One of Earth’s most biodiverse marine regions is threatened by the expansion of nickel mining projects in Indonesia, a new report showed.
Satellite analysis and on-the-ground visits found a rapid increase in land given over to mining pits in Raja Ampat Regency, a group of tropical islands near West Papua, according to the report from Auriga Nusantara, an environmental and conservation organization in Indonesia.
A few degrees south of the equator, the islands are home to 75 percent of the world’s coral species and more than 1,600 fish species, including critically endangered hawksbill sea turtles…