It could be the last and best chance to save the world’s tropical forests. As international aid budgets for conservation crash and carbon offset schemes for protecting forests are widely discredited, Brazil is about to unveil an ambitious plan that would triple current finance for saving forests worldwide by channeling profits from international trade in government bonds, effectively incentivizing tropical forest conservation.

The Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) is set to be announced by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva as a centerpiece of the U.N. climate conference in the Amazon city of Belém next month. It would create a $125 billion investment fund intended to provide up to $4 billion a year to potentially 74 tropical and subtropical nations as a reward for protecting their forests.

The viability of the proposed scheme is being questioned by some ecologists and economists. And rich-world governments and philanthropic organizations have so far been slow to follow Brazil in pledging the seed funding thought necessary to attract private investors. But late last month the World Bank agreed to become the facility’s trustee and interim host, raising hopes ahead of the TFFF’s launch, incentivizing tropical forest conservation.

The TFFF’s backers see the fund as a potential jewel in the crown of green capitalism, with bond markets coming to the rescue of the rainforests. Brazilian environment minister Marina Silva told a London Climate Week audience in June: “It will mobilize large-scale capital with sustained financial flows to conserve our biodiversity.” For Zac Goldsmith, British senior fellow at the Bezos Earth Fund, a potential funder, “the TFFF is the only game in town for forest finance… We will not have this opportunity again.”

The World Bank will now become the administrative headquarters of the facility, as well as eventually overseeing transference of its anticipated profits to tropical countries. “With this foundation in place, the TFFF is now ready for countries to follow Brazil’s lead by making their own pledges,” said Brazil’s finance minister Fernando Haddad.

Read the full article about incentivizing tropical forest conservation by Fred Pearce at Yale Environment 360.