Connecting the Amazon and Chiquitano Dry Forests in Bolivia

In the Bolivian municipalities of San Ignacio de Velasco and Concepción, the Andes Amazon Fund has supported the creation of two protected areas—Bajo Paraguá and Bajo Paraguá-Concepción—which together safeguard more than 1.13 million hectares of Amazonian and Chiquitano forests and wetlands. These areas strengthen a biological corridor of more than 4 million hectares, crucial for halting deforestation in the Chiquitano ecosystem and protecting emblematic species such as the jaguar, tapir, and white-lipped peccary. The territory harbors an extraordinary diversity of trees and vertebrates and, in Bajo Paraguá, is home to Chiquitano and Guarasug’we indigenous communities, whose culture and livelihoods depend on the forest. The declaration of these areas was made possible through collaboration between municipal governments, Fundación Natura Bolivia, FCBC, and regional partners, consolidating a crucial effort for large-scale conservation in eastern Bolivia.