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STORY: The captain of the boat that tugs the barge, Junior Cesar, said they had come to pick up supplies in Manaus, some 280 kms up the Rio Negro river, a tributary of the Amazon that has seen its water levels drop to record lows, and then to bring them to Borba.

The Amazon region is under pressure from the El Niño weather phenomenon, with the volume of rainfall in the northern Amazon below the historical average and river levels falling near record levels.

The heat wave and drought, linked to the mass deaths of fish and river dolphins, has limited the access to supplies by local communities that depend on rivers transport in the rainforest.