A forest in Ecuador is buzzing with life, thanks to a global movement granting nature legal rights

A cloud forest in northern Ecuador is protected from deforestation and mining after being recognised as an entity possessing legal personhood.

For more than 30 years, José DeCoux woke each morning to a deafening noise. In his home in Ecuador’s Los Cedros forest, monkeys squeal, squirrels scuffle, and 400 species of bird flit and squawk. A mist hangs in the trees, and ferns and mosses in countless shades of green cover every rock and tree trunk.

DeCoux moved to the Los Cedros reserve in northern Ecuador from the US in the 1980s. He was “sort of heeding the call to save the rainforest, or something”, he told BBC Future Planet with a smile in April.