The Brazilian Amazon region covers approximately 60 per cent of Brazilian national territory. It has an area of 5,217,423 square kilometres (about seven times the size of France) and comprises the states of Acre, Rondônia, Amazonas, Pará, Roraima, Amapa, Mato Grosso and the larger part of the states of Tocantins and Maranhao. The Amazon region is home to nearly 10 per cent of Brazil’s population (16 million), of whom approximately six million live in the rural regions and forests.
The tropical forests of the Amazon vary in type. The Igapo forests lie on the banks of rivers and are often under water. The Varzea forests also lie on a vast flood plain. The area contains the dense high tree rainforest area often seen on picture postcards. This part of the forest, known as the hylea, covers some 35 per cent of the Amazon area. The rest is much sparser and extends into the Campina forest and brush forests of the Cerrado. Each area has different ecological characteristics. The ecology of Amazonia has changed constantly as a result of natural disturbances and human intervention. It is estimated to contain more than 2,000 species of fish, 60,000 species of plants and over two million species of insect and microscopic forms of life.
The Amazon, the major river of South America, is the world’s second longest river (6,440 kilometres /4,000 miles) and most of its basin lies within Brazil. No other river approaches its discharge, or volume of flow: more than 198,100 cu miles (7,000,000 cubic feet) of water pass through its mouth into the Atlantic ocean each second. The river’s channel reaches depths of 91 metres (300 feet) in places, permitting ocean-going ships to navigate almost 1,600 kilometres (1,000 miles) upstream. By volume, this area has the largest concentration of fresh water in the world–one fifth of the earth’s fresh water reserves.
The Amazon basin has, since its discovery, offered Europeans a tantalising vision of wealth and natural bounty. Until the mid 19th century the region languished as an economic backwater. The Amazon boomed with the rising demand for rubber in the late 19th century. This boom ended around 1910, when the rubber market collapsed. There was renewed interest in the Amazon’s mineral wealth and agricultural potential in the 1960s and 1970s and major developments have taken place since.
There are two main Amazonian cities: Manaus, capital of the state of Amazonas and Belém, capital of the state of Pará. Many visitors to the Amazon are surprised when flying into Manaus in the middle of the Amazon forests to be greeted by the skyscrapers of a modern city. Manaus has industries producing electronic goods, clothing and plastics. These cities and growing industrial and mining towns like Porto Velho and Boa Vista, contain the majority of the Amazon’s population. This includes a growing number of mineworkers, known as garimpeiros. The caboclos who live directly on the banks of the river and have traditionally engaged in a subsistence form of shifting agriculture, have more recently been finding work in the growing paper and timber industries situated along the river.
Rubber plantations have long been in decline but there are large pepper plantations started by the Japanese in the 1930s when they came to settle in Tome-Acu in the state of Pará. Two thirds of this crop is exported to Europe and the United States. Jute is also produced on a commercial basis. The most significant area for the plantation of these cash crops and one of the most densely populated in the region stretches about 200 kilometres east of Belém and is known as the Bragantina. This was once flood plain forest which was cleared for the growth of cocoa, sugarcane and tobacco. The decline in production of these crops has led to arguments about the extent to which the tropical rainforest can be developed for extensive farming.
Another area of agricultural development has been the massive cattle ranges established mainly on the southern borders of the Amazon forests. Indian bulls and European crossbreeds have been successful in adapting to the tropics, although there is considerable controversy over clearing the forest for cattle rearing.
Gathering agriculture, mainly for rubber and Brazil nuts, is also a sector of the Amazonian economy. Although Amazonian rubber is today insignificant in the world economy (total production is approximately 25,000 tons annually compared to Malaysia’s 1.7 million tons), a small but significant section of agricultural workers still engage in gathering rubber from rubber trees (Hevea brasiliensis) in the states of Amazonas, Rondônia and Acre. These workers are known as seringueiros. There have been conflicts between rubber tappers and other Amazon industries such as ranching and logging. Since 1990 the rubber tapper industry has been granted special protection. Extractive reservations have been established for the exploitation and conservation of renewable natural resources. The most extensive reserve, with 970,570 hectares, is the Chico Mendes Extractive Reservation in the state of Acre.
Many of the rural population live within the vicinity of the great roads that traverse the Amazon. During the 1960s and 1970s Brazilian governments made great efforts to build an infrastructure and encourage settlement in the Amazon region. One of the first roads built stretches from the capital Brasília to Belém at the mouth of the Amazon river, some 2,100 kilometres long. Dwarfing this highway and probably the most famous and controversial road is the TransAmazon Highway. This runs from Estreito on the Belém-Brasília road north through Marabá and Altamira, westwards to Rio Branco and on to Cruzeiro do Sul in the far western state of Acre. Today there are more grand plans to improve the infrastructure through roads, waterways and railways.
The building of infrastructure is needed to keep pace with the opening up of industrial mining in the Amazon and to create transports routes for Brazil’s industrial and agricultural exports. One of the biggest mining projects is in the eastern Amazon based on the iron ore deposits in the Serra dos Carajás near Marabá on the River Tocantins. With an estimated 18 billion tons of ore this is the biggest deposit in the world. Other minerals such as gold, copper, nickel, manganese and bauxite have also been found in significant quantities in the Amazon region and more reserves of minerals are discovered each year. Much is exported in its raw form but there has been some attempt at refining it in the Amazon. The largest industrial plants utilising these reserves are an aluminium smelter in Belém and a steel mill in Sao Luis. Mining developments have led to increased energy demands, spurring the construction of dams for the generation of hydroelectric power. There is much controversy over dam construction due to the flooding of forests and of Indian land involved.
The Indians are the smallest section of the Amazonian population, although they control large areas of territory through the establishment of reservations. The National Foundation for Indians (FUNAI) considers Indian lands to be the physical space permanently occupied by tribal groups. Although having the use of everything it contains, Indians do not have the ownership of the land. The number of Indian reserves in the country is 651, with an occupied area of 94,645,221 hectares.
The largest one is the Yanomami Indian reserve (Amazonas and Roraima), with 9,664,975 hectares and a population of 6,706 Indians. One of the richest Indian tribes is the Kayapo who control vast mineral and timber reserves. In contrast to the popular Western view, most of the Indian populations have integrated with the wider population of the Amazon region. They are engaged, for example, in forms of gathering agriculture and fishing and live in villages. In the town of Tabatinga in the western Amazon there is a Tikuna village just past the airport and its inhabitants go to the city to work and to do their shopping. There are still a few tribes who are far more isolated but today they number only a few thousand. The preservation of Indian ways of life is another topical and controversial issue which is presented elsewhere in this pack. These basic facts suggest the Amazon is not just an empty forest. Its past and future is tied up with the development of Brazil in the modern world.