The Kayapó Indigenous Territory has emerged as a major hotspot for illegal gold mining in the Brazilian Amazon’s Xingu River Basin, a major Amazon tributary. That’s according to a new report from the watchdog Monitoring of the Andes Amazon Program (MAAP). At least 7,940 hectares (19,620 acres) of forest on Kayapó land were cut down for mining since 2018, according to Amazon Mining Watch. Around 140 hectares (346 acres) were felled in 2025. The Xingu Basin, a 51-million-hectare river basin (126 million acres), roughly the size of Spain, cuts through Brazil’s Pará and Mato Grosso states and is home to some of the highest levels of deforestation from illegal gold mining in Brazil.   In May 2025, the Brazilian government carried out operations to remove illegal miners, destroying 25 large excavators, almost 1,000 tents and more than 400 engines. They seized 63 grams (2.2 ounces) of gold and almost 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) of refined cocaine and cocaine base paste. A month later, in June 2025, just 2 hectares (5 acres) of land were illegally deforested. But by October 2025, mining activities began to encroach on the forest again, and an additional 15 hectares (37 acres) were deforested, MAAP’s satellite monitoring showed. Mining in the east of the Kayapó Indigenous Territory. Image courtesy of MAAP. Data from Planet/NICFI. Mining in the northeast of the Kayapó Indigenous Territory. Image courtesy of MAAP. Data from Planet/NICFI. Roughly 16,000 hectares (39,540 acres) of forest were destroyed between 2018 and 2024, according to Amazon…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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