Money talks Did you know that Brazil is the world’s largest exporter of soy? And that most of these shipments head to the Netherlands? The situation is similar with beef—here too, the Netherlands is the biggest importer. While large-scale producers and traders happily pocket the profits, Brazil—especially the Amazon and Cerrado regions—struggles with severe land conflicts, pollution, and the destruction of wildlife and soils. Will trade rules address the problem? The EU’s deforestation regulation (EUDR) was designed to exclude products [...]

Researchers, NGOs, activists all around the World stress the urgent need for transformative change to halt – or at least slow down the alarming loss of biodiversity. While this idea is widely acknowledged in policies and funding calls—using terms like “transformations,” “interventions,” and “transdisciplinary partnerships”—we still lack clear understanding of how partnerships can actually drive such change. This gap is especially clear when tackling biodiversity loss, which is often overlooked in research and decision-making. To address it, researchers of PLANET4B [...]

Can Christianity play a direct role in sustainable agriculture? Are churches ready to embrace biodiversity as part of their spiritual message? And what hands-on impact can local faith communities have when it comes to protecting nature, raising environmental awareness, and promoting sustainable practices? These thought-provoking questions are at the heart of a News of the Reformed Church's recent report, featuring insights from Ghezal Shabir — a researcher of PLANET4B and a colleague at FiBL. You can read the original interwiev [...]

Inspirational, educational, engaging, and scientifically valuable: this is the latest case study published within the PLANET4B project on the practice of transformative change, authored by our partner CGE Erfurt. The 48-page, colorful document with personal experiences explores how urban youth relate to a neglected topic like biodiversity, and how this topic can be brought to the forefront, shaping their knowledge, thinking, and attitudes about it. The authors reveal the journey of a young, student-led learning community formed in the frame [...]

A teacher of the Federal University of Western Pará is heading toward the BR-163 highway in the eastern Brazilian Amazon region with the students of the Indigenous Citizenship course. However, the road — which crosses Indigenous territories — has been blocked by local communities, and no traffic is allowed to pass. Seeing people singing, dancing, and performing their tribal rituals makes you think we are at a cheerful festival. […]

Communities, Nature, and their role in supporting biodiversity. Images taken on a field visit to the Ruhango district. Around the world, biodiversity is disappearing at an unprecedented rate. This isn’t just a crisis for ecosystems—it’s a crisis for people. Biodiversity supports food security, cultural identity, economic livelihoods, and climate resilience. Yet, the response to this crisis is too often shaped by top-down policies that overlook local communities lived experiences and values. The EU-funded PLANET4B project aims to explore how to [...]