On November 22 in Belém, at COP30, the Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Brazil, Ms. Marina Silva, and the Minister of Climate and Environment of Norway, Mr. Andreas Bjelland Eriksen, reaffirmed their strong and long-lasting bilateral climate, forests and biodiversity partnership, which started in 2008, and their shared commitment to combat climate change, protect biodiversity, and promote sustainable development.

The ministers recognized the urgent need to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.  The ministers further recognized Brazil’s significant historic and recent results in reducing deforestation and forest degradation in the Amazon and Cerrado biomes, its ambitious goal to achieve zero deforestation by 2030 and its comprehensive plans for all biomes.

The Minister Andreas Bjelland Eriksen congratulated the Brazilian government on proposing the Tropical Forests Forever Facility (TFFF) which has since been developed through close collaboration with partner countries and the World Bank. He recognized Brazil’s leadership in shaping this new approach to mobilize and channel large-scale finance toward forest conservation, and for being the first country to announce investment in the TFFF. Brazil welcomed Norway’s announcement of a significant loan to the Facility. They agreed to work together to mobilize additional investments in the TFFF in the coming year.

The ministers recognized that a menu of financing options is needed to ensure forest conservation, reduced deforestation and large-scale restoration. These options include results-based climate finance such as the Amazon Fund, high-integrity carbon markets for jurisdictional REDD+ and forest restoration, private sector capital mobilization for bioeconomy including large-scale forest restoration, innovative private and blended finance to support the transition to deforestation-free agriculture and supply chains, and repurposing environmentally harmful subsidies in the land use sector.

Minister Marina Silva emphasized the importance of the Amazon Fund in reducing deforestation and promoting sustainable development in the Amazon, and they welcomed the many new contributing countries that provided additional finance to the Amazon Fund over the last two years. Minister Bjelland Eriksen reaffirmed Norway’s long-term support for these objectives through the bilateral climate and forest partnership and contributions to the Amazon Fund.

In recognition of the success of the Amazon Fund and Brazil’s commitment to protect all biomes, they agreed to establish a dialogue about mechanisms to monitor, measure and financially contribute to results in other biomes, including the Cerrado and at the national level as soon as practicable and before 2030. They also agreed to exchange information and experiences on monitoring systems and data for all biomes including on the national forest inventory, forest degradation, uncertainties, integrated carbon accounting and data on carbon stocks.

The ministers further agreed to deepen their collaboration and dialogue on various strategies and initiatives to halt deforestation and forest degradation and to strengthen biodiversity conservation, including through support to national and transboundary efforts to combat forest crime, fostering large-scale restoration, sustainable agriculture and forestry, advancing sustainable commodity supply chains, pursuing strategies to reduce deforestation and implementing payments for ecosystem services, protecting the rights and livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities, promoting bioeconomy, fostering integrated fire management and strengthening protected area management.

The ministers agreed to continue and strengthen political and technical dialogue under the umbrella of the bilateral climate and forest partnership over the coming years and to work with other countries to reduce deforestation and increase forest finance globally.