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A surge in unlawful mining has led to the destruction of 140,000 hectares of tropical forest in the Amazon region of Peru, intensifying as foreign, armed groups move into the region to capitalize on record gold prices, as per a recent study.

About five hundred forty square miles of territory have been cleared for mining in the South American country since the mid-1980s, and the environmental destruction is spreading rapidly throughout Peru, investigations revealed.

The gold rush is also poisoning its waterways. Illegal miners use floating excavation machines – machines that chew up and spit out river bottoms – leaving toxic mercury used to extract gold from sediment in their wake.

Detailed satellite photographs enabled researchers to detect dredges together with forest loss for the first time, showing that the ecological disaster once confined to the southern part of the country was spreading north.

“We used to only see it in the Madre de Dios region but now we’re seeing it everywhere,” commented an official from the monitoring project.

The price of gold surpassed four thousand dollars for the first time this period on international markets as worldwide concerns increased about financial fragility. Indigenous groups have sounded the alarm that as the price soars, armed groups were more frequently destroying their woodlands and poisoning their rivers in search for the valuable mineral.

Aerial images show that previously lush forest areas are being converted into lifeless moonscapes of grey earth pocked with stagnant pools of green water.

“This small section is just a tiny sample,” a researcher noted, pointing to a small section of the vast red patchwork of forest clearance documented in the study. “Consider this multiplied to 140,000 hectares.”

Mercury contamination accumulate in fish and are transferred to the people who consume them, causing neurological and developmental problems such as congenital disorders and developmental delays.

A recent study of riverside communities in Peru’s far north of Loreto found the median level of mercury was almost quadruple the World Health Organization’s recommended limit.

Research found that hundreds of waterways have been affected, with 989 dredges spotted in Loreto since recent years – including two hundred seventy-five this year alone on the Nanay waterway, a tributary of the Amazon River that is the lifeblood of ecosystems and dozens of Indigenous communities.

“They are poisoning our rivers – it’s the drinking water that we drink,” said a spokesperson of multiple local communities in the area.

Residents began blocking miners from moving along the River Tigre in the region recently, leading to armed clashes with militant groups. “We have no choice but to fight back but we are alone. The state is nowhere to be seen,” he stated frustrated.

Extraction activities remains concentrated in the southern area of Madre de Dios in southern Peru but new hotspots are developing farther north in Loreto, Amazonas, Huánuco, Pasco and Ucayali.

These areas are limited but once extraction begins it could expand quickly, an expert said, stating that the study was a insight into what was occurring across the rest of the Amazon.

“It marks the initial occasion we’ve been able to examine so closely at a nation but I think in Brazil, Bolivia and Colombia we are going to see exactly the same thing,” he added.

Findings showed additional mining equipment appearing on Peru’s jungle frontiers with Bolivia, Brazil and Colombia.

With gold prices surpassing $4,000 an ounce, international armed factions are more frequently entering across the border into unregulated forest areas where local authorities are taking minimal action to halt their activities, according to a criminologist.

Criminal networks, such as factions from Colombia and Brazil, are more involved in the region.

“International crime networks trafficking cocaine and laundering profits through illegal gold mining – amid record values yielding high profits – are alongside a government that has not been a serious obstacle against organised crime,” the analyst stated.

A political coalition of Latin American nations instructed Peru to get serious about unlawful extraction or it could face economic sanctions.

But a researcher said: “The returns from gold are immense right now. There are no indications of a decline in value, so it’s likely going to deteriorate before it improves.”