Indigenous lands face the greatest threat from the expansion of gold mining in the Brazilian Amazon, according to an analysis released Tuesday by the nonprofit Amazon Environmental Research Institute, known as IPAM.
The area affected by gold mining across the Amazon was 20 times larger in 2024 than in 1985. The growth was even more dramatic on Indigenous lands, where mining covered 24 times as much land — and expanded nearly sevenfold between 2016 and 2024 alone.
