US President Joe Biden launched a historic trip to the Amazon rainforest on Sunday to promote his record on fighting climate change, amid fears that Donald Trump will roll back his green policies.
Before handing over the White House keys to Trump in January, Biden landed in the Brazilian city of Manaus, in the middle of the world’s largest jungle, on the final leg of a farewell South American tour.
The 81-year-old, the first sitting US president to visit the Amazon, will fly over the rainforest by helicopter, visit a museum and meet indigenous and local leaders working to protect the Amazon.
From Manaus he will travel to Rio de Janeiro for the G20 summit starting on Monday.
Ahead of his Amazon trip, the White House announced that the US had met its goal of increasing bilateral climate financing to $11 billion per year.
It said the figure this year was six times more than the amount the US was providing at the start of Biden’s term in 2021 and made “the United States the largest bilateral provider of climate finance in the world”.
“The fight against climate change has been a defining factor of President Biden’s leadership and presidency,” the White House said.
Biden arrived in Brazil from Peru, where he participated in his final summit with Asia-Pacific leaders.
He has cut a low figure on his tour. All eyes in Lima were on Chinese President Xi Jinping, who was welcomed with great fanfare.
In the meeting with Biden, the Chinese leader said he expected a “smooth transition” in relations with the future Trump administration.
Trump has promised to reverse Biden’s policies and could again pull the United States, the world’s second-largest polluter, out of the landmark 2015 Paris agreement on tackling carbon emissions, as he did during his first term. Had done.
On Saturday, he nominated Chris Wright, a fracking magnate and well-known climate change skeptic, as his energy secretary.
fire in amazon
The Amazon, spanning nine countries, is vital in the fight against climate change because of its ability to absorb planet-warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
But it is one of the most vulnerable areas to climate change and environmental degradation.
This year it experienced its worst wildfires in nearly two decades, caused by a severe drought that climate experts partly blame on global warming.
A recent study showed that the Amazon rainforest has lost an area equal to the size of Germany and France combined to deforestation in four decades.
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has promised to end illegal Amazon deforestation by 2030.
Experts have warned that Trump becoming a second president could derail progress in the green energy transition under Biden, giving heavy polluters such as China and India an excuse to scale back their own efforts.
During his campaign, Trump promised to “drill, baby, drill” and increase fossil fuel extraction. He even ignored climate change a few days before the vote.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
