members to target police and federal agents.

To launch Francy Baniwa’s book, celebrated as a “literary event,” flames were reignited at the National Museum, in Rio de Janeiro—this time, for the purpose of hosting memories as part of a twelve-hour vigil conducted by Ailton Krenak. Those who lived this experience will never forget it.

Flooded homes, food insecurity, restricted access to health care, and no prospects for the future—this is the undignified situation for people who defend the Amazon from powerful enemies while enduring death threats and receiving insufficient protection from official programs

A joint campaign by Altamira’s ruralists and Bolsonaro-supporting senators has helped Norte Energia to delay resettlement of traditional populations expelled by Belo Monte

Eighty organizations have written to government ministers and public officials warning about the risks of exploration and the need to establish sound technical and scientific precautions to avoid catastrophe.

Empowered and better represented in government than ever before, indigenous people opened a new chapter in their struggle at the “Terra Libre” (Free Land) Camp in 2023. But as well as celebrating political gains, there was disappointment at fewer-than-expected demarcations.

The destroyers of the Amazon and of all the biomes are working together to keep their losses to a bare minimum under the new government and are already taking their first steps towards the 2026 election

Groups have emerged among different communities to address issues ranging across education, health and LGBT+ rights. This year’s Terra Libre gathering was an arena for the young to show they are active and connected to their ancestors. SUMAÚMA photographers Matheus Alves and Fernando Martinho captures their vitality in images

They have moved to the front line of the indigenous movement and now occupy central positions in the federal government. For indigenous women warriors, the defence of territory is the defence of life and their own bodies. At the 2023 edition of the Free Land Camp, they demanded a national policy to combat violence against indigenous women and began to organize a national rally in September. SUMAÚMA records this historic moment with pictures taken by our photographers Matheus Alves e Fernando Martinho

For 19 years, the annual Terra Livre encampment has been a fulcrum of Indigenous cultures and campaigns. This year, for the first time, activists in the movement are able to celebrate their presence in the centres of power and unveil a strategy for unifying politics in the form of an indigenous village. SUMAÚMA records this historic moment with pictures taken by our photographers Matheus Alves e Fernando Martinho

Organizations and ethnic groups from all over Brazil have chosen this slogan for the most important annual gathering of indigenous people, the ATL, at which they will be demanding that their lands be recognized and respected

A congressional committee audience with Sonia Guajajara, presided over by Célia Xakriabá, demonstrates the fierce opposition in Congress to the plan to “indigenize politics.”

Aldo Rebelo, a former ally of Workers’ Party presidents Lula and Dilma Rousseff, now mixes with Bolsonaro supporters and landgrabbers. He is promoting an agricultural-military political agenda in one of the epicenters of the destruction of the Amazon forest

Anthropologist Caio Pompeia, explains how Brazil’s leading agriculture industry think tank strengthened the political influence of the country’s farming sector and how it is planning to respond to the election of Lula.

In an exclusive interview with SUMAÚMA, Marina Silva, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change of Brazil, discusses oil exploration at the mouth of the Amazon and the renewal of the operating license for the disastrous Belo Monte hydroelectric plant.

In an exclusive interview with SUMAÚMA Rodrigo Agostinho, the new president of Brazil’s environmental protection agency Ibama, says the "life of the river" will be paramount in deciding whether to extend the operation of the destructive dam on the Xingu. On the Petrobras application to explore for oil at the mouth of the Amazon river, he insists “every possible and imaginable impact” must first be examined.

Deise Alves and Cláudio Esteves created a healthcare model that saved the Yanomami in the 1990s and early 2000s. But because they denounced illegal miners, their reputations have been destroyed and they are being asked to pay millions of reais to the government

The imminent drilling of a well by Brazilian oil giant Petrobras in the Foz do Amazonas region is a foreseeable catastrophe which will test President Lula’s commitment to the environment

Nine years after the licensing process for Block 59 began, the people of the Oiapoque region are granted a first meeting with Petrobras in which they reveal the project is already impacting their lives. It is very late to consult them. An accident simulation test, which is regarded as the final stage of the process, is scheduled for this month

Serabi Gold is operating an Amazonian mine before completing a consent process with indigenous communities and without the approval of the land agency Incra, which has designated the plot for the sustainable settlement Terra Nossa

At a seminar for senior government officials in Brasilia, researchers finally reveal the weak study on which the dam's operator Norte Energia has based its quota of 8,000 cubic meters per second for nature. They say this is dangerously inadequate for the important ecosystem and way of life of people who live on the river's 'Big Bend'.

As a fisherman-writer, this ribeirinho writes to release feelings dammed up by the pain of what Belo Monte did to the river, which is his life

Residents of three regions invaded by criminal gold prospectors reveal how their communities have been destroyed by contamination, violence and prostitution. Their accounts highlight the disruption caused by the state's failure of care.

After four years of malign negligence by the Bolsonaro government, the territory is experiencing a continual removal of dead, or extremely sick, Indigenous people, and a still uncertain plan to expel thousands of illegal, heavily armed, miners

Figures obtained by SUMAÚMA show that during Jair Bolsonaro’s far-right government, the number of children under 5 years old who died from preventable causes increased 29% in Yanomami territory: 569 young indigenous children died in the last 4 years from diseases that are treatable

Deliberate negligence by the Bolsonaro administration has left Brazil’s largest Indigenous territory vulnerable to invasion by twenty thousand illegal miners who are accused of raping women and the land.

The Lula government wants to expand registration of the social welfare program in indigenous lands, but this alone will not be enough. The system of cash transfers must be adapted to the realities of different indigenous peoples. Without this, it could cause more misery and violence.

