Amazon and Nestlé join a public-private plan to save the planet’s jungles

LONDON, Apr 22 – The United States, Norway and Britain have joined forces with companies such as Amazon and Nestle to launch a project aimed at protecting the world’s tropical forests.

An emissions reduction coalition known as LEAF, a public-private project that aims to raise at least $ 1 billion in seed funding, was announced at the Leaders’ Summit on Climate convened by the United States.

Participating governments and companies will pay countries with tropical and subtropical forests for reducing emissions, a measure that is expected to help reduce and ultimately end deforestation.

At a time when the world wants to move quickly to a low-carbon economy to avoid catastrophic climate change, protecting forests is seen as a crucial step, but one that has largely failed so far.

The pace of deforestation increased in 2020, LEAF said, with data from Global Forest Watch showing a 12% rise from the previous year or more than 10 million hectares of primary tropical forest, roughly the size of Switzerland.

“The LEAF coalition is a groundbreaking example of the scale and type of collaboration needed to fight the climate crisis and achieve net zero emissions worldwide by 2050,” the US presidential special envoy for the United States said Thursday. weather, John Kerry.

“Pooling the resources of governments and the private sector is a necessary step to support the large-scale efforts that must be mobilized to halt deforestation and begin restoring tropical and subtropical forests.”

Other companies that have joined the project include Airbnb, Boston Consulting Group, GlaxoSmithKline, McKinsey, Salesforce, Bayer and Unilever, although more are expected to join over time.