Coast to coast.

With the stroke of a pen, Ecuador's President Rafael Correa and his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, signed an accord creating the Amazonian Multimodal Axle (EMA), which will connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans by land, water, air and rail. The project includes the construction of a multi-highway system beginning at the Ecuadoran port of Manta that will cross the Amazon jungle through Colombia, Peru and Brazil and connect to Manaus, a Brazilian city on the Amazon River. The US$1.50 billion project will be largely financed by Brazil's state-owned development bank BNDES, along with Asian investors.

The project will change a regional transportation scheme that is too dependent on what Correa calls the "congested and costly" Panama Canal. "With the EMA, Brazil will have easier trade connections toward the Pacific and Asia, and mutual trade will be stronger and more balanced with Ecuador, which is in a deficit now," says Sergio de Abreu, Brazil's Ambassador to Quito. In 2006, Ecuador had an $800 million trade deficit with Brazil.

For Ecuador, the EMA means the renovation of 650 kilometers of highways from Manta to Puerto Orellano through the Ecuadoran Amazon, a $450 million investment. Also, Chinese port operator Hutchison will invest $550 million in a deepwater port at Manta. Construction began in January. Another $400 million will convert the Napo River in Ecuador into a navigable system linking with the Huallaga, Maranon, Ucayali and Amazon Rivers in Peru, the Putumayo in Colombia and the Ica, Solimoes and Amazon in Brazil, covering 6,000 kilometers in total.

Construction should begin by the end of 2007 or early in 2008 and wrap up by 2010. Brazilian construction companies Odebrecht and Andrade Gutierrez have begun initial studies of the projects, Abreu says.