Green Bonds and Amazon Forest Financial Products

good afternoon

it’s a pleasure to be with all of you

today

of course i should probably also start

with welcome to 2020.

what an extraordinary time that we are

living in and one that we could never

have predicted as the start of our year

that we would be faced with a global

pandemic

of course the warnings have been there

we have been told that this is

uh a highly likely scenario to play out

in our lifetime but of course we heard

the warnings

and got on with our life but we are now

faced with

a global pandemic crisis which has

put us on the back foot and made us

quickly realize

that we as humanity are not prepared for

such crises

of course if we’re not prepared for a

global pandemic

then how can we possibly be prepared

for future crises one that has been

looming

in the backdrop to this pandemic

climate change climate change and the

warnings around it

have been with us for decades

but we continue to look past it

and get on with our daily lives get on

with our business as usual

and work as we do

but this is one that we will have to pay

attention to

one that will make future pandemics more

likely

extreme weather events more common and

in fact

what we are experiencing now and in the

future will be the norm

and we as humanity in order for us to

survive

what is going to be the century of

volatility

we need to learn quickly how to adapt to

what is already

the extreme events that we are

experiencing

and how we move into the future more

sustainably

now backdrop to all of that is

something very exciting that despite the

challenges that we are faced with

and are currently experiencing now and

of course

the feeling of hopelessness that we all

may be having right now

we should also look at the

positivity behind all of this the

opportunity

that we have before us sustainable

finance

has been an emerging theme in the

backdrop

to these challenges in the last decade

we’ve seen

a huge rise in the demand from the

investment community

on providing investments that are going

to

work towards the solutions we need to

address climate change and other

environmental

and social challenges the poster child

to the sustainable finance agenda

has been the green bond green bonds

being a debt instrument

where all of the financing is used

for climate change and environmental

solutions

so things like renewable energy if we’re

talking about our energy systems

water infrastructure that takes into

account resilience to ensure

better quality and quantity of our

resources

in light of drought low carbon transport

and our land use systems are also areas

of focus

in fact every major sector of our global

economy

is the focus and being able to

transition those sectors

to ones that contributes to a greener

more sustainable economy

is what is currently developing

in the last 10 years we have seen the

rise of green bonds

from as little as 3 billion us dollars

to now a total of 800 billion

outstanding ever so more closer to the 1

trillion

mark of a global green bonds market

this is a huge opportunity before us

why because we have access to capital

that we’ve never had before huge amounts

of institutional capital hundreds of

trillions

potentially cheaper sources of capital

for us to finance

this urgent transition that we must make

a transition that will bring resilience

and a low-carbon future for humanity

and most importantly better integration

of our natural resource environment more

responsibility

and care and sustainable management of

our natural resources

and the environment as we go

this is the opportunity

if we look at brazil brazil

is a huge economy and it is one that is

most

well known for its agribusinesses

brazil has huge potential

in leading the world on sustainable

agriculture production

at scale in the last decades

brazil has been pushing the frontier

on technological innovation in its

agribusinesses

it has been trying to work towards

better regulation in the agri-business

environment

to ensure minimal impact on the

environment

most notably the amazon

of course there is a tremendous amount

of work that still needs to be done

but if we look at what brazil has before

is

it has the ability to produce more

with less a model that no other country

has been able to

work towards perfecting it is a

opportunity that is

allowing for us to let lessen the

pressure

on our need to continue to expand into

the amazon environment

degraded pasture lands being able to

integrate agroforestry systems

and being able to take those

opportunities and connect those

the international investment community

is where we need to focus our intentions

food security is going to be critical

in the decades ahead and is susceptible

and vulnerable

to climate risks and it is also

the rising demand for food

as the population moves towards 9

billion in 2050

we must think creatively we must be

smart

in the way in which we produce our food

with brazil being the largest producer

of agri

for the world in order for it to meet

that new economic opportunity

for rising food demand it must be able

to produce sustainably

and also at scale so how can we

package the technological innovation

on moving towards sustainable agri

practices

if we look at brazil’s potential in a

publication

earlier this year brazil’s investment

roadmap to sustainable agriculture

it was identified that over 160 billion

us dollars

exists of investment opportunities today

to help brazil transition in this

dimension

of course there is also the regulatory

environment and what

many do not realize is to the extent of

brazil’s regulation

in the agribusiness in the land use

space

more explicitly this of course

also needs to be where we can match

the investments in compliance to those

regulations

we need to utilize sustainable finance

as an incentive to transition the

agribusiness towards sustainable

practices

with the rising demand coming from the

investment community internationally

for having greener investments this

presents brazil’s

agribusiness with an opportunity

by packaging sustainable agri production

activities

into green bonds or other types of

labeled

debt products that match the appetite

of investors for green this presents a

new source of capital potentially

cheaper capital

for brazil’s agribusiness to transition

and scale up in sustainable agriculture

of course in the backdrop of all of this

is the amazon

and with all of the attention that we

have seen particularly in the last two

years given the

forest fires that brazil’s amazon has

been

experiencing better management

of those impacts is in its urgency

the amazon is one of the last remaining

lungs of the earth in its tact and we

must be

responsible and take care to ensure the

longevity

of its natural resource services not

only to brazil’s economy

but also to the world

by inducting sustainable agriculture

production at scale in brazil that

allows for harmonization

within the amazon and less pressure on

deforestation

utilizing existing land mass

with producing more with less

as the journey continues we must

with urgency look to implement

sustainable agriculture practices and

brazil

is the place to start

of course brazil is not the only country

in the world

that is faced with the need to preserve

its natural resource

environment if we look across southeast

asia

indonesia malaysia for example

all of those areas are also critically

under threat

and so as the world embraces

this new paradigm this new century of

volatility

we must be able to move the capital and

the investments in the right direction

to help us be able to adapt

and be able to mitigate these risks

going back to the opportunity for brazil

this is a call for action and action

from the investment community

the producers the governments

and also civil society to recognize

that there is an opportunity to be had

and that what we need to do is to be

able to start putting our minds

and putting those investments into the

market

together so that we can realize the

potential