Environment

IOI, the second largest producer of palm oil in Malaysia, has been kicked out of an industry group that certifies sustainability practices, for environmental and labor violations. As a result, dozens of companies, including the makers of Dove soap, M&M's and Kellogg's Corn Flakes, have stopped buying from IOI. Read More

The World Bank's International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) has ordered the government of Venezuela to pay US$1.386 billion to Crystallex, a bankrupt Canadian gold mining company, for canceling a 2002 permit to mine for gold in the Imataca Forest Reserve Read More

A new report on garment factories in Burma issued by Action Labor Rights (ALR) estimates that nearly a third of workers were required to work 60 hours or more a week, with almost two thirds reporting that they had no choice in the matter. Read More

The Navajo Diné community have notched up a victory over Uranium Resources Inc. decades old plan to dig for uranium at Crownpoint and Churchrock, New Mexico, by successfully appealing a state permit for the Colorado company to dump waste into the Westwater Canyon aquifer. Read More

Activists say fines paid by Volkswagen to settle the "Dieselgate" scandal should be paid into a fund to help vulnerable populations like school children and low income communities, as punishment for installing software in some 11 million vehicles to enable the cars to cheat on emissions tests. Read More

Sierra Leonian courts have started to release a group of community activists from the Malen Land Owners and Users Association (MALOA) who were jailed recently for taking part in a October 2013 protest at a palm oil plantation operated by Societe Financiere des Caoutchoucs (Socfin). Read More

A key witness has admitted under oath that he lied on behalf of Chevron, the California oil multinational, when the company sued to overturn a $9.5 billion verdict for pollution of the Ecuadorian Amazon. Read More

A $50 billion plan by a Hong Kong based developer to cut a canal through Nicaragua to allow ocean going cargo ships cross back and forth from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean has suffered major setbacks after fierce opposition by environmentalists and local communities. Read More

Some 500 Angolan fisherfolk have demanded compensation from Chevron after an oil spill polluted the Mandarin and Mpuela shoreline in Cabinda last month, close to the California company's drilling operations. Under government orders, all fishing activity was banned for almost two weeks. Read More

A music video asking Unilever, an Anglo-Dutch consumer goods giant, to clean up mercury waste from their former Indian factory notched up two million views in less than a week, prompting a reply from the company CEO. 'Kodaikanal Won't,' the video by Sonia Ashraf, parodied Nicki Minaj's song 'Anaconda.' Read More