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Amazonia Is The Way To Our Future

Let’s make it a Global Commitment.

World leaders will meet at COP26 to address the climate crisis. As a voice from the business sector involved in this discussion for the last 20 years, we hope an agreement will be reached to create a global carbon market.

We understand the urgency to curb emissions, which is why we have committed to become net zero by 2030. However, whilst this is necessary, it is not sufficient. Nature must be placed inside this equation.

Amazônia plays a vital role in all our futures. As the planet’s largest storehouse of carbon, its greatest source of biodiversity, and home to 30 million people whose traditional cultures, rights, and livelihood depend upon it, it must be protected.

But if the Amazon – and tropical forests like it – continue to be cut down at the present rate, the world will not reach net zero carbon emissions or fulfil the ambitions of the Paris Agreement.

Let’s be clear, economic development and forest conservation are not mutually exclusive. Biodiversity loss is now one of the greatest threats to both climate change and the global economy. In this context, it’s easy to see why the Amazon must move up the COP26 agenda.

The fate of the Amazon is not just a regional concern for Latin America, it is truly a global one. Now, COP26 presents a breakthrough moment, because the Amazon’s immense power both to heal, or to further harm, our global climate, has been scientifically proven.

And whilst the 2015 Paris Agreement validated the idea that nations with extensive forest reserves could become “carbon creditors” to the industrial world, and so be rewarded financially for protecting their standing forests, no mechanism was ever enacted.

Currently, less the 3% of global climate finance is spent on nature. We are calling for more access to the US$100 billion fund currently being created to support and regenerate tropical forests, and for a timeline to be set for carbon markets that will reward a country’s transition towards becoming nature positive.

But ultimately, to ensure a net zero, nature positive future, we believe that the world needs an Agreement on Nature that is similar in scope and significance to the Paris Agreement.

To achieve this, we are calling on the framers of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework to embed Paris-style goals, targets and compensation mechanisms, to encourage all companies to adopt regenerative business models that also protect both biodiversity and the traditional and indigenous communities who keep the forests standing.

For the past 20 years, our Natura business has worked to protect the Amazon, and as a Group we will continue that commitment. Since 2010, we’ve invested US$400 million in the region, and established relationships with 34 communities and more than 7,300 families. We protect an area of over 2MM hectares and aim to expand to 3MM hectares by 2030. But this is still a mere fraction of what is necessary, which is why we are engaging with partners to foster collective efforts towards zero deforestation in the region by 2025.

We remain optimistic that the future of the Amazon will be positive because solutions exist. But to get there we know that no one can do this alone. At Natura &Co, we believe we can play a role through our network and our multi-dimensional business.

So please join us. Because Amazônia is the way to our future.

 

You can learn more about the rate of deforestation and the incredible work of communities who are working to protect the Amazon at www.plenamata.eco. If you are in the UK and want to see outstanding images of the forest, please visit the “Amazônia” exhibition at the Science Museum in London. To find out more about COP26 and what Natura &Co is doing to help secure a net zero, nature positive future for people and the planet visit www.natureco.com/news

 

Natura &Co is calling for:

  • Countries be more ambitious in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). The world is not on track to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5°C by 2050. We must do more and move faster.
  • Socially inclusive carbon markets created to strengthen the protection of biodiversity and traditional and indigenous communities in line with Article 6
  • Tangible support for a bioeconomy with nature-based solutions that will promote low carbon agriculture, forest conservation, reforestation, and regeneration.
  • Zero deforestation in the Amazon: By moving away from deforestation, Brazil has the opportunity to become a world leader in forest bioeconomy, with proper use of land, investments in science and biotechnology, and access to the knowledge of traditional peoples.
  • Climate justice and human rights at the forefront of COP26. The most vulnerable populations have contributed the least to the climate crisis, yet they are the ones to pay the highest price