‘Almost utopian’: how protecting the environment is boosting the economy in Brazil

As Brazil hosts the United Nations climate summit COP30 in Belém, its government is taking steps to boost the economy without damaging the environment. The goal sounds almost utopian: by 2050, Brazil aims to double income per capita, slash emissions of every greenhouse gas to attain ‘net zero’, and distribute wealth more fairly to achieve a 20% reduction in the Gini index — a metric that reflects income inequality.

There has already been substantial progress. For example, deforestation has substantially decreased since the start of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s latest term in 2023, and is now at its lowest rate for 11 years (see go.nature.com/442bqtp). As a member of the team in charge of the Ecological Transformation Plan at Brazil’s Ministry of Finance, I hope that our early successes will encourage other nations to proceed in a similar direction.

Two initiatives, in particular, could fundamentally reshape global climate finance — the funding systems that support climate mitigation and adaptation efforts. The first is the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), a fund ran by participating nations, with support from the World Bank, to help low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to preserve their tropical forests. The fund aims to reach US$125 billion in the coming years. An initial investment of $25 billion should come from nations and philanthropic organizations. Brazil has pledged to invest the first $1 billion, and other countries, including Norway, Indonesia, France and Germany, have announced substantial contributions. Another $100 billion is expected to come from capital markets, through the issuing of bonds that pay interest at the market rate.

The fund is made up of investments rather than donations — the distinction matters. Experience shows that aid flows are volatile and are subject to political winds and fiscal constraints in donor countries. The TFFF breaks this cycle. Here’s how it works: sponsors invest in the fund and receive annual returns that are comparable with those from low-risk sovereign bonds, at, say, 4%. The fund deploys this capital in a diversified portfolio of fixed-income assets, mainly bonds from emerging markets, with an expected yield of 7–8% (historically, a representative portfolio of diversified emerging-market bonds has paid out at around that rate). This portfolio excludes investments that finance fossil fuels or activities linked to deforestation.

When mature, this mechanism could generate nearly $4 billion annually for forest conservation — rewarding ecosystem services and paying for anti-deforestation enforcement and capacity-building to foster the bioeconomy, such as biotechnology for pharmaceutical production.