5 to 8 million people live in the basin of the Amazon with three significant social groups among them: native Indians, Riberinhos alias Caboclos and new colonists, settlers of the modern age.

Riberinhos are natives who have set up their home for self-sufficiency. They live their lives in the jungle as an integral part of the nature, and most of them never leave their narrow territory. Riberinhos live from the river, they regard it as a part of the jungle and they exploit its every little thing they can. Their wooden houses are built onto piles or near the waterfront. They maintain their livelihoods by working on gum farms, for Brazilian nut processers or trading with game and fish. The Amazon is not only their food source, but also the chief way of transport.

There are Riberinho settlements where tourists are welcome, food, drink, souvenirs are sold, and tourist groups are guided through the jungle or on the Amazon by the natives. Riberinhos know the river, the surroundings, the water extremely well, that is why they are employed by tourist groups or expeditions of researchers, film makers travelling around the area.

Despite the fact that Riberinhos are considered to be an ethnic group which favours traditional social framework, they do use the achievements of our modern age like chain saws or guns. These when needed are acquired in the nearest town. A narrow layer of Riberinhos live on walking for days to get to the ‘civilization’ and selling animals (sloths, snakes, monkeys, caimans, birds) captured in the jungle. They are the ones who bring all those things back home to the others which cannot be produced within the society by their own.

However these utterly poor people insist on their style of living, their society formed within the jungle, by the river of the Amazon, while computer controlled megacities are mushrooming from the ground merely a few hundred kilometres away.