US contribution to Amazon Fund to be defined within weeks

U.S. Ambassador to Brazil Elizabeth Frawley Bagley informed that the White House and the U.S. Congress will define in the coming weeks the amount of financial resources to be offered as a contribution to the Amazon Fund.

During a press conference on Wednesday(Feb. 15) in Brasília, the ambassador said that the U.S. is happy to be part of the fund.

Last week, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva met with U.S. President Joe Biden in Washington. After the meeting, the US government announced its intention to contribute to the fund.

Currently, the fund has a total of BRL 5.4 billion in resources. Out of this amount, BRL 1.8 billion have been contracted and there are 14 projects from the 2018 Call for Proposals eligible to be approved.

The Amazon Fund aims to finance projects for reducing deforestation and monitoring the biome. The funding mechanism had been deactivated in the last government and has been reactivated now after a determination by the Supreme Court.