The UK government announced on Thursday (Sept. 3) that it intends to invest £400 million (about US$540 million, or R$2.7 billion) in the Tropical Forest Forever Facility, or TFFF, a fund created by Brazil and launched at COP30, the UN climate conference the country hosted in Belém, in the Amazonian state of Pará, in November 2025. According to news outlet g1, the contribution will come as a loan and still depends on the conclusion of the fund's governance and operating rules, plus a final review by the British government.
How the fund works
The TFFF is designed to pay countries that keep their tropical forests standing, the Amazon among them. Unlike donation-based schemes, it combines public and private money: the capital is invested, and the returns are shared between investors and forest countries, according to their conservation performance. Countries that receive the money do not have to pay it back, the British government said, as reported by g1.
With the British pledge, total commitments to the TFFF reach US$7.3 billion (R$37.6 billion), according to the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo. To keep Norway's contribution of US$3 billion (R$15.3 billion), the fund must reach US$10 billion (R$51.2 billion) by the end of the year, which means raising about US$2.7 billion in the next four months.
The UK as investor
The British amount sits below other European commitments: Germany has confirmed €1 billion (R$5.9 billion) and France has approved €500 million (R$2.9 billion), Folha reported. The UK's choice of a loan instead of a grant allows it to recover the money invested, according to a statement from its Department for Energy Security.
"With the UK investment in the TFFF, the loan will be repaid, while continuing to support action on climate and nature. This demonstrates the UK's new approach to climate finance, acting as an investor rather than a donor," the British government statement said.
As a condition for the contribution, the UK also wants a role in the fund's decision-making and supervision structures, g1 reported. For Mauricio Voivodic, executive director of WWF-Brasil, the pledge arrives at a "decisive moment" and could "encourage other countries to move forward as well". He noted that the fund places indigenous peoples and local communities at the center of the solution, which in the organization's view can turn conservation into a development agenda.