Collect, process, organize and disseminate comprehensive and internationally comparable official information among the Member Countries, providing information services agreed with the competent national public institutions through their foreign ministries, for the study and development of the Amazon region in the defined topics previously.

The Amazon Regional Observatory will contribute with the exchange of information on specific studies carried out by the Member Countries, at their request and approval, on the basis of existing research, including a periodic inventory of research initiatives, researchers and Amazonian institutions or that act in the Amazon.

At the end of 2019, the Permanent Secretariat of ACTO took the decision to effectively implement the ORA and thus began an intense work to fulfill this purpose, inaugurating this regional milestone on November 10, 2021.

At the end of 2019 and during 2020, each member country was consulted again to develop an updated concept so that the ARO can become a Reference Center whose information and data can be used mainly for decision making in public management and to support the development of public policies in the Amazonian countries. It will also serve the different stakeholders in the Amazon region, public institutions, government authorities, the scientific community, academia, NGOs and civil society in general.

The Amazon Regional Observatory is based on one of the mandates of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty (ACT), signed in 1978 by the eight ACTO Member Countries. Article VII refers to the need to promote cooperation in scientific research and the exchange of information in order to increase knowledge of the flora and fauna resources of the Amazonian territories, as well as to establish a regular system for the adequate exchange of information.

Thus, the political mandate to establish the Observatory was delegated to ACTO through a decision adopted during the XI Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs in 2011. Since then, different working groups formed with representatives of ACTO Member Countries have contributed with discussions on the concept and characteristics of the Amazon Regional Observatory.

• It will be supported by a computer platform, hosted on the ACTO website, with due safeguards, which will have human talent and institutional capacities that will be coordinated with the corresponding national node of each Member Country.
• It will only manage information from government institutions, provided through the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, specifically from the bodies in charge of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty, from Member Countries of the OTCA.
• It will give a special regional boost to the presentation and dissemination of information that already exists or will be produced within the framework of the programs and projects executed by the SP / OTCA, or in execution by the Research and Development (R&D) units and institutions. social linked to the development and preservation of the Amazon; once they have the respective authorizations of each Member Country in these projects and of the official internal instances in each country responsible or focal point of each of these projects or initiatives within OTCA.
• It will disseminate the information formally received from the respective Foreign Ministries of the Member Countries, in a transparent manner and with permanent availability.
• The information received will be stored in a data bank with internal control and the respective safeguards, it may be withdrawn at the time required by the Member Country that sent it.
• It will take into consideration the existing asymmetries among the Member Countries in terms of technology, human talent and methodologies.
• It will seek to maintain a balance in the dissemination of information, incorporating, as far as possible, all OTCA work areas that have been approved by the Member Countries.
• It will base its annual work plan on the consensus of the representatives of the Member Countries, in the competent authorities.

• Facilitate and promote access to the information generated and sent by the Member Countries, through a virtual space for storing, exchanging and socializing the information of the Amazon region generated by the Member Countries.
• Prepare and disseminate regional documents on the thematic content prioritized by the Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs.
• Promote the exchange of information on the compendia, research and the training of human talent that resides in the Amazonian states.
• Establish a mechanism for the flow of information to and from the Observatory through the Foreign Ministries that allows a process of dissemination, visibility and standardization of the information that will be made available at the regional level, initially from the activities, programs and projects of the ACTO.
• Identify and disseminate common needs for information on institutional availabilities, logistical capacities for information management, to promote communication and training of human talents of the Member Countries in the prioritized areas.
• Carry out other activities related to their own functions as agreed by the Member Countries.

