The Geographical Podcast

One day in Iver, a village on the data centre frontier. Just outside of London, the land around the village of Iver has become ripe territory for the data centre build-out. Of all the sites given the go ahead, one in particular became the subject of national debate.  Follow host Laura Cole on LinkedIn . If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review and share it with a friend.

It's 1963 in the village of Smarden and all around the vet, Douglas Good, the animals have started to behave erratically. They pace the ground, run away, or become overly thirsty. Then, they fall down dead.  What he does next will make this story one of the strangest of the chemical age.  Read the research:   Pesticides, pollution and the UK's silent spring, 1963–1964: Poison in the Gard...

The first two episodes of On the Ground are available right now. Subscribe and listen on your favourite app. On the Ground is the new monthly podcast from Geographical , written and hosted by Laura Cole. In this series, Laura gets out from behind her desk and onto the ground, reporting from across the UK’s landscape and speaking to the people changing it. Expect the same rigorous, original reporti...

When scientists Neil Davies and Will McMahon stopped for lunch under the cliffs of west Somerset, they found something very unexpected. Their discovery supports a new paradigm about the world's oldest engineers, and may even change your mind about deep time . In this episode of On the Ground , host Laura Cole travels to the rugged coastline of South West England to walk the site of a groundbr...

When Stephen Clarke, a prominent local councillor and leading climate activist in Bristol, called the expansion of Bristol Airport the biggest carbon decision for a generation, he knew the environmental stakes were high. Then he found out who actually owned it. In this episode of On the Ground , host Laura Cole reveals a story of a massive national oversight. It’s the story of a local planning bat...

This is On The Ground , a new podcast series from Geographical , written and hosted by Laura Cole. In this series, Laura will be getting out from behind her desk and on the ground, reporting from across the UK’s landscape – and speaking to the people changing it. Coming up, we’ve got investigations into corporate wrongdoing, rural town halls holding the government to account, the human faces behin...

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, we’re in the Faroe Islands, where a unique new project is getting tourists to do the hard work of maintaining the islands’ natural sites.  

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, journalists Marcello Rossi and Davide Mancini report from Spain, where an endangered salt lagoon has been granted its own legal rights – similar to those of a person. 

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine  and website. This week, we join writer and photographer Anthony Ham in Australia's Great Sandy Desert to meet a once-extinct marsupial that's returned to the outback: the mala .  You can see Anthony's images of Australia's native wildlife in the link above. 

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, share Nick Danziger's work to document the devastating impact of sickle cell disease on local communities who often struggle to access essential medical care. You can see Nick's images in the link above.  On Friday 13 August, we are hosting a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) with...

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, we report on the campaign to save Mexico’s famous cenotes – natural sinkholes that form the second longest underwater cave system in the world, as well as the country’s largest and most important freshwater aquifer – from the construction of the Maya Train. Also in this episode, we hear...

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, we hear how – worldwide – nature conservation is working .   Also in this episode, we visit an unusual British sports stadium in the Cotswolds, home to a unique version of the Olympic games. This story is part of our Discovering Britain series, which explores Britain's landscapes t...

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, we investigate the impact of new visa regulations on the UK’s fishing industry. With support from Journalismfund Europe, investigative journalists Christine Ro, Laura Cole, Aliya Bashir and Imran Muzaffar report on a situation that some in the industry fear could threaten the future of...

In this episode of The Geographical Podcast, we read out articles from our print magazine or website. This week, we head into the mountains with Dawn Hollis, a historian at St Andrews University, whose research focuses on the history of mountains and mountain-climbing. For many hillwalkers and mountaineers, mountains are something to be conquered – but it hasn’t always been this way. As famous pea...

This week, we head into the Ecuadorian Amazon, where Indigenous leader and environmental activist Nemonte Nenquimo has spent the last decade fighting to protect her ancestral territory, the forest ecosystem and her way of life, from encroaching oil companies. We also hear from Andrew Brookes, a geographer at King’s College London and a regular contributor to Geographical on why the increasingly co...

In this bonus episode, we interview recent Whitley Award winner Aristide Kamla and hear all about his work, conserving Cameroon's marine wildlife

This week, a trip to the Ecuadorian Andes where Mark Stratton visits a project aiming to save the country's last wild condors. Plus, an ancient Egyptian mystery and writer Alec Ash's decision to ditch the rat race in China and move to the beautiful rural town of Dali. 

This week, we dive into the science of shipwrecks and find out what they can reveal about our changing oceans; board an icebreaker en route to Antarctica; and visit the rooibos plantations in South Africa's Cederberg Mountains, where Indigenous farmers are finally getting a fairer deal for their increasingly popular crop.   

This week, we travel to the high peaks of Ladakh in northern India to track one of the most elusive and charismatic animals in the world - the snow leopard. Plus, a bizarre proposal in Malaysia and the terrifying, underreported, impacts of climate change on brain health. 

In this episode, Andrew Brooks of King's College London explains why using historical comparisons when contemplating African hospitals is lazy and misleading; we hear some good news from the world of conservation; and Bryony Cottam charts the adventures of botanist Chris Thorogood and his hunt for rafflesia, the world's largest and smelliest flower. 

In this weekly edition of the Geographical podcast, we read out three articles from the magazine or website. In this episode, we hear how climate change is impacting the world's northernmost rivers ; we learn about traditional Indigenous fire practices ; and we meet the founder of a new group helping travellers connect with ordinary people in Iraq.

In this bonus episode of The Geographical Podcast: Editor's Picks,  associate editor Katie Burton speaks to Tommy Trenchard about his article on treating clubfoot.

In this weekly edition of the Geographical podcast we read out three articles from the magazine or website.

In this month's podcast, we visit some of the driest parts of the world, where ecosystems and the communities that depend on them face a growing threat: desertification. Human activity and our warming climate are driving changes in these regions, but some scientists are working on solutions to help restore degraded landscapes. 

This month we return to a country that no longer dominates headlines, but where the reality of war, and its impacts, are still very much felt.  Syrian infrastructure, and its economy, have been devastated by the conflict that began in 2011. Though ISIS has now been largely defeated, and the Assad regime has regained control of much of the country, the conflict still continues and life in Syria is...