The Australian Minderoo Foundation has announced a capital investment of A$15.4 million ($10 million) in the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) as well as A$3.8 million ($2.5 million) in support of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative (FFNPTI).

Commitments were announced to coincide with the United Nations-led COP 30 climate change conference in Belém, Brazil. Launched under the leadership of Brazil’s president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the TFFF aims to create economic incentives to protect tropical forests, raising $125 billion from public and private sources to deliver $4 billion in annual results-based payments to countries with tropical forest for verified forest protection, with at least 20 percent to flow directly to Indigenous peoples and local communities. In addition, the foundation made a further commitment to the FFNPTI, which aims to provide governments a framework to align national plans with global climate goals, help implement the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, and unlock international support for a just and equitable global transition.

“The TFFF protects the world’s great carbon sinks—nature’s own defense against climate breakdown—ensuring they continue to sustain life on Earth,” said Andrew Forrest. “Offsets have too often been used as a license to pollute. They categorically do not work the vast majority of times they have been independently measured. This is the opposite. The TFFF makes forest protection a strong economic choice in favor of our environment—rewarding countries that actually keep their forests intact.”

(Photo credit: Getty Images/Brasil2)