Does a Forest Have Rights? In Ecuador, It Does.
In 2008, Ecuador became the first nation in the world to vote on a new constitution that centers the rights of nature and of natural systems to “exist, flourish, and evolve.” That document has helped protect the Los Cedros Protective Forest, a protected region rich in biodiversity, located in the northwest Ecuadorian Andes.
In a new story for YES! as part of our ongoing Progress 2025 initiative, award-winning journalist Peter Yeung, who traveled to Los Cedros, explains how the region remains protected against extractive industries thanks to its constitutional rights. Yeung, who covers climate, global health, migration, human rights, and cities through a solutions-oriented lens spoke with YES! Senior Editor Sonali Kolhatkar on YES! Presents: Rising Up With Sonali about his report.
Sonali Kolhatkar
joined YES! in summer 2021, building on a long and decorated career in broadcast and print journalism. She is an award-winning multimedia journalist, and host and creator of YES! Presents: Rising Up with Sonali, a nationally syndicated television and radio program airing on Free Speech TV and dozens of independent and community radio stations. She is also Senior Correspondent with the Independent Media Institute’s Economy for All project where she writes a weekly column. She is the author of Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice (2023) and Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence (2005). Her forthcoming book is called Talking About Abolition (Seven Stories Press, 2025). Sonali is co-director of the nonprofit group, Afghan Women’s Mission which she helped to co-found in 2000. She has a Master’s in Astronomy from the University of Hawai’i, and two undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. Sonali reflects on “My Journey From Astrophysicist to Radio Host” in her 2014 TEDx talk of the same name.
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