Yungas

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Yunga Road in Bolivia

The Yungas is an area in the eastern piedmont of the Andes Mountains, primarily in Bolivia. Like the surrounding areas, it has characteristics of the Neotropic ecozone. It is rainy, humid, and warm. The Afro-Bolivian community is concentrated here. Coffee, citrus, and coca are important crops, and the Yungas Cocalera Revolution is based in the region. Its name derives from the one applied for the same mountain level by those who study the economic system of the prehispanic Andes.

[edit] Ecoregions

The World Wide Fund for Nature has delineated three yungas ecoregions along the eastern side of the Andes. The northernmost is called the Peruvian Yungas, located entirely within Peru and stretching nearly the whole length of the country. The Bolivian Yungas lies to the south, mostly in Bolivia but including part of southern Peru. The Inambari River marks the boundary between the Peruvian Yungas and Bolivian Yungas since the the yungas north and south of the river have distinct ecological differences. The Southern Andean Yungas begins in southern Bolivia and continues south into Argentina. The Southern Andean Yungas is a humid forest region between the drier Gran Chaco region to the east and the dry, high altitude Puna region to the west.

All three yungas ecoregions are transitional zones between the Andean highlands and the eastern forests. The yungas forests are extremely diverse, ranging from moist lowland forest to evergreen montane forest and cloud forests. The terrain is extremely rugged and varied, contributing to the ecological diversity and richness. A complex mosaic of habitats occur with changing latitude as well as elevation. There are high levels of biodiversity and species endemism throughout the yungas regions. Many of the forests are evergreen, and the South Andean Yungas contains what may be the last evergreen forests resulting from Quaternary glaciations.