The Amazon: a river tourism frontier

The statistics of the Amazon region are impressive. The volume of water carried by the river is more than that of the next eight largest rivers combined while the Amazonian rainforest is the largest in area in the world and contains\ud an extraordinary diversity of flora and fauna. The Amazon basin, which is approximately 6.9 million square kilometres in size, contains approximately 13% of the world's biota and sustains about 40% of the earth's remaining tropical\ud rainforest (Brandon et al., 2005). Although Scientific interest in Amazonia started soon after it was explored by Francisco de Orellana, who travelled along the river from the Andes to the mouth of the river between 1541 and 1542,\ud the region receives relatively few tourists even from Brazil or other Latin American countries