Today (2017 C.E. - 2025 C.E.)

This archive spans the years 2017 through 2025, a period marked by rapid advances in clean energy, medicine, technology, and social equity. It collects documented breakthroughs, policy wins, and scientific achievements from the present era. If you want evidence that progress is real and ongoing, this is where to look.

New Zealand coast, for article on Māori co-management marine reserves

New Zealand opens five marine reserves under Māori co-governance model

By / / Good News For Humankind

Māori co-governance of ocean territory just got a concrete, working model. Five new marine reserves along New Zealand’s southeastern coast grant the Kāi Tahu equal decision-making authority alongside the government, with a jointly run ranger team conducting restoration and research across protected seabed, reefs, and kelp forest. The full reserve network remains incomplete, one area faces a boundary dispute, and current coverage falls far short of global conservation targets. Research consistently shows conservation succeeds when the people who know a place best hold real authority over it — and this model may become a blueprint for Indigenous ocean governance worldwide.

image for article on Wild Coast communities

South Africa’s top court permanently blocks Shell oil off the Wild Coast

By / / Good News For Humankind

South Africa’s highest court has handed Indigenous and rural fishing communities a permanent, binding victory — one that sets a new legal standard for who gets a say before oil companies drill near vulnerable coastlines. The Constitutional Court ruled that Shell and Impact Africa never meaningfully consulted the Mpondo and other communities whose livelihoods and spiritual lives are tied to the Wild Coast, also citing international climate obligations. Whether South Africa will reform its consultation process — or force the next community into the same grueling legal fight — remains an open question.

Beirut, Lebanon, for article on death penalty abolition

Lebanon becomes first Middle East country to abolish death penalty

By / / Good News For Humankind

Death penalty abolition in Lebanon is a genuine regional breakthrough — the first time any Middle Eastern country has moved from informal moratorium to formal law banning capital punishment. Lebanon hadn’t executed anyone since 2004, so this vote closes a legal gap that kept the door open to resumption. The bill now awaits President Joseph Aoun’s signature, a step expected to follow given the government’s already-stated support. Advocates hope Lebanon’s path gives neighboring governments a concrete domestic precedent to point to in their own debates.

Forest with sun shining through, for article on land-use emissions

Global land-use emissions have fallen 30% this century

By / / Good News For Humankind

Net land-use emissions averaged roughly 5 billion metric tons a year over 2015–24, with 2025 about a third below the 2000s average — driven by slowing deforestation and by regrowing forests pulling carbon back out of the air. Brazil’s forest protection policies, Indonesia’s peatland rewetting, and China’s reforestation programs reshaped the picture. The uncertainty is large, more than half that figure. And the Democratic Republic of the Congo remains hard to reach, since its clearing is subsistence farming rather than export crops. Where deforestation is commercial, policy can stop it. Where it isn’t, that is much less clear.

Food packaging, for article on PFAS ban in food packaging, for article on PFAS food packaging

E.U. forever chemical ban in food packaging now in effect across 27 member states

By / / Good News For Humankind

PFAS restrictions on food-contact packaging are now enforceable across every E.U. member state — one of the most sweeping coordinated measures of its kind. Pizza boxes, paper bakery bags, and wrapping paper have long relied on PFAS — compounds linked to liver damage, immune suppression, and certain cancers — leaving manufacturers to reformulate or forfeit E.U. market access. The rules apply at strict concentration thresholds, and PFAS in cookware, textiles, and firefighting foam remain largely unaddressed. Still, harmonizing standards across 27 countries at once offers a replicable model for the world.

element digital T CXBZLUvic unsplash, for article on Seychelles democratic transition, for article on voting rights restoration, for article on Virginia voting rights

Virginia governor restores voting rights to 66,000 citizens with past convictions

By / / Good News For Humankind

Voting rights restoration in Virginia has reached a scale in 2026 that would have seemed unthinkable just a few years ago. A federal court ruled that Virginia’s lifetime voting ban violated an 1870 Reconstruction-era federal law — meaning most Virginians with past convictions are now legally eligible to vote without asking anyone’s permission. Governor Spanberger’s office has also proactively restored full civil rights to more than 66,000 people in just six months. A November ballot measure could make restoration permanent, though a requirement to pay outstanding fines first may still leave some people behind.

Waving large Pride flag, for article on same-sex marriage in Bolivia

Bolivia recognizes first same-sex marriage after years-long legal fight

By / / Good News For Humankind

Same-sex marriage in Bolivia just moved from impossible to real — not through new legislation, but through one couple’s nearly four-year legal fight. Fabiana Banzer and Scarlett Rocha secured two constitutional injunctions to have their civil marriage officially recorded in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, a stronger legal status than the partnership registrations Bolivia had previously allowed. The ruling applies only to them, not to same-sex couples broadly, and Bolivia’s constitution still defines marriage as between a man and a woman. But legal precedent builds, and advocates say each individual court win makes the next one more reachable.

Tree kangaroo, for article on conservation deed

Papua New Guinea clans to protect 300,000 acres of rainforest for tree kangaroos

By / / Good News For Humankind

Across Papua New Guinea’s Torricelli Mountains, clan leaders from dozens of villages have signed a legally binding deed protecting hundreds of thousands of acres of some of Earth’s most biodiverse rainforest from logging, mining, and large-scale agriculture. The tenkile, a critically endangered tree kangaroo found nowhere else, has at least tripled in population this century as communities chose stewardship over hunting. Each village governs its own conservation committee, required to include at least 30% women. Logging pressure and a slow government approval process remain real obstacles, but this deed shows Indigenous land protection need not wait on politics.

Batteries, for article on lithium-ion battery costs

Battery costs have declined by 99% worldwide over three decades

By / / Good News For Humankind

Battery storage — once the missing link in the clean energy transition — is finally arriving at scale, and the numbers behind it are hard to overstate. A learning curve built from millions of small improvements in chemistry and manufacturing has made what once seemed impossible feel routine. What was an extraordinary expense in 1991 now costs a fraction of that, pulling electric vehicles, home storage, and grid-scale power into reach for far more people. Supply chain pressures and raw material constraints mean progress isn’t guaranteed — but the direction, so far, is undeniable.

Bus, for article on Latin American electric buses

Latin American cities cross milestone of 10,000 electric buses

By / / Good News For Humankind

Latin American cities are proving that large-scale clean transit is genuinely achievable, with 10,000 electric buses now running across 80 cities in 13 countries — collectively avoiding an estimated 10 million tonnes of CO2 every year. Santiago, São Paulo, and Bogotá are carrying most of that weight, enabled by a financing model that blends regulatory pressure with structured funding. The electric fleet remains a small fraction of regional totals, and smaller cities still face real barriers around grid reliability and maintenance. Still, what’s emerging here is a transferable blueprint, not just a local win.