2024-11-01T17:00:04.672543

2025-02-20T18:40:15.239111

5 × 5 km

30°N to 30°S

Quarterly

Source: “Places to Watch”.  World Resources Institute. Accessed through Global Forest Watch on [date] www.globalforestwatch.org. 

Places to Watch

quarterly, 5 km, tropics, UMD/GLAD, WUR, and Mongabay

Carter, S., Berger, A., Weisse, M.J., Petersen, R., Sargent, S., Gibbes, S., Terry, J. 2024. “Places to Watch: Identifying High-Priority Forest Disturbance from Near–Real Time Satellite Data.” Technical Note. Washington, DC: World Resources Institute. Available online at [[www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch](http://www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch)]([www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch)](http://www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch). 

[CC by 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

en

The Places to Watch (PTW) initiative is an automated workflow to identify high-priority areas of deforestation alerts each quarter, based on the intersection of the integrated deforestation alerts with other datasets. There are three separate alert filtering approaches which result in the three PTW types in the legend: Mongabay reporting, Oil Palm, and Soy.   #Mongabay Reporting   These locations were generated by the Places to Watch method which filters the deforestation alerts to those in protected areas and primary forest or intact forest landscapes and identifies the 5x5 km grid cells containing the most alerts in each tropical region. These locations are selected as potential Places to Watch and, after a curation process to identify alert drivers and provide further context, are shared with Global Forest Watch’s “Action Network” of environmental journalists. The goal is to get this information into the hands of journalists who can sound the alarm on new frontiers of deforestation and inspire intervention. These organizations have contact with journalists or activists on the ground, who can then investigate further. If there are articles that are written as a result of sharing the top PTW with the media, the articles are added to the GFW map. The locations and articles on the map are regularly replaced with new articles from more recent curations which may highlight new frontiers of deforestation or provide updates on previous PTW. PTW has proven to be useful in providing a starting point for investigative journalists, contributing to numerous articles reporting on the causes and context of deforestation across the globe. More information on the methodology and curation process involved in Places to Watch is available here: [<https://www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch>](<https://www.wri.org/publication/places-to-watch)>    #Places to Watch – Commodities (Oil Palm and Soy)  Similarly, these locations are the result of filtering recent deforestation alerts within key datasets. The PTW – Commodities (PTWC) workflow a descendant of the quarterly, global Places to Watch analysis, which provides inputs for curated stories about emerging deforestation. For PTWC, these alerts are related to current palm and soy plantation areas that are likely to be in noncompliance with zero-deforestation commitments made by large companies if planted with oil palm in Southeast Asia, specifically Indonesia and Malaysia, and if planted with soy in various countries in South America. In particular, the PTWC – Soy  method picks up large clearance events most likely caused by industrial palm concessions or large soy farms. The analysis is an automated process that is executed once a quarter with the curated results displayed as a layer on the Global Forest Watch flagship platform. The main differences between PTWC and global PTW is that PTWC focuses only on potential oil palm expansion in Southeast Asia and potential soy expansion in South America rather than on any deforestation in the entire tropics.   PTWC – Oil Palm: The palm approach filters alerts that intersect either peat, protected peat, or primary forest or intact forest in protected area, and fall within 50 km from palm oil mills or 10 km from oil palm plantations.    PTWC – Soy: The soy approach filters alerts that fall within a 10 km buffer around existing soy plantations.  More information on the Places to Watch – Commodities methodology is available here:  [<https://www.wri.org/research/places-watch-palm-and-soy-identifying-high-priority-forest-disturbances-related-palm>  ](<https://www.wri.org/research/places-watch-palm-and-soy-identifying-high-priority-forest-disturbances-related-palm)>    If you have additional information to share about a Place to Watch, or are interested in joining our Action Network to provide more information about places near you, please email us at gfw@wri.org.  Sign up here to receive each Places to Watch curation in your email, and share these places on social media using the hashtag #PlacestoWatch! 

Identify areas of high-priority deforestation alerts on a quarterly basis and inform investigative journalism. Sign up for the newsletter [here](https://www.globalforestwatch.org/subscribe/).

- Places to Watch is an automated algorithm, and as such, may miss areas that some would consider “high priority.” Additionally, the algorithm does not consider the legality of identified Places.  - We assume that for journalists and activists, who rely heavily on storytelling and public support, the most concerning clearing takes place in remote, undisturbed areas with high ecological value. We acknowledge that this method's design to identify priority alert locations is subjective, based on the data inputs that our team and audience deemed priority regions for conservation.  - WRI makes every effort to ensure that information distributed as part of Places to Watch is accurate, but some information comes from an Action Network of on the ground partners and is not possible for WRI to verify. If you do notice any inaccuracies, please email us at gfw@wri.org. 

https://www.wri.org/research/places-watch-identifying-high-priority-forest-disturbance-near-real-time-satellite-data

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