Focus on Arts and Ecology

Today at Yale Environment 360, journalist Adam Welz reports from South Africa on the poaching of millions of exotic plants from the Succulent Karoo region, home to thousands of species found nowhere else on Earth. Vast criminal networks are smuggling plants to the U.S., Europe, and Asia, where “plantfluencers” on social media have fueled a craze for the tiny, colorful succulents. Poaching has resulted in the functional extinction of at least eight species, with hundreds more being pushed toward the same fate. Despite a crackdown by law enforcement, solutions to the plant poaching crisis remain elusive. Read the article.

In the e360 interview, author and activist Bill McKibben talks about climate activism in the second Trump administration. In conversation with our contributing writer Elizabeth Kolbert, McKibben reexamines the role of protest in the changed political landscape and explains where he sees reasons for hope. "Our species is now fully capable of moving from an energy source that’s concentrated in a few hands to one that’s available everywhere," McKibben says of the shift to solar power. "That’s the most subversive and liberating possibility we have at the moment." Read the interview.

View all our reporting and commentary at Yale Environment 360 and add your thoughts to the discussion. Plus, keep track of new environmental developments at our e360 Digest.

Roger Cohn
Editor

(Sources: Yale Environment 360)