On the banks of the Yukon River, after arriving by canoe only a few miles from the Canadian border, I shared some salmon with Karma Ulvi, the chief of the Native Village of Eagle in Alaska. But the fish we ate wasn't caught locally: A plane had delivered the salmon from Bristol Bay, in the southwest corner of the state, over 1,000 miles away. For the Native tribes that have lived along the Yukon for millennia, importing is the only option.
Buenaventura is the most important port on Colombia's Pacific coast, handling about 40% of the country's foreign trade and acting as the gateway to the Uramba Bahia Malaga national natural park. Every year, tens of thousands of tourists arrive there, heading to the village of Juanchaco or the beaches of Ladrilleros and La Barra. But the coast around Juanchaco, in the Valle del Cauca department, is experiencing accelerated erosion that has already left damaged streets, collapsed homes and a local economy exposed to the elements.