Editing Amazon basin (section)

== Human lifestyle ==
[[File:Amazonas floating village, Iquitos, Photo by Sascha Grabow.jpg|thumb|upright=1.15|A floating village in [[Iquitos]], [[Peru]]]]

Amazonia is [[Population density|scarcely populated]]. There are scattered settlements inland, but most of the population lives in a few larger cities on the banks of the Amazon and other major rivers, such as in [[Iquitos]] – [[Department of Loreto|Loreto]] in [[Peru]], [[Manaus]]-[[Amazonas (Brazilian state)|Amazonas State]], and [[Belém]], [[Pará]]. In many regions, the forest has been cleared for [[soya bean]] [[plantation]]s and [[ranching]] (the most extensive non-forest use of the land); some of the inhabitants harvest wild [[rubber]] [[latex]], and [[Brazil nut|Brazilian nut]]s. This is a form of extractive farms, where the trees are not cut down. These are relatively sustainable operations in contrast to lumbering or agriculture dependent on clearing the rainforest. The people live in thatched houses shaped liked beehives. They also build apartment-like houses called "[[Maloca]]", with a steeply slanting roof.