Faced with the enormous repercussions of the most recent crisis suffered by the Yanomami population, part of the legal community, belatedly and shamefacedly, has now begun to babble: well, now, maybe... As if the signs, and even proof, of the ongoing genocide had not already been offered by indigenous people for many years.

The indigenous people face a dramatic impasse: if they denounce their genocide to the world, they run the risk of not finding happiness after death

Morzaniel Ɨramari, the first Yanomami filmmaker, will shortly release 'Mãri hi: The Tree of Dream', a portrait of how messages from the forest reach the shamans of a people whose lives have been jeopardized by mining activities over the last ten years

Threatened with death in Brazil, Alessandra Korap is one of six activists from around the world whose work is recognized this Monday by the prestigious Goldman Prize for Environmentalism

For the first time since her husband was murdered, Beatriz Matos returned to the Javari Valley on Monday. this time as head of the department responsible for uncontacted peoples. In this exclusive interview with Sumaúma, Beatriz says she blames Bruno's murder on the negligence of former president Jair Bolsonaro and his appointees, who allowed organised crime to proliferate in the region.

The country's first indigenous female federal deputy is now the first indigenous head of Funai. Her advisor, the journalist Mayra Wapichana describes how history was made in office 231 of the House of Representatives.

In an exclusive interview with SUMAÚMA, the newly elected congresswoman Célia Xakriabá tells how poetics will be an Indigenous weapon in parliament—and how the small but potent Indigenous caucus will take on the powerful ruralist lobby

A look behind the scenes at the events and alliances that allowed Sonia Guajajara to take power and make history

The inaugurations of Sonia Guajajara, Célia Xakriabá and Joenia Wapichana mark a new moment in the struggle to protect nature and defend the rights of traditional peoples

Stronger indigenous rights, greater protection of headwaters and fewer dams should be part of any global deal on water.

The disaster in São Paulo reminds us that we must reinforce the Amazon rainforest and other natural pillars that ‘hold up the sky'

A Rio Branco--based journalist who covers the impact of global heating, reports on his personal distress when the São Francisco, a tributary of the Acre River, flooded his street and home last month

A two-minute round-up of the best Amazon news stories on the Internet.

This is life in Katõ Village, in the Munduruku Indigenous Territory, one of the lands hardest hit by illegal mining. If such mercury contamination were detected in a wealthy neighborhood in an urban area of Brazil, how would the State and the press react?

The Amazonian municipality of Itaituba is a centre of illegal gold prospecting, which puts it firmly in the sights of the federal government's crackdown on polluting activity inside indigenous territory. The pro-mining mayor Valmir Climaco response has been to deny the existence of indigenous lands, despite hundreds of years of evidence to the contrary.

The new president should revoke dubiously-enacted legal clauses that facilitate the purchase of gold criminally extracted from indigenous lands. These flawed legislation contributes to a humanitarian and environmental catastrophe

Even though the coup was not consummated, once again the right-wing extremists succeeded in delaying urgently-needed actions and debates in Brazil. The situation in the Amazon worsens everyday. In a statement, Lula suggested that the destroyers of the forest are involved in the January 8 coup attempt

Former Brazil striker claims he ate gold leaf steak with current members of the national team to inspire people, but his choice could hardly have been worse

The recent pact between Brazil, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Indonesia raises hopes for tropical conservation but there are concerns it may be overly focussed on carbon credits. Sumaúma looks at the origins of this new front in nature diplomacy for clues about which way it will go

Known as the "Man of the Hole", he protected the Amazon for 26 years. And even after his death, a victory in Brazil’s Supreme Court will help preserve the forest in which he lived

The recent killing of an indigenous woman began in 1973, when a road built by Brazil’s military dictatorship was carved through the forest

A visit to the Awa Guajá, where people have died from sadness as well as guns since their land became a freight line for the world's biggest iron-ore mine

18 years after her assassination in Anapu on February 12, 2005, missionary is becoming both a martyr and an encantada in the forest

'In this era of the deliberate destruction of nature, rampant consumerism, unhealthy narcissism and the metaverse (or should it be murder-verse?), Joaquim was committed to forming readers and, while hardly rich, donated books to students and readers from humble backgrounds, something I witnessed on several occasions. He gave all of himself that he could, in a gesture of profound generosity, with affection was paramount'

From harrowing tales of forced contact to a failed capitalist scheme to build a resource-supplying city in the forest, here is a sample of cinematic Amazonian destruction and beauty

Works that address important topics and might encourage the reader to delve deeper into primary sources and reference books

The Amazonian designer Sioduhi invited SUMAÚMA into his ateliers, in São Paulo and Rio Branco, to describe his journey from the Upper Rio Negro to the catwalks of São Paulo, and explain why he is returning to his ancestral origins

Maickson Serrão, aka Pavulagem, shares his experience of the World Economic Forum, addressing the audience in Davos, meeting Marina Silva, and mingling with attendees: 'One person talked to me about Bluetooth phones as if he were showing me a mirror 500 years ago’

Brazil's most iconic indigenous leader, the Kayapó learnt from the experience of Belo Monte that pressure must be put on white people's governments - no matter the political party - so that nature and the native peoples are respected

What do the peoples of the Amazon rainforest and other biomes want from the president-elect? These communities have demands that cannot wait.

The children and adolescents of the city of Altamira, SUMAÚMA’s base and a region violently affected by the Belo Monte Hydroelectric Plant, tell Brazil’s president-elect Lula what they want from him

What the Amazon’s traditional populations, agroecological workers and leaders of social movements want from the president-elect

In the third part of our Nature in Power series, SUMAÚMA brings you voices for those that are never heard, although they are most affected by the planet’s dominant species