• Coordinate, plan, guide and https://oraotca.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/nota5-1.jpgister the activities identified by the Member Countries, as well as the information sent for inclusion in the Observatory’s database.
• Provide information for research and activities in scientific, technological and innovation matters that are carried out in the region, after consultation and approval of the Member Countries and in accordance with the principles of their sovereignty.
• Build, manage and progressively update a database on Amazonian information prioritized by the Member Countries, complementary to the integrated information system of the ACTO website.
• Consider the dissemination of publications of systematized Amazonian information on a regular basis, which are requested, agreed upon, and approved by the Member Countries, through their Foreign Ministries.
• Identify and suggest possible areas of training and research necessary to strengthen knowledge of the region, with the participation of an interdisciplinary academic group and indigenous and local communities, taking into account the protection of traditional and ancestral knowledge, and specifically, safeguarding the legal frameworks for the protection of intellectual property in each Member Country.
• Disseminate information on the national training, training and research offers – including the Academic Offer Guide prepared by the SP / ACTO – that promote the exchange and mobility of teachers, researchers and students, systematizing the information on the training activities of the programs, projects and activities carried out by ACTO.
• Promote that the quality, uniformity and compatibility of the sources and processed data facilitate the dissemination of official information with a regional perspective.
• Establish complementarity, as far as possible, with other initiatives or regional cooperation mechanisms on consensually defined topics, in which the Member Countries participate or establish; in accordance with the procedures established by the decision-making bodies of ACTO.

The management of the Amazon Regional Observatory will be carried out through a Steering Committee that will be responsible for the implementation of the decisions established by the institutional framework of ACTO (Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs). To coordinate and facilitate its work, it will have the support of the Permanent Secretariat of ACTO. The provision of information that the Observatory will deliver to the Permanent Secretariat of ACTO implies carrying out a preliminary work for the organization of data, indices and indicators, which must be endorsed by the Foreign Ministries of each Member Country, for the purposes that are useful. in the analyzes or projections that are intended to be carried out.

Constituted by the government representatives of each Member Country to safeguard parity and equality in decision-making, duly appointed through the Foreign Ministries of the Member Countries; It may count, depending on the topics to be addressed, with the participation of delegates from other sector ministries duly designated by the Member Countries.

Decisions on the activities of the Observatory will be adopted by consensus of all Member Countries.

It will be responsible for preparing the proposals for priorities and work guidelines of the Amazon Regional Observatory, through the procedures agreed upon by the Member Countries.

It will hold a face-to-face meeting that will be chaired by the host Member Country, and may have virtual follow-up meetings. The same modality will be adopted in the case of the establishment of specific Working Groups for the activities of the Amazon Regional Observatory.

It is the responsibility of the Steering Committee to know and evaluate future proposals to improve the functioning mechanism of the Amazon Regional Observatory, at the request of one or more Member Countries or the SP / ACTO.

The Steering Committee, in coordination with the SP / ACTO, will establish the necessary mechanisms for cooperation, articulation and sustainability among the Member Countries, in order to guarantee continuity and results of the proposed objectives.

Said Steering Committee may, if it deems it pertinent, establish specific Working Groups for the activities of the Amazon Regional Observatory and may maintain complementary activities with other initiatives on Amazonian information developed by the Member Countries.

It will have a small and flexible structure for the work system, whose main objectives will be:

1. information collection, treatment and management;
2. the realization of diagnoses, analysis among others, and the basics for its general operation. Likewise, it will coordinate and support the activities of the actors linked to the socio-institutional network, said activities are framed in the paragraphs of the Steering Committee and
3. make recommendations to the Steering Committee, they will not make decisions that compromise the Member Countries.

The financing for the participation of the delegates in the Steering Committee or in the specific Working Groups for the activities of the Amazon Regional Observatory, will come from the budgets of the national institutions of the Member Countries.

The financing of the structure and human talent of the Amazon Regional Observatory (operational operation, exercise of its powers and maintenance and support of the technological platform), will come from national institutional budgets of the Member Countries, these resources being understood as those necessary to maintain the operational operation of the same in each Member Country

The initial management of the Amazon Regional Observatory must be made up, both in its Steering Committee and in the Working Groups, by technicians from the Member Countries and / or public servants of the Ministries or official institutions in the field of Science, Technology and Innovation

The Amazon Regional Observatory shall adopt the necessary measures to complement its activities with future initiatives of regional cooperation through the Foreign Ministries, which are agreed between the Member Countries of ACTO. To do this, through consensus, you can adapt your management structure

Within a period of no more than 60 days from the approval of this initiative, the first meeting of the Steering Committee of the Amazon Regional Observatory will be held, in which the procedures for its operation and annual work plan and other constituent documents will be drawn up, which will be submitted to the ACTO decision-making bodies for consideration. The SP / ACTO will take care of the necessary arrangements for the convocation and organization of this first meeting.