Pramila Pradhan, 51, embraced thengapalli, a form of forest stewardship, because of her mother-in-law, who took her along on forest patrols. Thenga means stick, and palli means turn or rotation. For decades, stick-wielding women have taken turns every day to patrol and safeguard the woodlands in Kodalpalli village in India’s Odisha state. But it was […]
We live in a rapidly urbanizing world, with half of humanity now concentrated in cities. Without adequate and affordable housing, more than a billion people live in informal settlements or urban slums, which lack essential infrastructure and services such as sanitation and secure land tenure. As the climate changes, people living in these informal areas […]
For decades, the nomadic Bajo people have crisscrossed the seas of Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia. But due to pollution, climate change, overfishing and other harmful practices, their way of life is under threat. “The Bajo population increases, but resources are declining day by day,” Andar Halim, a member of a Bajo community in Indonesia’s […]