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The Bolivian Amazon's Indigenous peoples consider the forest as their "casa grande," or main house, encompassing communities, rivers, wildlife, spiritual beings, and ancestral memories. Conservation of this forest is paramount, as it represents their very existence. However, a new analysis by Amazonía Traficada, a joint journalistic effort supported by the Pulitzer Center, Mongabay, Bolivian platform RAI Bolivia, and Asuntos Centrales, reveals a dire situation.

Over the period of 2003 to 2023, an alarming total of more than 186,500 hectares (460,900 acres) of forest was cleared across the 48 Indigenous territories within the Bolivian Amazon basin. Astonishingly, the Bolivian Authority for the Supervision and Social Control of Forests and Land (ABT) granted authorization for just 10% of this deforestation, amounting to 168,670 hectares (416,800 acres) cleared unlawfully.

For Rivelino Segundo, the leader of Isoso, the largest Indigenous territory in terms of illegal forest clearing with over 43,000 hectares (106,000 acres), the encroachment into ancestral lands is directly linked to land invasions and the burgeoning agricultural frontier. The invaders, driven by the desire to convert forest into farmland, particularly large-scale soy production, are the ones responsible for the destruction, Segundo told Mongabay.