The Upper Amazon of Ecuador includes around 131,000 km2, mainly covered by exuberant tropical humid forests with a high biological diversity and endemism, combining Amazonian species, Andean species and unique species of sub Andean mountain ranges of the Kutukú and the Cóndor. According to several scientists, only the High Amazon of the south of Ecuador (province of Zamora Chinchipe) can possibly have the richest flora of any area of similar size in the Neotrópics and almost with certainty is one of places on earth with the highest concentrations of vascular plants species yet scientifically unknown.
The region gives home to more than 540,000 people of indigenous and racially mixed cultures, who generate knowledge of ancestral-tied practices strongly related to the forest and its resources.
In the South Amazon, NCI has focused their efforts on the ecosystems linking the Podocarpus National Park and the Condor Mountain Range, working together with the indigenous Shuar towns in Yacuambi in their initiatives to obtain the legalization of their ancestral territories and the efficient management of their natural resources. NCI also assists the Ministry of the Environment of Ecuador in the demarcation process of the State Forest Patrimony in the basin of the Mayo River.
In addition, NCI has offices available in the Amazon city of Zamora, which promotes education on matters of urban environmental management.
