Rio Branco

The land along the Acre River was home to the Aquiri, Canamari and Maneteri peoples when migrants from Brazil's drought-stricken north-east arrived during the rubber boom. On 28 December 1882 they founded a rubber estate, Seringal Volta da Empresa, on the right bank of the river; a gameleira, a giant strangler fig, still marks the spot, in what is now the Second District.

Acre was then claimed by Bolivia, and the settlement saw fighting between the Acrean revolutionaries led by José Plácido de Castro and Bolivian troops during the Acre War. The Treaty of Petrópolis of November 1903 ended the war and gave the territory to Brazil, in exchange for land, a payment of two million pounds and a promise to build the Madeira-Mamoré railway. By August 1904 Villa Rio Branco was the main town of the Acre valley and the richest in the region, its streets around the Gameleira full of trading houses, bars and casinos.

It became a municipality in 1913, capital of the federal territory of Acre in 1920, and state capital in 1962. The government moved across to the higher left bank, which flooded less, and commerce followed; the old quarter, home in the 1930s to a Syrian and Lebanese "Bairro Beirut", ran down. After the rubber economy faded, timber and beef became important to Acre, and the city now looks to its neighbours, heritage, ecotourism and fish farming for growth.

Rio Branco's identity is bound up with rubber and the forest. The Acre revolution is commemorated in the Palácio Rio Branco, the Memorial dos Autonomistas and Plácido de Castro square, and in Acre the rubber-tappers' leader Chico Mendes, who fought forest clearance, was murdered in Xapuri in 1988. The environmentalist and minister Marina Silva, born in a village outside the city, began her political career as a Rio Branco city councillor in 1988.

Acre is also the birthplace of Santo Daime, the religion founded in Acre in the 1930s on the teachings of Raimundo Irineu Serra, a migrant drawn to the region by the rubber boom, whose rituals use ayahuasca; his tomb in the Alto Santo neighbourhood has become a place of international pilgrimage. At the 2022 census evangelical Protestants were the largest religious group in the city, at about 47 per cent, ahead of Catholics at about 31 per cent.

Much of the population descends from north-eastern migrants, which shows in the June festivals, the music and the food. Football is followed through Rio Branco FC, Juventus and Atlético Acreano, the state's three main clubs, all based in the city, and evening life centres on the riverfront and the parks.

The 2022 census counted about 365,000 people in Rio Branco, almost half of Acre's population; IBGE estimated about 389,000 for 2025. The city is spread along both banks of the Acre River, with the government, shops and offices in the First District, the old quarter in the Second District, and large residential neighbourhoods beyond.

Public administration and services are central to the city's economy, and the Federal University of Acre is here. Rubber and Brazil nuts built the economy; today timber is Acre's main export, and the state produces açaí, farinha, copaiba oil and beef, while agribusiness, fish farming and ecotourism are growing. Poverty affects a large share of residents.

Deforestation is a pressing local issue: in November 2023 the federal government added Rio Branco to its list of priority Amazon municipalities for action against forest clearance. The river shapes the year, running high in the wet season and falling in the dry months. Cycling is common, helped by an unusually large network of cycle paths.

Acre's cooking mixes the Amazon with the north-east. The classic breakfast is baixaria: cuscuz, the steamed maize cake of the north-east, topped with minced beef and a fried egg. River fish such as tambaqui and pirarucu are grilled or stewed, and everything is eaten with farinha, the coarse manioc flour.

Tacacá, the hot sour soup of tucupi broth, tapioca gum, dried shrimp and jambu leaves that numb the lips, is sold in the late afternoon, and the June festivals bring maize dishes such as pamonha. Brazil nuts are gathered in the forest reserves, and açaí, produced in quantity in Acre, is eaten as a thick purée.

Eating out is informal. The refurbished Mercado Velho by the footbridge is a place to eat and drink, the kiosks of the Parque da Maternidade fill in the evening, and simple restaurants serve set lunches of rice, beans and meat at midday. Fruit juices of cupuaçu and açaí are drunk throughout the day.