UNDERSTANDING AMAZONIA – A blog post series by AmazoniaForever360+
Blog #1
Amazonia has long captured our collective imagination, conjuring images of lush greenery, winding rivers, and unparalleled biodiversity. But what exactly do we mean when we say “Amazonia”? As it turns out, the answer is far more complex and nuanced than one might expect.
When we speak of Amazonia, we’re not referring to a single, monolithic entity. Instead, we’re dealing with a tapestry of overlapping definitions and conceptualizations, each serving a unique purpose:
- The Amazonia Biome: This is perhaps the most ecologically focused definition, encompassing the vast expanse of tropical rainforest and associated ecosystems linked to the Amazonia River basin.
- The Amazonia Basin: A hydrological definition that includes all the territory drained by the Amazonas River and its tributaries.
- The Brazilian Legal Amazonia: A governmental construct used for planning and development purposes, covering a significant portion of Brazil.
- Pan-Amazonia: The broadest conception, which includes not just the core rainforest but also adjacent areas and ecosystems that influence or are influenced by the Amazonia region.
Map 1: Multiple Regional Definitions for Amazonia
The map above shows several regional definitions for the term “Amazonia”. The Amazonia Biome, the green line encompasses most of the forest cover. Ecosystems, associated with the Amazonas River basin, delimited by the blue line. The Brazilian Legal Amazonia, within the yellow line, is a governmental instance of planning and promotion of development. The grey line represents Pan Amazonia. The work area of the Amazonia Forever program, in pink shading, is aligned with this concept. In light-green the forest coverage derived from ESA/WorldCover.
Amazonia Forever, the IDB-led program, adopts and adapts the Pan-Amazonia definition to delineate its work area. This choice reflects a holistic, interconnected view of Amazonia, acknowledging that the region’s influence extends beyond the traditional boundaries of the rainforest or river basin. By embracing this broader definition, the program can address challenges and opportunities that span across ecological and political borders.
The program’s work area, based on this adapted Pan-Amazonia concept, spans over 8.4 million square kilometers — slightly larger than the contiguous United States — and encompasses parts of eight nations. This vast expanse is home to an estimated 60 million people as of 20251, living in diverse landscapes ranging from Andean valleys to bustling urban centers like Manaus.
The Complexity of Amazonia
The variety of landscapes, national and local realities, local cultures and languages, challenges and risks in the Amazonia is overwhelming. Actions to promote sustainable development face different political and administrative realities, as well as the distribution of population, the layout of cities, many forms of occupation, population centers and services, the territory dimensions, logistics challenges and seasonality.
This complexity underscores the need for a comprehensive approach to understanding and managing the region. It’s not enough to consider Amazonia as just a rainforest or a river basin; we must account for its diverse human elements, its urban and industrial centers, its cultural diversity, and its global connections.
Map 2: The boundary of the the Amazonia Forever working area, as s green line, on a political map of South America
The Amazonia Forever working area covers just over 8.4 million square kilometers and an estimated population of some 60 million inhabitants by 2025, spread over the territory of eight countries. The dots represent the federal administrative capitals, in blue the national capitals and in red the capitals of districts and municipalities. In the working area there are 64 departmental capitals and a total of 1,330 local government seats, municipalities.
The Critical Role of Territorial Knowledge and Geospatial Intelligence
The sheer scale and complexity of Amazonia presents unique challenges for development and conservation efforts. How do we balance the needs of growing urban populations with the imperative to protect one of the world’s most crucial ecosystems? How can we ensure that infrastructure projects don’t come at the cost of indigenous lands or biodiversity hotspots?
This is where the concept of territorial intelligence comes into play. To support informed decisions and design high-impact projects, we need a deep, nuanced understanding of the region’s geography, ecology, demographics, and socio-economic realities. This requires not just data, but the ability to analyze and visualize that data in meaningful ways across the entire region.
High resolution data and visualization tools have enabled the creation of this three-dimensional perspective of Cochabamba, Bolivia. The image below shows the city (red patch) situated in a valley surrounded by dramatic Andean terrain, where urban expansion and farmland (pink areas) compete for space alongside transportation networks. With the terrain elevation exaggerated 2.5 times, the visualization captures Bolivia’s remarkable geography: from the high-altitude region of La Paz and Lake Titicaca in the background left, through the steep mountainous terrain, to the Amazonia plains visible in the background right. This digital elevation model effectively illustrates how the challenging topography influences human settlement and connectivity in this region.
Image 1: Three-dimensional perspective of Cochabamba, Bolivia. Cartography, analysis, 3D modelling and visualization: AmazoniaForever360+. Data: ESA Copernicus DEM; ESA WorldCover; OSM road network; JRC Water Bodies.
AmazoniaForever360+ : Territorial Knowledge to drive development and impact.
Based on almost three years of collaboration with sectoral teams, executing agencies, partners and researchers, the Amazonia Forever program and the Amazonia Coordination Unit have established a specialized working group focused on Amazonia territorial intelligence. This group has two primary objectives:
- Provide tailored territorial intelligence support to the Amazonia Forever program, contributing to the contextual understanding for IDB’s investments and projects in the region, and amplify impact and monitoring.
- Develop a user-friendly platform aiming to simplify complex geospatial data for a broader audience focusing on non-GIS2 specialized users.
By facilitating access to comprehensive territorial information, AmazoniaForever360+ seeks to guide informed discussions accurate projects and positive impact in Amazonia . It represents a step towards fostering a deeper understanding of this complex region, supporting the vision of the Amazonia Forever program to harmonize the Amazonia’s natural wealth with sustainable development initiatives.
More map-driven stories to come
As we launch this AmazoniaForever360+ blog series, we invite you to join us on a journey of discovery through the Amazonia. Our goal is to illuminate the pivotal role that enhanced territorial intelligence plays in implementing the Amazonia Forever program.
This blog series is not just about maps and data—it’s about understanding the pulse of the Amazonia.
So, bookmark this page, follow our updates, and prepare to see Amazonia through a new lens.
Footnotes:
1Global Human Settlement Layer – Global population forecast for 2025
2Geographic Information System
The cartographic data presented here, along with other types of data, unless explicitly specified licenses or rights are mentioned, come from public access sources. These data are provided solely for general reference purposes and should not be used for precision applications or for decision-making in emergency situations. They do not represent the official stance of the Inter-American Development Bank on any matter depicted, nor do they imply support for any parties involved in disputes over territorial boundaries or jurisdiction. Although the data have undergone careful geographic processing, they may contain inadvertent errors or inaccuracies inherent to such processes. Please report any suggestions or detected errors to the webmaster.
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