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The Amazon Conservation Team (ACT) has launched a first-of-its-kind interactive StoryMap, A Fight for Survival, that shows the territorial areas of Isolated Indigenous Peoples in South America—communities who do not maintain regular contact, or have never had contact, with non-Indigenous peoples as an intentional act of self-determination and resistance to colonization.
Created in collaboration with the International Working Group on Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact (GTI-PIACI), the StoryMap combines maps, images, and text to show where isolated peoples live, the growing threats they face, and strategies for their protection. According to GTI-PIACI, more than 188 groups of Isolated Indigenous Peoples inhabit the Amazon and Gran Chaco ecosystems, yet only 60 are officially recognized by their respective states. The StoryMap helps to raise awareness around the cultural diversity of these isolated groups and reaffirms their continued existence across much of the continent.
“Maps also help to show how PIACI territories encompass some of the best-conserved ecosystems in the region and how development threats are encroaching on those areas, threatening the well-being of PIACI and ecosystem stability vital for maintaining global climate stability,” said Brian Hettler, Director of Mapping at the Amazon Conservation Team.
“ACT worked with Indigenous organizations and civil-society allies from GTI-PIACI to compile the first complete maps of isolated Indigenous peoples across South America,” Hettler said. “We also generalized the visualization of PIACI areas to maintain confidentiality and to avoid potentially revealing PIACI locations.”
To better understand the environmental importance of PIACI territories without putting communities at risk, the StoryMap draws on global and regional datasets derived from satellite imagery, including data layers available through ArcGIS’s Living Atlas of the World. The map is a finalist in the Environment category of the 2025 ArcGIS StoryMaps Competition. The public can also vote for their favorite map in the Community Choice Awards.
ACT and GTI-PIACI hope that after exploring the StoryMap, readers will realize that protecting isolated Indigenous peoples is a critical human rights issue that also has far-reaching environmental consequences.
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